Educational sector leaders co-create systems change

Errika Moore, senior program officer

Last month we honored the lives of Hank Aaron and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. As we reflect on their lives, we should reflect on their passion to support education and economic justice respectively. Hank and Billye Aaron worked to ensure that hundreds of students could have their own opportunity to “chase their dreams.” They gave their time, talent and treasure to universities throughout Atlanta to ensure educational advancement and economic mobility. 

Between 1965 and 1968, Dr. King shifted his focus toward economic justice. His collaborative efforts culminated into what became the “Poor Peoples Campaign,” a broad effort to assemble a multiracial coalition of impoverished Americans who would advocate for economic change. Even in 1965, the Poor People’s Campaign was seen by Dr. King as the next chapter in the struggle for genuine equality. In fact, Dr. King believed that African Americans and other minorities would never enter full citizenship until they had economic security.

“This is a highly significant event,” Dr. King told delegates at an early planning meeting, describing the campaign as “the beginning of a new co-operation, understanding, and a determination by poor people of all colors and backgrounds to assert and win their right to a decent life and respect for their culture and dignity” (Southern Christian Leadership Conference, 15 March 1968). Unfortunately, Dr. King didn’t live to see the event come to fruition. After his assassination in April 1968, the SCLC decided to go on with the campaign under the leadership of Ralph Abernathy. And on May 12, 1968, thousands of women, led by Coretta Scott King, formed the first wave of demonstrators for the campaign.

So how is the Community Foundation for Greater Atlanta working to align to the legacy of these two dynamic families?

In response to COVID-19, the Prosperous People team, which focuses on educational and vocational pathways for individuals, recognized that the inequities for marginalized communities pre-COVID were much more exacerbated as a result of the pandemic. So how could we help students and young workers chase or realize their dreams? How could we help them overcome inconceivable circumstances to achieve economic mobility? In analyzing our approach, we decided to focus on collective impact strategies that would enable systems change in marginalized communities of our PreK-12 and workforce development ecosystems. But not strategies designed by the Community Foundation – strategies designed by organizations with “lived experiences.” We curated two groups of innovative thought leaders (one each for PreK-12 and workforce development) who would foster systems change, champion collaboration and hopefully garner a seat at the table within their respective ecosystems. These collective impact teams have met several times over the last several months, while developing strong relationships with each other.

For PreK-12, the pre-COVID-19 time represents inequitable learning models, students in need of wrap-around services to support their educational advancement, disparate access to digital learning models and limited access to individualized education plans. If we could redesign a future educational ecosystem by mitigating the inhibitors in the previous educational system…could we dare to dream an impossible dream? The PreK-12 collective impact team strategized about “a different world”. A world that empowers individualized education plans and student-centered learning models for all students particularly since there’s a greater variance in student needs, retention and access points as a result of COVID-19. A world that enhances social emotional learning and support systems for an exponentially increased number of students that have been traumatized. And a world that actively embraces digital learning, ensures equitable digital access and proactively identifies how students, teachers AND parents can gain the support instruction they need to optimize a digital educational experience.

Prior to COVID-19, in workforce development, members in our community transitioning from incarceration, with disabilities, or living in underserved geographies experienced several challenges within the ecosystem. They were under-employed and unemployed jobseekers in an economy 1) still recovering from the 2008 recession, 2) with large disparities in wealth and income and 3) tremendously low rates for socioeconomic mobility.

During COVID, in the second quarter of 2020, Georgia had an overall unemployment rate of 9.9%, while Black unemployment was 11.8% and Hispanic unemployment was 12.4%. The workforce development sector in our region has long been underfunded. And much of the funding available is earmarked to train the unemployed, rather than up-skilling workers that are underemployed in low-paying jobs. Traditionally funding sources prioritize quantity over quality, meaning that workforce development programming has to be geared towards placing unemployed workers quickly in “low-skills” jobs rather than training them for higher-paying jobs or upward economic mobility. Therefore, the workforce collective impact team’s “different world” includes 1) advocacy that identifies the need for employers to support upskilling, continuing education and sustainable career growth, and 2) an awareness campaign that highlights these innovative intermediaries and partners.

Our hope is that this collective impact effort will revolutionize and mitigate the systemic inequities that existed pre-COVID, while priming us for an improved post-COVID-19 new normal. We applaud these organizations for bravely thinking outside of the norm, sharing best practices and innovation for the benefit of the entire ecosystem and making the commitment to tackle systemic challenges. In support of their efforts, our commitment is to fund and amplify the success of this innovative and collaborative ecosystem effort.