Race Equity Culture™ Fellowship

About

The Race Equity Culture™ Fellowship is a new 10-month peer cohort program for racial equity and DEI leaders in grantmaking organizations. The fellowship is designed and led by a partnership between GEO and Equity In The Center®.

Equity In The Center® (EiC) works to shift mindsets, practices and systems in the social sector to center race equity and build a Race Equity Culture™. The fellowship program will be based on EiC’s core research and publication, Awake to Woke to Work: Building a Race Equity Culture™, and their Race Equity Cycle™ framework. The framework outlines key organizational levers that are necessary for building, deepening and sustaining racial equity practice within organizations.

Applications for this new fellowship program are now closed

Fellowship participants will deepen their understanding and practice for how to build a Race Equity Culture™ in their organizations. All cohort experiences in 2022 will be virtual, with a possible in-person closing retreat in February 2023, depending on health and safety considerations at that time. Click here to access the recording of the informational webinar hosted on Feb 2.

Goals of the Cohort

The overall goals of the fellowship, are to provide participants with support and opportunities to:

• Deepen their understanding, analysis, and ideas for how to build a Race Equity Culture™ in their organizations.
• Connect with like-minded peers in an intimate space to work together to make and sustain organizational change.
• Build their competence and confidence to lead change, both within their organizations and in the sector.

Cohort Participants

Eligible participants for the Race Equity Culture™ Fellowship are organizational leaders and decision-makers who:

• Work at grantmaking organizations that are GEO members;
• Lead or participate in advancing DEI or racial equity initiatives within their organization
  • This might look like leading or sitting on a DEI or equity committee/working group; leading or managing strategic planning; designing or managing communications, development, or operations rooted in equity; centering DEI or racial equity approaches in their programmatic work with the community; among other actions or responsibilities
• Have decision-making authority in the organization; and
• Have a foundational understanding of race, racism and racial equity in US society

We will be looking for approximately 18 participants to join this pilot program. Additionally, each cohort participant will need to designate 3 people from their organization that they work closely with on racial equity work, to also participate in a supportive role with the cohort. These staff will create the cohort member’s “Org Team,” and will be required to attend two Org Team coaching calls throughout the course of the cohort (June/July and Nov/Dec 2022) and join the cohort member for a presentation of their racial equity actions for 2023 at the closing retreat (February 2023)

If you do not know your organizational team at the time of applying, the cohort facilitators will work with you to identify 2-3 team members closer to the first retreat in April

Our intention with this hybrid cohort/team model is to ensure cohort participants have full organizational support to design and implement race equity work, and to model that racial equity work has to be held and led by a team; it is collective work for an entire organization, not the sole responsibility of one Race Equity/DEI leader.

Cohort Experiences & Time Commitments

The Race Equity Culture™ Fellowship will include a variety of different types of experiences to support participant learning, skill development and relationship building. The best learning communities are ones where all members actively participate, making commitments to themselves and their fellow community members to be fully engaged throughout the entire 10-month experience.

Participants in this program must make the following commitments:

• Three full group virtual retreats (up to 12hrs each)
  • As virtual experiences, the retreats will consist of 3-half day sessions within the same month. Retreat months are: April 2022, September 2022, and February 2023. At this time, we are considering the option of an in-person retreat in Feb 2023.
• Two small group coaching sessions (60min each)
  • Cohort participants will be divided into trios to receive more focused support and coaching in between retreats.
• Two Org Team coaching sessions (60min each)
  • These sessions are with the cohort participant + the 3 staff they designated as their Org Team
• 5-10 hours per month to prepare for and follow-up from retreats and coaching sessions.

Additional experiences:

• Online community - place to communicate and engage throughout the 10 months
• Each cohort member will get a complimentary ticket to attend one of EiC’s other training offerings from their partner facilitators
• Coffee hours (not during months of retreats)
• Set time in off months to use as participants want; organized around participant interests
• 1:1s with facilitators - as needed/requested by individual participants

Fee for the Program

For members with an annual grantmaking budget greater than $25 million in grants, the price of participation for the 2022-2023 cohort is $7,000. For members with an annual grant making budget of less than $25 million in grants, the price of participation is $4,500. Please use your foundation’s grantmaking giving range (e.g. grants, discretionary, FOI, etc.) to determine your fee. This fee includes all of the experiences stated above, for both the cohort members and their designated Org Teams.

In order to remove prohibitive barriers to participation and assemble a diverse and inclusive cohort, GEO will be able to offer two scholarships (full or partial depending on need) for two applicants. If cost is a barrier, please let us know in your application as we have a limited number of scholarships available.