28 results found
Shifting Power Dynamics: Equity, diversity, and inclusion in the nonprofit sector
July 6, 2023The first study of its kind, Shifting Power Dynamics: Equity, diversity and inclusion in the nonprofit sector, explores what Canadian charities and nonprofits are doing to advance equity, diversity, and inclusion (EDI) within their organizations. The study provides key insights into our sector's commitment to EDI through an exploration of the following topics:how organizations are integrating EDI into their workthe role of equity working groups in advancing EDIthe factors that enable and hinder organizations as they seek to apply EDI principlesthe role of governance and operational leadership in advancing EDI In addition to research highlights, this post includes recommendations for organizations to improve their EDI practices. We firmly believe that all organizations, regardless of their mission, have a responsibility to advance equity and address systemic discrimination and racism. Funders have a unique role to play so we include specific recommendations for them.
Influence, Affluence & Opportunity: Donor-advised Funds in Canada
May 17, 2023Donor-advised funds in Canada have a seventy-year history, and their use as a tool for charitable giving has become more popular in the past decade. Alongside this growing popularity and attention, there is significant interest in understanding the scope and scale of donor-advised funds in Canada, as well as how they are becoming an integral part of the charitable giving landscape.KCI and the CAGP Foundation have partnered together on this research initiative to add to the growing body of knowledge about DAFs in Canada and help strengthen relationships and understanding between donors, DAF organizations, and operating charities to continue to strengthen communities across Canada.
Sustaining Art Research Collections: Case Studies in Collaboration
April 18, 2023Art research collections continue to be impacted by the lingering effects of economic uncertainty and the global COVID-19 pandemic, which resulted in reduced or stagnant budgets and staffing cuts. These impacts have coincided with a period of institutional reflection and examination of the fundamental role of cultural heritage institutions in society. The case studies presented here illustrate how partnerships can support sustainability and growth, and they also share case study participants' generous insights into the lessons learned from their experiences. The report provides recommendations like conducting an upfront analysis of the benefits that a partnership will provide to each participant, understanding the core mission values that a potential partnership would support, and ensuring that the effort required to create and sustain a partnership aligns with the partnership's benefits. This timely report offers key insights into successful and sustainable collaborations for practitioners who may be facing immediate staffing, technology, or space needs and provides a framework that can guide future collaborations that not only meet basic needs, but also advance experimentation and innovation.
Sustaining Art Research Collections: Using Data to Explore Collaboration
February 15, 2023The report in hand builds upon earlier studies by employing analysis of collective collection and resource sharing data to identify patterns in art library collections that may point the way toward valuable collaborative opportunities. This will provide a baseline from which art libraries can think about how they might work with other institutions to create sustainable long-term collection management and sharing partnerships that will benefit researchers and institutions alike. No doubt a lofty goal, but a challenge worth pursuing in order to strategically position art libraries for a future where resources may indeed be more limited, but where leadership, unity, and creativity may be the best possible antidote.
Ending Street Homelessness in Vanguard Cities Across the Globe: An International Comparative Study
April 5, 2022Street homelessness is one of the most extreme, and visible, manifestations of profound injustice on the planet, but often struggles to achieve priority attention at international level. The Institute of Global Homelessness (IGH's) A Place to Call Home initiative, launched in 2017, represented a concerted effort to support cities across the globe to eradicate street homelessness. A first cohort of 13 'Vanguard Cities' committed to a specific target on ending or reducing street homelessness by December 2020. Our independent evaluation of this initiative found that:Two Vanguard Cities – Glasgow and Sydney – fully met their self-defined target reductions for end 2020. In addition, Greater Manchester, while it did not meet its exceptionally ambitious goal of 'ending all rough sleeping', recorded an impressive 52% reduction against baseline.Overall, there was evidence of reductions in targeted aspects of street homelessness in over half of the Vanguard Cities. In most of the remaining cities data limitations, sometimes as a result of COVID, meant that it was not possible to determine trends. In only one Vanguard City – Edmonton – was there an evidenced increase in street homelessness over baseline levels.Key enablers of progress in reducing street homelessness included the presence of a lead coordinating agency, and coordinated entry to homelessness services, alongside investment in specialized and evidence-based interventions, such as assertive street outreach services, individual case management and Housing First.Key barriers to progress included heavy reliance on undignified and sometimes unsafe communal shelters, a preoccupation with meeting immediate physiological needs, and sometimes perceived spiritual needs, rather than structural and system change, and a lack of emphasis on prevention. Aggressive enforcement interventions by police and city authorities, and documentary and identification barriers, were also counter-productive to attempts to reduce street homelessness.A key contextual variable between the Vanguard Cities was political will, with success in driving down street homelessness associated with high-level political commitments. An absolute lack of funds was a major challenge in all of the Global South cities, but also in resource-poor settings in the Global North. Almost all Vanguard Cities cited pressures on the affordable housing stock as a key barrier to progress, but local lettings and other policies could make a real difference.The impact of the COVID-19 crisis differed markedly across the Vanguard Cities, with people at risk of street homelessness most effectively protected in the UK and Australian cities. Responses were less inclusive and ambitious in the North American and Global South cities, with more continued use of 'shared air' shelters, albeit that in some of these contexts the pandemic prompted better coordination of local efforts to address street homelessness.IGH involvement was viewed as instrumental in enhancing the local profile, momentum and level of ambition attached to reducing street homelessness in the Vanguard Cities. IGH's added value to future cohorts of cities could be maximised via a focus on more tailored forms of support specific to the needs of each city, and also to different types of stakeholders, particularly frontline workers.
Unintended Pregnancy and Abortion in Northern America
March 24, 2022Model-based estimates offer an opportunity to observe and assess unintended pregnancy and abortion over time and, because they enable comparability across borders and groups, to do so for individual countries, for regions and globally. Estimates for regions and subregions, as defined by the United Nations Statistics Division groupings, can offer advocates, policymakers, researchers and others valuable insight into sexual and reproductive health and autonomy. Regional estimates can help reveal disparities and areas where continued investment is needed to ensure that individuals can access the full spectrum of quality sexual and reproductive health care.The estimates below provide an overview of the incidence of unintended pregnancy and abortion in Northern America from 1990 through 2019; the values are based on average annual estimates for five-year time periods. View these estimates in country profiles on guttmacher.org.
Aproaches to Learning Amid Crises: Reflections from Philanthropy
March 29, 2021Early 2020 sparked an urgency for foundations to work equitably and adapt quickly, while also reflecting deeply on their roles in society and the alignment between their operations and values. The covid-19 pandemic and murder of George Floyd have brought to the forefront the long-held assumptions about how foundations should work and be held accountable. Many foundations have begun to explore significant changes to their practices. Along the way, they have also been forced to learn, reflect, and adapt in unprecedented ways. We wanted to know whether developing an organizational learning culture yields benefits in terms of better evaluation outcomes as well as stronger more adaptive decision-making.In interviews with seven foundations from Canada and the U.S. in the summer and fall of 2020, we spent time applying the lens of organizational learning to how each of these foundations made sense of their reality, asked different kinds of questions to inform their thinking, and acted in new or different ways as a result.In our report: Approaches to Learning Amid Crises: Reflections from Philanthropy, we lift up examples of how foundations have reacted and specifically what and how they are learning.
Imagine Canada’s Sector Monitor: Ongoing Effects of the COVID-19 Pandemic
February 1, 2021Nearly a year into the global COVID-19 pandemic, Canada's charitable sector has been at the forefront of providing supporting and vital services to people in need. In the early days of the pandemic, Imagine Canada sought to better understand how lockdowns, cancelled events, the need for immediate digital adaptations etc. were impacting the ability of organizations to fulfill their missions.This second Sector Monitor report, focused on the health and well-being of the country's charities, was commissioned to take the pulse of how organizations and leaders were faring. In particular, we sought to track the ripple effects of the global pandemic and its impact on the ability of organizations to continue to deliver services.With over 1,000 organizations reporting, we are confident that this snapshot accurately reflects the 'on the ground' reality that is being experienced. We have been able to better understand the changes in demand for services, the softening of revenue streams, the impact of federal government support measures and the impact to staff well-being.
Our Commitment to Anti-Racism: Beyond Diversity, Equity and Inclusion: An introduction to CFC's commitment to supporting and progressing anti-racism
January 1, 2021As an organization, CFC's purpose is "Relentlessly pursuing a future where everyone belongs." Without anti-racism, and confronting the inherent inequalities and discrimination in our society, it is not possible to create the true space of belonging that is needed and necessary for a just and equitable future.CFC has been a historically white-led organization. While this remains the case, ongoing programming has worked to engage and include input from Black, Indigenous and people of colour, on intersectionality and intersectional feminism, Indigenous resilience, and equity principles in emergency grantmaking. These have been starting points that have helped us further reflect on systemic racism in Canada, however we know we need to do more, and we need to help local community foundations do the same. During recent years, the organization has been privileged to grow and be able to support additional staff members, including Black, Indigenous and people of colour staff and board members who were welcomed to the team full-time, but the organization acknowledges that up until recent years, there has been limited Black, Indigenous or people of colour representation on our staff, board and in our program design.Given that we are still at the start of an anti-racism journey, we did not feel it was appropriate to share or market this package as a guidebook. Until we do more of our own inner work to address inherent systems of racism and white supremacy in our systems, we are not in a position to designate ourselves as leaders in this space.This invitation is not meant to be an exclusive guide, toolkit, or one-stop-shop for anti-racism materials for community foundations. Rather, this is a space to begin a conversation on the community foundation movement's shortcomings, and to take pause to reflect on where we need to go.
Unfunded: Black Communities Overlooked by Canadian Philanthropy
December 3, 2020The COVID-19 pandemic and contemporary anti-Black racism movements have shone further light on the systemic racism and hardships faced by Black people in Canada. The experience of Black people in Canada points to the inadequacy of public policy in addressing the concerns of Black communities. It also suggests that Canadian philanthropy has not sufficiently invested in the well-being of Black communities and Black community organizations.This research report provides the first systematic, empirical examination of the extent to which Canadian philanthropy has responded to the unique and intersectional challenges facing Black communities. In establishing the social context and lived experience of Black community members, the report makes apparent that the needs of Black people in Canada are both specific and urgent. Despite the clear case for investment, Canadian philanthropy has largely been absent in supporting Black people in Canada. Evidence that illustrates how Canadian philanthropy has failed to meet the needs of Black people in Canada is drawn from the analysis of two sets of original data: 1) Semi-structured qualitative interviews with ten Black and non-Black philanthropic leaders from across the Canadian philanthropic sector; and 2) a review of the funding portfolios of 40 Canadian foundations.
The Toronto Fallout Report
November 1, 2020The Toronto Fallout Report captures seven months in the life of the COVID-19 pandemic in Toronto. This report applies an equity lens to data, issues and the analysis of the research. It documents the disproportionate impacts of COVID-19 on marginalized populations and the organizations that serve them. At the same time, it surfaces the knowledge and expertise of community leaders whose lived and professional experiences shed light on the fallout from the pandemic. Their perspectives and leadership will point the way to a more fair and just social and economic recovery in Toronto.
Advancing Evaluation Practice to Meet Global Challenges: A call to action and reflection
October 21, 2020Working together, foundations and evaluators can contribute to global transformation necessary to address the world's most pressing problems.Funders and evaluators based primarily in the US and Canada have been collaborating on shared priorities through the Funder and Evaluator Affinity Network (FEAN) since 2017. The goal of FEAN is to change the relationship between funders and evaluators from a transactional one to a partnership, shifting the field of philanthropic evaluation to become fairer, more equitable, and more effective. In 2019, the conversation expanded to consider issues of interest to FEAN members working in the international arena.The vision inspiring this paper is one in which North American foundations and evaluators can make significant contributions to achieving the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) as allies with people across the globe whose lives are most closely impacted by pressing challenges including climate change, migration, pandemics, growing authoritarianism, disparities and instabilities, and the depletion of critical resources.The recommendations outlined in this paper are a starting point, an invitation to both reflection and action. We explore how foundations and evaluators can nurture and grow a robust, inclusive ecosystem of what we are calling evaluation for global transformation (EGT). Such an ecosystem is necessary to co-create the paths by which funders and evaluators can catalyze innovative thinking and undertake coordinated action with others in support of global transformation.The working paper takes a critical look at the current state of EGT and what it will take to position evaluation to advance effective, equitable and sustainable global transformation efforts. It begins with defining global transformation and its importance, describing the ways in which global development is evolving, and the growing role that philanthropy is playing within this arena.Next, it lays out an analysis of the current state of evaluation and resulting recommendations, building from conversations that took place among members of the Funder and Evaluator Affinity Network during 2019.
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