Racial Equity in Grantmaking Measurement Process and Framework
Coming Soon From the President’s Blog
Eddie Torres, Maurine Knighton, and Suzanne Callahan
Grantmakers in the Arts (GIA) and Doris Duke Foundation (DDF) with Callahan Consulting for the Arts (CCA) will soon release the results of the Racial Equity in Grantmaking (REG) cohort during a breakout session at our upcoming conference in Chicago in October 2024. We will explain the racial equity measurement process and share the Working Guide, a tool created and tested collaboratively by funders to aid them in measuring changes from their racial equity grantmaking efforts.
Attendees of the 2023 GIA Conference in the conference lobby.
The Racial Equity in Grantmaking Working Guide offers a process and measurement framework to help grantmakers track their own grantmaking that is BY, FOR and ABOUT communities of color: BIPOC [01], MENA [02], SWANA [03], AAPI [04] ALAANA [05], and other racialized communities. The premiere of the Racial Equity in Grantmaking Working Guide at GIA’s conference will be followed by a publicly accessible GIA webinar.
The goal of the Racial Equity in Grantmaking cohort, including the Working Guide, is to help grantmakers track their progress within their own goals in increasing support to self-determination for racialized communities. REG, including the Working Guide, was originally developed by a cohort of grantmakers that includes the Doris Duke Foundation, Mellon Foundation and William & Flora Hewlett Foundation. These funders used the framework outlined in the guide to research and code their own grants, document their assumptions about making change, and - most importantly - prompt internal discussions about if and how their funding fostered change. The Racial Equity in Grantmaking cohort participants did so in dialogue with each other, forming a community of support.
Its current use and refinement is being conducted by Calgary Arts Development, Calgary, Alberta, Canada; Community Foundation for Greater Atlanta, Atlanta, GA; Indy Arts Council, Indianapolis, IN; Jerome Foundation, St. Paul, MN; National Performance Network, New Orleans, LA; New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Foundation, New Orleans, LA; Opportunity Fund, Pittsburgh, PA; and The Morris and Gwendolyn Cafritz Foundation, Washington DC.
Since 2008, GIA has elevated racial equity as essential to all our work. To actualize this work within the sector, GIA published its Racial Equity in Arts Funding Statement of Purpose in 2015. Here we articulated our support of equity rather than diversity and inclusion for the sake of supporting self-determination by communities of color. Therefore, we explicitly encourage support to cultural expression that is by, for, and about communities of color. In 2021, GIA shared our Racial Equity Theory of Transformation, where we shared our conviction that supporting racialized communities’ cultural self-determination is essential to supporting our economic self-determination. Notions of cultural inferiority are used to dehumanize racialized people, facilitating economic exploitation. Therefore, cultural self-determination for BIPOC is a part of economic self-determination for BIPOC and all oppressed peoples.
GIA introduced the Racial Equity Coding Project in 2022. Throughout that year, in a series of podcasts, GIA spoke with funders participating in the project cohort including Susan Feder (Mellon Foundation), Adam Fong (William & Flora Hewlett Foundation), and Maurine Knighton (Doris Duke Foundation) here and Eleanor Savage (Jerome Foundation), and Tiffany Wilhelm (Opportunity Fund) here.
The REG process involves work and research. The real work of measurement and accountability happens when staff and other stakeholders engage in discussion about measurement and change and commit to accurate measurement; as outlined in the Guide. This is only possible if good data is maintained, including researching their own grants; and if hard conversations are had that question personal assumptions about racial equity.
We look forward to sharing more with you at GIA’s conference in Chicago in October and in our webinar shortly thereafter.
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Eddie Torres is president & CEO of Grantmakers in the Arts.
Maurine Knighton is the chief program officer at the Doris Duke Foundation. In this role, she oversees the foundation’s five national grantmaking programs: Arts, Environment, Medical Research, Child Well-Being and Building Bridges. Knighton joined the foundation in 2016 and served as program director for the arts, leading the development and oversight of grantmaking programs to support artists and organizations in the contemporary dance, theater, jazz and presenting fields.
Suzanne Callahan founded Callahan Consulting for the Arts in 1996 to help artists, arts organizations, and funders realize their vision through services that include strategic planning, resource development, evaluation, research, and philanthropic counsel. Callahan brings 30 years’ experience as a national funder, having begun as Senior Specialist for the Dance Program at the National Endowment for the Arts and later run national funding initiatives.
NOTES
01 BIPOC stands for Black, Indigenous, People of Color
02 MENA stands for Middle East and North African
03 SWANA stands for Southwest Asian and North African
04 AAPI stands for Asian American Pacific Islander
05 ALAANA stands for African, Latine, Asian, Arab and Native American. GIA has used this language extensively throughout our racial equity work and more details about the history and origins of this terminology can be found on the Racial Equity section of our website.
