The Funders’ Collaborative on Youth Organizing (FCYO) is a collection of national, regional and local grantmakers and youth organizing practitioners dedicated to advancing youth organizing as a strategy for youth development and social transformation. The main goals of FCYO are to:
- Increase the level of funding directed towards youth organizing -groups;
- Support youth organizing groups to devel
op stable and sustainable organizations; and
- Increase the awareness and understanding of youth organizing among funders and community organizations. In order to accomplish these goals, FCYO employs a multi-level capacity building model that integrates grantmaking and group learning, leveraging and funder education, and research and dissemination. We cultivate financial resources for the broader youth organizing field through our leveraging and funder education efforts to promote youth organizing as an important social justice and civic engagement approach. Finally, we build and expand the base of knowledge on youth organizing and its specific relevance as a strategy for social change through innovative research and publications. Grantmaking
Since its inception, FCYO has been focused on increasing philanthropic, intellectual and social capital necessary to strengthen, grow and sustain the field of youth organizing. To strategically resource, build and sustain youth organizing efforts, FCYO aims to:
Regrant nationally through pooled funds and a fully supported, cost-effective, collaborative learning process
Promote networking and infrastructure development to connect and strengthen youth organizing efforts, and support peer exchange and relationship-building;
Build the capacity of youth organizing groups through convenings, research and documentation, and the development of materials and resources. Strategically partner with key youth organizing intermediaries and youth-serving professionals to strengthen and support grassroots groups at all stages of development. ABOUT THE ReGenerations FRAMEWORK
In 2006, FCYO embraced the ReGenerations framework in response to a major question that faced the field of youth organizing: How can we help create a sustainable social justice movement? The framework underscored that a pro-active and preventative response to the loss of social justice leaders was to build a social justice leadership pipeline – starting with youth – in order to build a “re-generating” base of social justice leaders and a more vibrant and sustainable social justice movement. ReGenerations: Youth Leadership in Environmental Justice (ReGen: EJ) was our first ReGenerations initiative; a multi-year program that responded to the critical need for youth leadership development in order to create a sustainable environmental justice movement. Through funding support, peer exchanges, national convenings and evaluation, the ReGenerations frame allows FCYO to explore how to build effective models of leadership and sustainable social justice organizing across many different sectors and also to observe how cohorts of groups form and maximize a learning community. ReGenerations: Leadership Pipeline and ReGenerations: Healthy Communities are an evolution of this framework.
