Nonprofit
Mission Award for
Anti-Racism Initiative
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Criteria
The
Anti-Racism Initiative Award recognizes an organization
that actively engages audiences in anti-racism activities.
Nominated organizations should:
- Work
to eliminate prejudice and racism in society;
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Demonstrate a commitment to pluralism and inclusively;
and
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Develop unique and thought-provoking strategies
to combat racism.
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Finalists
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Finalist
Profiles
Organizing Apprenticeship Project
The
Organizing Apprenticeship Project (OAP) works to advance
community-based movements to achieve racial, cultural
and economic justice in Minnesota. It provides racial
justice leadership training to a diverse group of organizers.
In addition, OAP publishes the Minnesota Legislative Report
Card, is a member of the Education Equity Collaborative
and is conducting a statewide Power Analysis to determine
where current and potential allies in racial justice work
exist and where entrenched barriers to this work are.
 When OAP was
created in 1993, its primary program was a six-month,
paid apprenticeship program for emerging organizers. While
the apprenticeship program remains one of OAP’s
primary programs, OAP’s staff and board expanded
its work by positioning racial justice in the center of
all its work in 2006 and redefined its mission, added
new staff and new strategies, and expanded its board.
OAP’s work is guided by the following five principles:
focus on racial equity outcomes; uphold equity, enfranchisement
and economic justice; invest in opportunity and advancement;
strengthen protections against discrimination, racial
violence and racial profiling; recognize and harvest the
contributions of racial and cultural communities.
In
addition to revising its training curriculum for its core
organizing mentoring work, OAP developed several bold
new strategies. The Minnesota Legislative Report Card
is an annual analysis of the significance of the proposals
presented in a given legislative session that has implications
for communities of color and lists how each legislative
representative voted. The Report Card, first released
in 2006, is used to break the silence about race in state
legislature as well as to connect issues and communities
of color. The research uses a race equity lens, where
the race frame is articulated rather than buried. The
Report Card is used as a reference tool for a variety
of groups and creates framing tools that communities can
use to move race into public dialogue.
 OAP has played
a pivotal role in bridging cultural communities together
to find common ground on issues of race and equity, through
the Education Equity Collaborative, a multiracial collaborative
of several groups, focused on organizing and empowering
grassroots community members in the education policy debate.
Due to a history of competition for resources and attention,
it is extremely rare for organizations from the various
communities of color to come together in a sustained fashion.
Because of OAP’s unique role of already working
with various communities of color, it is able to play
the role of trusted convener that enables cultural communities
to realize and exercise their collective power.
By breaking
the silence and confusion about ‘how’ to discuss
and address institutional and structural racial and cultural
bias, OAP has provided a language and platform for the
activist community to come together in a united front
to work for racial equity. OAP’s work has allowed
us as individuals and as nonprofits to become more effective
in addressing racism and moving forward in unity on this
issue.
Organizing
Apprenticeship Project Web site: www.oaproject.org
Pillsbury
House Theatre — Pillsbury United Communities
Pillsbury House
Theatre is a professional theater troupe housed within
the Pillsbury United Community Center in Minneapolis.
The theatre is a multi-cultural company of artists whose
purpose is to provoke examination of our world in a broad
community using their programs and performances. One of
its ongoing programs is Breaking Ice, a multiracial improvisational
theatre company that creates and performs original shows
to address difficult social issues. Its performance model
uses poetry, music, movement and drama to create customized
performances in a non-linear interactive style that evokes
not only intellectual, but also emotional and visceral
responses.
 Through Breaking
Ice, the Pillsbury House Theatre seeks to undo racism
and intolerance one person at a time using the powerful
medium of theatre. No matter who the audience or what
the subject matter, Breaking Ice uses the foundation of
undoing racism to inform all of its performances. Through
identification with the stories and characters dramatized
onstage, individuals are able to both recognize themselves
and put themselves in the shoes of others. The program’s
goal is to use this very personal identification to spark
an ongoing open dialogue about how we all can contribute
to creating equity. The performance becomes a powerful
vehicle that stimulates dialogue across race, culture,
gender, generations and economic status, evoking a new
awareness that can lead to action within schools, businesses,
government offices and neighborhood communities.
In 2007, the
Breaking Ice company created and performed over 28 shows
for a variety of different groups including the Minnesota
Department of Health and Family Services, the Multicultural
Development Center and Neighborworks National Training
Institute. In 2008, Breaking Ice worked interactively
with a historically segregated community in Biloxi, Mississippi.
Engaging in creative movement, writing and improvisational
theatre allowed these Hurricane Katrina survivors to access
their voices, recount history and reclaim their stories
in an attempt to talk openly about the social barriers
to envisioning and rebuilding an inclusive multicultural
community.
 Pillsbury House
Theatre measures the impact of each Breaking Ice performance
with a six-month long, three-step assessment track. The
assessment includes immediate follow-up phone interviews
with the main contacts, distribution of written surveys
to each audience member one month after the performance
and an interview with the main contact six months to one
year after the performance to learn about the long-term
impact of the performance. Perhaps the greatest measure
of success, however, is the live dialogue that follows
each show, during which audience members share their thoughts,
feelings and personal discoveries with each other.
Pillsbury House
Theatre’s Breaking Ice program reaches 8,000 people
every year, performing for diverse audiences that range
from district managers at Best Buy Corporation to nonprofit
advocates to incoming freshman at St. Thomas University.
In these multiple settings, Breaking Ice inspires individuals
to talk openly about the fears, assumptions and prejudices
that keep people apart and brainstorm ideas to change
the culture of their workplace, school or community to
create a more inclusive society.
Pillsbury
House Theatre Web site: www.pillsburyhousetheatre.org
Facing
Race We’re all in this together™
The Saint Paul Foundation’s Facing
Race We’re all in this together initiative was launched
with a vision is to create a more equitable, just and
open region in which everyone feels safe, valued and respected.
Facing Race is a multi-year initiative that works to eliminate
prejudice and racism in society by addressing racism at
both individual and institutional levels. Facing Race
meets people and institutions where they are, gives them
the tools they need to discuss the issue and moves them
to take action to end racism. While the initiative’s
geographic emphasis is Ramsey, Dakota and Washington Counties,
some of the initiative’s tools are available statewide
and have been used in Red Wing, Minneapolis and Fergus
Falls.
After conducting a research assessment
of race and racism in the area it serves, Facing Race
found that many of the respondents defined racism as something
interpersonal or individual. To engage the public by addressing
racism at the individual level, Facing Race created and
promoted the New Conversations About Race and Racism™
discussion tool. This tool, released in February of 2006,
is free to groups and individuals in or serving people
in Minnesota. By watching the DVD and completing the accompanying
exercises, participants learn new skills such as sharing
personal histories, assuming good intent and addressing
real-life situations.
 Over 100 individuals and groups have hosted
New Conversations since 2006. The New Conversations tool
can be used on-their-own by individuals or organizations
or the Foundation can provide facilitation assistance
larger groups within the East Metro and provide training
to organizations that want to train their own facilitators.
Hosts have included businesses, government institutions,
and nonprofits. The Foundation has also successfully obtained
continuing education credits for professionals such as
lawyers and realtors and its Ambassador Award honors individuals
who excel in creating opportunities for all people to
understand the impact of racism and work to address it.
 Since the release of New Conversations,
nearly 3,000 people have participated in conversations
in their workplaces, with family and friends, or with
civic and volunteer groups; from 2007-2008, 1,700 participated.
Participant evaluations, which are completed by participants
both after their conversation and three-months after,
with a follow-up telephone survey of a randomly sampled
group, show that the sessions are valuable and encourage
continued discussion and thought about racism. Evaluations
of New Conversations are. The information gathered is
used to monitor impact over time. After reviewing evaluations
from nearly 1,400 participants received between February
2006 and September 2007, the Saint Paul Foundation found
that 89 percent of participants indicated having a meaningful
conversation using the New Conversations tool; 50 percent
reported an increase in their comfort in addressing issues
of racism with others; 48 percent of participants reported
an increase in their awareness of racism; and participants
relayed several anecdotes about how they have applied
skills learned in New Conversations to real-life situations.
Facing
Race Web site: www.facingrace.org
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