Workshops – Thursday 2:30pm

Shared values. Collective action. For nonprofit and philanthropic leaders, driving social change requires building collaboration across diverse individuals, teams, organizations, communities, and identities. However, forging partnerships amid complex power dynamics is challenging. Join Jayke Hamill and Michelle Schneider, senior faculty from the Center for Creative Leadership, to identify barriers to collaboration and to practice leadership skills that bridge divides. Through interactive group activities, discussion, and self-reflection, you’ll gain strategies to build more equitable, inclusive partnerships across differences. This workshop will expand your capacity to mobilize diverse stakeholders toward shared goals. Come learn to navigate boundaries and unite voices to amplify impact.

How can innovative budgeting solutions unlock a true living wage for our early childhood educators while expanding access and quality? The field of early childhood education struggles to provide living wages to educators, many of whom can now make more working at Walmart or Amazon warehouses. It’s time to unlock new opportunities for early childhood care to turn it into a diverse, thriving wage field — and to make sure students get the education and care they need. The Cost of Poverty Experience (COPE) offers a glimpse into the lives of real low-income individuals and families. The participants navigate and explore the obstacles, decisions and complexities that impact the lives of COPE families in our community. The simulation is 1 simulated month, four 15-minute weeks, (1 hour). After the simulated month in the lives of the families, we lead our group in a 1-hour discussion to reveal the hidden challenges embedded in each COPE family and share about navigating the difficulties. Not from our personal point of view, but from the perspective of the families in the COPE community.  The event culminates with a 30-minute presentation of tangible Next Steps beyond the day’s events. A commitment to learn, volunteer, and/or donate more in our continued development of greater empathy and connection to the people we advocate for. Since launching the first education bachelor’s degree at a historical 2-year college in the state of Texas in 2020, support from the Dallas College Foundation and the philanthropic community has helped position the new Dallas College School of Education as a national leader and innovator in the early childhood education space. This workshop provides a platform for the School of Education and other community partners to amplify and raise awareness around the complex challenges North Texas faces related to early childhood and generational poverty.

Black and Disabled   individuals living in the United States consistently contend with institutional and compounding systemic racism, ableism, heterosexism, ageism, sexism, and classism. In recent years, these systemic challenges have compelled artists and leaders within Black and Disability communities to rely on art and protest as a way to find meaning and resolve within the systems that have divided communities and collectively pushed us to the margins. The cumulative psychological, physical, and emotional effects of systemic oppression, grief, and trauma on individuals in the Black and Disability communities is both well-established and documented. With this as our foundation, the workshop explores the three keystones of constructive cultural, social, and political disruption: identity, accessibility, and care. We’ll encourage participants to consider the ways in which Black and Disability communities rely on care work as a primary source of healing and how—in today’s world, especially—the act of care is, in itself, a necessary form of disruption. We’ll conclude by illustrating how artists and leaders of today’s Black and Disabled movements are pushing the boundaries on what we define as intersectionality, challenging how we navigate spaces, practices, and even the possibilities of what language can be.    

Points of Light’s Civic Circle® is a framework that helps the social sector advance a cause or social issue based on the idea that a diversified engagement strategy, intentionally expanded beyond volunteering, can create pathways for increased and deeper engagement. For those not yet involved, it provides an onramp where there may be barriers. For those already involved, it provides ways to deepen engagement. A critical component of the framework is in exploring how we can uplift more diverse voices in civic engagement and social impact work. Our session will examine the impact of increasing diversity of voices, how nonprofits can expand their voice and advocacy work, and how our Daily Point of Light honorees represent this element of the Civic Circle© in their existing advocacy and civic engagement.

As the nonprofit sector doubles down on its commitment to advance workplace equity, we must collectively cultivate spaces for peer learning and offer accessible tools to assess diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) efforts across the industry. Join the Building Movement Project (BMP) and ProInspire for an interactive workshop exploring how organizations use expert-tested DEI assessments to spark change across national communities of practice. The session will feature a live demonstration of BMP’s new race equity assessment tool, Building Blocks for Change (BB4C). Session attendees will explore the interactive user dashboard, automated report, and supplemental resources designed to help nonprofits move from assessment to implementation. The session will feature small breakout discussions to allow participants to dig deeper into the assessment framework and explore opportunities to use race equity assessments in their practice and organizations. Lastly, you’ll interact with and learn from a national DEI practitioner about her experience leveraging the race equity assessment process in her work leading communities of practice.

Coalitions can help nonprofits to work towards their missions, provide services to the communities they serve, amplify their voices, and share intelligence, resources, and workload. In fact, research commissioned by Independent Sector indicates that nonprofits belonging to collaborative working groups such as associations or coalitions advocate at higher rates than nonmembers. We Want to Hear from You. Independent Sector is convening a group of stakeholders with all levels of experience to hear their expertise and devise long-term solutions. During this listening session, participants will explore emerging strategies that nonprofits can leverage to share power within coalitions, find and join a coalition, tackle a wide range of policy issues, work towards common goals, and more. Attendees will also be presented with opportunities to ask questions, interrogate findings, discuss barriers, share their expertise, and brainstorm solutions. Information gathered during these convenings will be used to inform future research and capacity building tools and resources.

During this panel discussion, a group of funders, investees, beneficiaries, and academics will deep dive into the mechanics of impact investing (the practice of making investments in good social enterprises for a financial return) and the tools used to evaluate potential investments. You’ll learn how creating impact through investing for a return is a viable endeavor. You’ll also gain a greater understanding of the challenges and obstacles of impact investing, as well as a roadmap for how you can become an impact investor.

Every day, we use technology to make our lives easier. Yet millions of Americans still don’t have what they need to learn, work, or access information online—a problem called the digital divide. That’s why support from community-based experts, or Digital Navigators, is critical to build trust and help people get connected. Nonprofits including World Education, Inc., NPower, and United Way of Metropolitan Dallas alongside AT&T have launched several Digital Navigator programs in cities across the country. And because of the local-first approach, more people will be able to use the internet safely and successfully in these communities. Join this expert panel to learn about the digital divide and who it impacts, how organizations are partnering to address and bridge the gap, and best practices for launching and scaling Digital Navigator services in a community.

“How do we make sure things at an organization meaningfully change besides just the faces around a table?” “Does the diversity of leadership really matter if an organization already factors race into its strategy?” We have heard a variety of questions like these in response to the calls to elevate leaders of color. To be sure, calls across the social sector to put BIPOC  leadership at the forefront have always been there for anyone willing to listen. The case for the importance of proximate leadership for the sake of impact has already been made many times over. Bias-fueled myths about the lack of qualified leaders of color have repeatedly been debunked. This session isn’t designed to convince you of these things, but will instead elevate the assets and skills that leaders of color bring  — because of their identity — that make them effective leaders. Participants will learn how organizations can better recognize and support the overlooked skills that are critical for impact. They’ll also explore how to refine their own definitions of leadership to be more inclusive and equitable.