OUR PURSUIT OF LIBERATION | |
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Greetings Deaconess Community,
The onset of the pandemic and a change in executive leadership called us to reexamine our multi-year strategic plan and reevaluate the ways the Foundation is advancing justice as an institutional advocate. Over the course of 18 months, we sought the wisdom of residents in our communities – those in which we live, work, and serve. We listened with new ears and open hearts, believing that no voice is too small, and no vision is too audacious to influence our work.
The Foundation engaged a consultative project team to connect with and collect feedback across a variety of neighborhoods and community gatherings, funded partner focus groups, one-on-one interviews, and national peer funder conversations and policy research.
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To achieve our community and participant-centered engagement goals our consultative partners employed a three-prong outreach strategy:
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Regional Community Engagement – Goals: 1) listen to, learn from, and understand the desired improvements of community residents and organizational leaders; 2) ensure community voice guides and leads the work; 3) ensure community is at the center of all decisions; and 4) support community ownership of policy change.
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Deaconess-Interested and -Impacted Parties – Goals: 1) better understand Deaconess’s potential from the perspective of those closest to the organization; 2) determine lessons learned from Deaconess’s existing priority portfolio that might have implications for this project’s recommendations; and 3) glean additional feedback on potential organizational values to guide Deaconess’s work in the future.
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National Partner Engagement, Research, and Analysis – Goals: 1) explore policy trends and themes; 2) connect insights to community findings to inform recommendations, and 3) discover relevant case studies to provide context to findings and recommendations.
WHAT WE HEARD
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Challenges must be addressed in the aggregate
Time and time again, our neighbors and partners near and far said that it is much too difficult and unrealistic to compartmentalize individual and community needs in neat public policy boxes or zones. That just isn’t how any of us experience life. Our life experiences are intersecting and interdependent on many variables. There is no one systemic failure that could truly be addressed without great effort around the others, so challenges must be addressed in the aggregate.
There is a need to care for everyone from newborns to Centenarians
Generational transformation is tied to the health and wellbeing of everyone. Children, adults, and elders exist in the context of one another, families, communities, and systems. Together, we are shaping our ideal healed future.
It is difficult to survive and thrive in a colonized, racist set of systems
With our collective understanding of systems’ roles in creating and exacerbating brokenness and harm, no efforts can solely focus on the impact of systems. Many of them are working as they were designed. We must undo the harmful systemic structures that exist while prophetically imagining and pursuing a future of atonement, healing and restoration.
Deaconess’ mission, vision, and values must be reimagined for the work ahead
For this chapter, in Deaconess’ history, the Foundation must be explicit in its intention in the world around us.
Ultimately, the insights urged us to imagine a journey and future for which the last seven generations of Deaconess’s work have prepared us.
OUR RESPONSE
We are clear, our community has called us to envision a future society where liberation is the lived experience, and all people have space and capacity to dream. With a focus on health justice and social justice through building beloved community and power building, Liberation within 100 years –7 generations—is attainable.
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Our strategic aspiration and strategy reflect what we have learned and what we have processed together up to this point. Our guiding values are faith in light of our commitment to Jesus Christ reflecting His love for all people, healing as a holistic process, justice as a resolution against oppression in all its forms, and liberation, not meant to simply describe an outcome, but rather it is an intentional and conscious movement in which our community can freely exist, dream and thrive in the absence of oppressive systems in a culture of solidarity, respect and dignity. Our focus areas, health justice and social justice, are built on these values.
In the coming weeks, in our newsletter we will continue to share various components of our new strategy with you. We will share hallmarks of building beloved community and power building. We will share our incremental goals and frameworks informing our approach.
Our approach is designed with you and the heartland in mind. And we invite you to join us, to lend your voice, to lean into your power, to share the joys and solve for the challenges. Our strategic plan is adaptive and responsive. The urgency of now requires that we forecast today for the outcomes we expect in by year 2123.
So, join us in uprooting oppressive systems and planting anew. Truly we’re in a new season with fresh oil.
In service to the will of the Spirit and the mission,
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Bethany Johnson-Javois
President & CEO
Deaconess Foundation
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Constance Harper
Vice President of Policy, Advocacy, & Strategic Initiatives
Deaconess Foundation
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P.S. – If you have not yet attended one of our in-person community meetings outlining the strategy with audience participation, please join us on Wednesday, October 25th in Belleville, IL. Learn more and register here. | |
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EPA says community involvement vital to address environmental racism in East St. Louis area
Sarah Kellogg | St. Louis Public Radio | August 13, 2023
When Kathy Jones was growing up in East St. Louis in the 1950s, she says her family believed her hay fever as well as other conditions like asthma that affected her siblings and grandmother were hereditary.
“We didn't know that the environment was what was making us sick. But we suffered through that,” Jones said. Read more.
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City alderwoman’s daughter gets shot, says free bullet-recovery center saved her family
Melanie Johnson | KMOV | September 15, 2023
ST. LOUIS - Shameem Clark-Hubbard is the Alderwoman of Ward 10 but also a mother of a child shot in the city she has been elected to serve.
“I was hurt, I was scared, I was heartbroken,” says Alderwoman, Shameem Clark-Hubbard.
Her daughter was shot twice in South City two months ago. She is one of 60 St. Louis City children 17 and under shot in 2023.
“A team of doctors came in and told us they weren’t going to be able to get the bullet out of my baby,” Clark-Hubbard says. Read more.
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New Strategic Framework and Funding Information Session
If you haven't had the chance yet, here is another opportunity to learn about our new strategic framework.
This event will be held in-person only on Wednesday, October 25th in Belleville, IL. Audio and visual support will be available.
Register to join us!
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Now Accepting Funding Proposals
Deaconess is accepting funding proposals for the new Seeding the Future Grant. These are one year general operating grants ranging from $15,000-$20,000 to advance an organization's efforts to promote health justice and social justice. Proposals are accepted on a rolling basis.
Learn more and submit a proposal here.
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Annual Public Joint Meeting of the Deaconess Boards
Join us on Tuesday, November 14 for the Annual Public Joint Meeting of the Deaconess Foundation and Deaconess Center for Child Well-Being Boards. The evening will include remarks from Deaconess Foundation CEO & President Bethany Johnson-Javois and board chairs.
The meeting will be held in-person, and we are also offering an engaging virtual option. Register to attend here.
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PARTNER OPPORTUNITIES & EVENTS | |
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Upcoming Events
September 30: "The Educators' Healing House" by the Youth Council for Positive Development. Register.
October 2: "Community First Responders (CFR) Training" (Every first Monday of the month) by The T. Register.
October 5: "Monthly Movement Meeting" by Defund. Re-envision. Transform. Register.
October 14: "Equity Dialogues: Navigating Affirmative Action Repeal" by LEAD STL and more. Register.
October 14: "The People's Plan Town Hall" by The People's Plan St. Louis. Register.
October 14: "Fall Harvest Festival" by Rustic Roots Sanctuary. Register.
October 14: "Environmental Justice Action: Emissions in the Midwest" by MCU St. Louis. Save the Date.
October 19: "Monthly Legislative Update" by Kids Win Missouri. Register.
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DON'T MISS IT: VOTER REGISTRATION DEADLINES | |
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View voting information and make a plan regarding polling places, voter registration and eligibility, voter rights, absentee voting, election calendars, and more:
State of Missouri – Next special election is November 7. Register by October 11 (mail, online, and in person). View details and sample election ballots: St. Louis City, St. Louis County, St. Charles County, Franklin County, and Jefferson County.
State of Illinois – Next general primary is March 19. Register by February 20 (mail), March 3 (online) and March 19 (in person).
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