Fundraising for Communities of Color
A comprehensive, three-day training program in resource development created by and for Communities of Color.

This program ended in November 2006. These pages are being provided for informational purposes only.

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Conference Description

Fundraising for Communities of Color is a program designed to meet the unique fund development needs of persons and organizations serving communities of color. All too frequently, such organizations might lose funding opportunities because they lacked the skills, knowledge or expertise to make their best possible case, verbally and in writing, to a funder. They may also be unaware of the tax and other financial benefits of planned giving programs or may have had no previous
experience in organizing a capital campaign to make badly needed capital improvements or expand their facilities. Such information is available if one knows where to look or whom to ask. But organizations of color frequently are in the position of not knowing where to look or whom to ask. Although there are many good fundraising training programs available, they are frequently beyond the current
financial means of organizations of color, and such programs typically do not take the special needs of communities of color either as fundraisers or donors, into consideration.

Finally, with the growing awareness that communities of color possess wealth and have already been practicing culturally appropriate forms of philanthropy for decades if not centuries, it is imperative that organizations serving these communities develop effective strategies to ensure their fair share of such resources. These are the gaps that the Fundraising in Communities of Color seeks to fill-in. Accordingly, the program seeks to accomplish only three simple goals. These are:

1. To assist communities and organizations of color in accessing the knowledge, skills and resources necessary to seek and obtain funding from public and private sources to help ensure the successful
   fulfillment of their missions;
2. Understand and utilize the potential of fund development from within their own communities; and
3. To do so in a culturally sensitive manner, taking into account the similarities and differences of multi-ethnic communities.

For more comprehensive information please click the "Theme and Preliminary Program" button to the left.