Fall news from BFF
https://mailchi.mp/b381888c70b8/bff-news-nov2021
Dear BFF Community,
We are excited to welcome the new folks who recently signed up for emails from Birth Future Foundation. Thank you for joining us in the work to achieve a liberated birth future with racially just and equitable access to midwifery care and the midwifery profession. (Learn more about BFF.)
At BFF, we are not replicating the conventional model of philanthropy. It has been a busy year as we build this new organization from scratch, leveraging our prior experience with midwifery funding while radically reimagining how every step of the process can be more equitable and racially just. In this newsletter, we are pleased to preview our grantmaking approach as we prepare to make our first grants. When it comes to fundraising, we are launching a traditional donor campaign as well as getting ready to pilot a BFF Giving Circle. We expect to continually iterate and improve BFF’s strategies and processes as we try new things, learn, and collect community input. Thank you for joining us for this journey.
Join us at Decolonize Birth this weekend!
BFF is proud to sponsor the 2021 Decolonize Birth conference this weekend, November 20-21. This annual event organized by Ancient Song Doula Services will be held virtually for the first time, and this year's theme is Beyond Survival: Liberatory Practices to Center Hope & Healing for Black & Indigenous Peoples. We look forward to community connection, idea sharing, and joy this weekend. It’s not too late to register.
Save the date! We are planning our annual BFF virtual celebration event for December 16 at 8 PM Eastern, 7 PM Central, 6 PM Mountain, 5 PM Pacific, 3 PM Hawaii.
Get ready for Giving Tuesday!
We are launching our ambitious end-of-year fundraising campaign to raise $50,000 by December 31. These funds will fuel next year’s grantmaking cycles and give us the capacity to keep growing and innovating. We hope you will consider making a donation now to give us a running start before our Giving Tuesday push on November 30. Also, watch your email for an announcement soon about how to join our new BFF Giving Circle!
BFF’s Grantmaking Principles
Support innovative and reimagined approaches to equity and liberation in midwifery care, midwifery education, and the midwifery profession
Support initiatives that dismantle systems of oppression in midwifery care, midwifery education, and the midwifery profession
Prioritize resources for Black, Brown, Indigenous, and LGBTQIA+ led work
Fund leadership development and operating expenses as well as projects
Remove barriers to funding with an accessible application process
Respect and trust grantee partners
BFF’s approach to grantmaking strives to implement decolonization principles and centers Black and Brown perspectives and voices, which have been systematically excluded in philanthropy and midwifery funding. To carry out BFF’s mission, we are continually reflecting and questioning status-quo approaches that perpetuate inequities in fundraising and grantmaking. Conventional grantmaking maintains power and control of resources. BFF was founded on the understanding that the community knows what they need, ergo "nothing for us without us" (Gibson, 2018, p. 8). With these principles in mind, BFF is excited to share that we are working to create our own participatory grantmaking infrastructure. BFF will convene advisory committees of people who represent the grant focus at hand to be the decision makers. Not only does this shift the power of *who* decides, it honors that the knowledge shared by community members is valuable, centering reciprocity and knowledge shared by grantees as equal to value of money from donors. We honor the expertise of communities and will provide compensation to advisors. To further promote this, we are currently working to create frameworks that promote ease and accessibility for grantee applicants, recipients, and the advisory committee. We look forward to sharing more about our first grantmaking cycle soon!
Reference: Gibson, C. (2018). Deciding together, Participatory grantmaking. Grantcraft.
Follow BFF: Follow us on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook (new!). We are @BirthFuture everywhere.
Get the word out about BFF: Forward this email to someone who would be interested in learning more about the Birth Future Foundation, or share our email sign-up link: https://birthfuture.org/bff-mail.
Join us! Want to serve on a grantmaking advisory committee, plan a fundraiser, or help expand our community? Get involved by emailing birthfuturefoundation@gmail.com.