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- Virtual Virtuous Circle
Virtual Virtuous Circle
Voting Summary (Elevator Pitch):
Through its website SPF will showcase leaders transforming rural communities using community organizing to break through isolation, improve economic infrastructure, clean up environments and overcome racial inequities endemic to the region.
Supporting organization:
Southern Partners Fund
URL:
www.spfund.org
City:
Atlanta
State/Region:
GA
Country:
USA
Project Vision Statement & Potential Social Impact:
The Virtual Virtous Circle is a platform for social change leaders of rural Southeastern U.S. communities to tell their stories of organizing for change, promote the preservation of rural culture, and inform others of techniques for organizng their local communities against poverty and marginalization. The deepened knowlege gain by interacting with the website will help Southern Partners Fund members and board to better assess trends in rural areas and common obstacles to social change in these communities. The platform promotes a virtuous circle of knowledge and change making in areas that are slow to receive such knowlege and even slower to act on it with SPF's support.
Sustainability (financial) model:
Southern Partners Fund has given away almost $7 million dollars over its eight years of existence to rural social change organizations. It will seek the necessary resources to update and upgrade its exisiting website and continue to support the digital stories project now in its third year in the South. We have a proven track record of success in our grantseeking and we are developing new approaches to outreach to new donors and wider giving through donor circles in the South.
Potential obstacles:
Amongst the obstacles to this project are "internalized racism" that convinces rural residences in the Black Belt and Appalachian regions where we are active that their stories are worth telling and nothing will ever change the extractive industries and large land owners who run their lives. Second to this is the lack of technology for producing the videos without our support and finally the lack of funds to currently update and upgrade SPF's website.
Resource Needs:
The primary resources needed are funds, and some technical assistance with our website.
Key Milestones:
I. uploading of current digital stories II. Continued production of new stories III. SPF Grants committee influenced by trends displayed through stories. IV. New donors and activists drawn to the causes of rural communities V. Continual improvement in the website.
Project Summary:
Rural communities in the Southern United States are using the grassroots collective processes of community organizing to break through isolation, improve economic infra-structure, clean up polluted environments, overcome racial inequities endemic to the region, and finally make small communities models of positive democratic social change. A leading partner is this transformation has been Southern Partners Fund, a social justice fund dedicated to grantmaking in the rural Southeastern U.S.
Through its website it will display the stories of transformation of rural communities and the leaders who inspire low-income communities to push for change. Examples of improved public schools, political change that better respects and serves the minority racial community, environmental clean-ups, and farm labor organizing amongst many others will be captured in "digital stories" and on site reports from Southern Partners Fund (SPF) board and and membership, who are all activists in rural communities. Because of SPF's involvement this will not only serve as models of inspiration but will help SPF spread the knowledge and technics of community organizing in areas where change is rare and poverty pervasive.
The expanded website accompanies trainings of grassroots leaders which have already captured dozens of stories and a train the trainer series which is in the process of disseminating the techniques and technology.
