Caylin Waller

Social justice work is draining and exhausting… Economic Justice work adds additional layers of barriers and obstacles that make it imperative to be intentional about preserving the mental and physical health of our team. We work diligently throughout the year to increase opportunities for asset and wealth building, primarily for Black residents living and working within Allegheny County. Our team counsels hundreds of people a year, many who bring very complicated poverty trauma with them. This is not easy work. I believe that we have one of the best teams in the nonprofit sector because I am intentional about our office culture which includes technical support, professional development, selfcare practices and opportunities to rest for our team. I know it’s unconventional to close an office for the last two weeks of the year but it shouldn’t be. I’ve heard varying opinions and responses about our teams announcement of our end of year shutdown and I stand on our decision. Not only do I stand on it, it might be longer next year. What I do know is that I have a team fully committed to this work, loyal, dedicated and better at what they do because they aren’t burnt out. Our turnover rate is low, losing only three employees in 7 years. So although I know it makes those who have been working within this sometimes broken nonprofit system raise an eyebrow when we promote livable wages and intentional preservation of the HUMANS that are doing this incredibly important work, I would hope that you also see a need for a shift in this culture. Gone are the days of expecting nonprofit employees to do this work in a way that is detrimental to their wellbeing, expecting us to work for poverty wages and wondering why it’s hard to have longevity in this work. It’s time for a change… Oh yeah, the Catapult Greater Pittsburgh office is officially closed for the remainder of 2024; see you in 2025. #catapultgreaterpittsburgh #healthyworkplace #SeeYouIn2025

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This needs to be addressed through community leader advocacy. Meanwhile, you can hear amazing #latino #latina #latine #latinx authors Adelante Leadership Podcast

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📣 NYC youth development and social work colleagues! My organization, Partnership for After School Education (PASE), is hosting our annual conference THIS Wednesday (7/24), and it is a not-to-be-missed event for those working with NYC children and youth! 🌟 I'm particularly excited (slash semi-star struck!) because our closing keynote will be delivered by one of my youth development heroes, Dr. Shawn Ginwright! If you haven't encountered his work yet, you are in for a treat - more below. First, some key links: 🔗 See our full event agenda: https://lnkd.in/e9Jc5E8P 🔗 Read our workshop lineup: https://lnkd.in/e2zDWsAr 🎫 Save your spot - still some left, but not for long! bit.ly/2024PASEConference **** If you've continued reading, here's a little walk down memory lane to share how Dr. Ginwright has shaped my relationship with my field(s) - & why I hope you join us on Weds! tl;dr - Dr. Ginwright is the type of speaker who will remind you of your "why" and challenge you to dive deeper. 📅 2016: My first intro to Dr. Ginwright. I'm still fairly new to youth development (s/o to Seattle Parks and Rec CLC team), & I have the pleasure of attending my first national youth development-related conference, NSLA's convening. Dr. Ginwright is a keynote speaker, & he is both moving and grounding. I remember feeling, "This is what it means to be part of a field and a movement." 📅 2018: By this point, I've relocated to NYC for social work school & Dr. Ginwright has just published his Medium article, "The Future of Healing: Shifting From Trauma Informed Care to Healing Centered Engagement." In the piece, Dr. Ginwright shares youth work anecdotes that challenged him to move FROM the idea of "trauma-informed" TO "healing-centered". A quote from a youth in his programs will ALWAYS stick with me: "I am more than what happened to me, I’m not just my trauma." This article & that line give me permission to critically examine & challenge the norms of my new field in a way that is so generative. Full article: https://lnkd.in/efTq8xZF 📅 2023: I get to hear Dr. Ginwright discuss his latest book, The Four Pivots: Reimagining Justice, Reimagining Ourselves, during a virtual convening. He's examining healing at an organizational & leadership level, and you can feel the electric energy in the (Zoom) room. The attendees are SO engaged - in fact, so motivated that they start organizing an impromptu virtual book club via the chat (!). More on Four Pivots: https://lnkd.in/e4agDMgQ So, NYC youth dev & social work friends - if you need an energy boost in these hard times, I hope YOU can join PASE on Weds to soak in inspiration from Dr. Ginwright and over a dozen other inspiring youth-serving leaders!

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Investing in care is a winning strategy for candidates. Period.

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It was refreshing being in a space that elevated the importance of our lived experiences and stories and how #identity shapes the way we are understood and treated in professional spaces both in #philanthrophy and beyond. IN CT, policy, advocacy, and philanthropy are deeply connected and I left asking these questions: 1. Every leader holds power, regardless of their title. How are we democratizing power and calling people in, especially the underserved? 2. How do we move past our preconceptions of others and learn to recognize their value and impact as people? 3. If people know better, what are we going to do to have them do better? What needs to be done to get them to take learning to action? Thanks to Connecticut Council for Philanthropy for all their hard work!

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🌍 Social Impact & Service Professionals—this workshop is for you! Join us on Tuesday, October 1st at 12pm CT for a FREE workshop tailored for nonprofit executives, community organizers, activists, fellowship leaders, NGOs, and other social impact professionals. This session will help you connect deeply with your communities, understand diverse needs, and drive greater impact in your mission. Together, we’ll sharpen your skills as a listener and collaborator, working to identify the unique needs, values, and strengths of the communities you serve. Why join us? 1️⃣ Build Resilience Amidst Global Crises: Learn strategies to keep your mission and values intact in the face of adversity. 2️⃣ Enjoy a Healing Space for Collective Humanity: Reconnect with your purpose, reflect, and renew in a supportive environment. Let’s build smarter, stronger pathways for both personal and organizational growth. 📅 Register now and invite a colleague: https://lnkd.in/gXtJmd7f Together, we can transform communities and create real change.

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🌟 OPEN | Empowering Families with INCLUDEnyc Kibin Alleyne is joined by Cheryelle Cruickshank, Executive Director of INCLUDEnyc, to explore how the organization is building a more inclusive society for children and youth with disabilities in New York City. About INCLUDEnyc Mission INCLUDEnyc is dedicated to: Enhancing the quality of life for children and youth with disabilities (birth through age 26). Empowering families with the knowledge and skills to navigate systems, make informed decisions, and advocate for equity and access. Supporting educators, youth workers, and policymakers to create person-centered, family-inclusive services. Vision A world filled with love, equity, and access for all young people with disabilities. Making an Impact This year, INCLUDEnyc: Directly served over 16,000 individuals. Reached nearly 450,000 New Yorkers through outreach and communications efforts. By offering resources, advocacy training, and personalized guidance, INCLUDEnyc is transforming lives and promoting systemic change for an inclusive future. For more on how INCLUDEnyc is driving inclusion and equity, visit their website or watch the full conversation on BronxNet’s YouTube channel! ❤️

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Idealist.org is a wonderful resource for students interested in non-profit work! Check out some nonprofits that Idealist.org highlighted below!

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REPORT REVEALS NYC GOVERNMENT PAYS WOMEN OF COLOUR LESS THAN WHITE AND MALE COLLEAGUES The report shows city employees who identify as Black, Latino, or Asian earn an average of 84 cents for every $1 that white city employees make. For gender-related disparities, for every $1 that white male city workers make, other city employees only make 82 cents on average. Women of colour make up over two-thirds of the overall racial pay gap among government employees. Between the 2018 and 2021 fiscal year, women of colour received the smallest increase in their pay gaps with white male workers—up 3.8% or less. “In contrast, white female employees, Black or African American male employees, and male employees who identify as Other race/ethnicity saw the largest reduction of their pay gap over this period,” the report reads. The Department of Citywide Administrative Services (DCAS), NYPD, and FDNY were highlighted as the agencies with the largest racial/ethnic pay gaps. Between ABHLO (Asian, Black or African American, Hispanic or Latino and Other Race/Ethnicities) and white employees, DCAS has the largest pay gap, with a difference of $28,065.16. The first responder agencies come in second place with pay differences of $24,539 and $27,766, respectively. The Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) and the Department of Transportation (DOT) also ranked as agencies with large racial pay gaps, with DEP’s difference at $16,089.52 and DOT’s difference at $15,716.20.

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Here's my 2024 LinkedIn Rewind, by Coauthor.studio: (Thanks for the idea Joel M. Caplan ) In Brownsville and South Bronx, I watched communities transform violence prevention from an institutional program into a neighborhood movement. Through micro-projects at Citizens Crime Commission of NYC, residents proved what I've always known: lasting change comes from within communities. 2024 showed the power of connecting ground-level work to systemic change: • Violence Prevention: Four community initiatives where residents designed solutions - from environmental improvements to youth leadership programs. Working directly with the Mayor's Office of Criminal Justice proved that institutional resources combined with community wisdom creates sustainable impact. Looking ahead: 2025 is about scaling what works - expanding micro-projects to more neighborhoods while strengthening voting rights initiatives. The blueprint is clear: when communities lead their own solutions, transformation follows. To everyone working to reform our justice system: real change happens in the community, by the community, for the community. Let's keep building pathways to justice together. -- Get your 2024 LinkedIn Rewind at https://lnkd.in/eWBD3UFa

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THINGS I HAVE LEARNED FROM KIDS (1/5): Over the last 7 years The Giving Square has been spreading a model that reimagines children’s engagement in community life. We have grown to 75 partners in Maryland, Missouri and Virginia and worked with over 6,000 kids. In that time, I have learned a lot FROM kids, insights that are relevant to this moment in time. I'll start with the election. Kids have been experiencing the results of the election in their own way. Those who are within a few years of voting identify as "pre-voters" and were more attuned to the details of the election - candidates, policies, polls. Younger kids carry the election angst of the adults in their lives without broader context. In both cases, processing the election with adults was/is valued because kids feel it too. Most surprising was how kids of all ages received information about the election. EVERY KID WITH A PHONE OR ACCESS TO YOUTUBE WAS INUNDATED WITH POLITICAL ADS. As you can hear in this "special election" podcast (https://pod.fo/e/2843a7), young people of all ages had memorized the smear campaigns of local to national candidates. Why is this deeply concerning? Our political and social divisions will only intensify if political ads are the foundation for the civic experience of children. Finally, political identity seems to form once kids see themselves as "pre-voters". Younger kids reported that while they care about different social issues, they perceived that the election was "more relevant to the parents who are responsible for them" and "are the ones paying taxes". This gives us an opening. The time to build a foundation for community engagement is when kids are young. They are pre-political, highly empathetic, fluid thinking, and care about making life better for others. We need to lock in childrens' sense of responsibility for community before things get divisive. Otherwise, the political and social divides will only spread and calcify. Want to hear directly from kids about this? Listen to the *special election* podcast episode, spread the world, donate, and check out The Giving Square for more resources.

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Attention STEM Grantmakers and Nonprofits Offering Out-of-School Time STEM Education in the DMV 🌟 🚀 You're Invited to The STEM Justice and Equity Convening! 🚀 📅 Date: Tuesday, May 7, 2024 🕙 Time: 10:00 AM - 12:30 PM 📍 Location: Battelle (Address provided upon registration) Dive into engaging discussions, network with fellow grantmakers and nonprofit leaders, and help shape the future of STEM education. Let's spark change together! Registration is absolutely free! But hurry—spaces are limited and filling up fast. 🚀 Secure your seat here: https://lnkd.in/ei9VJVMs Join us for an energizing morning packed with: Rich Discussions: Dive deep into the challenges and opportunities in STEM education. Breakout Sessions: Engage in targeted discussions tailored to your interests and expertise. For Nonprofits: Network with STEM grantmakers serving the DMV area. Discover strategies to effectively position your organization to secure more funding from STEM-focused grantmakers. For STEM Grantmakers: Network with DMV-based nonprofits that are making a difference in out-of-school time STEM education. Learn strategies for creating more inclusive and equitable funding practices that position BIPOC-led organizations for sustainability and success. ⚙️ Together, we can help build a more diverse STEM pipeline ⚙️ and increase minority representation in STEM fields. ⚙️ #Nonprofit #Fundraiser #TheGoToFundraiserforBIPOCNonprofits #Social Justice #KiaCroomFundraising

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