Across sectors, leaders are facing a new reality: Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) efforts have been questioned, politicized, and dismantled. From charged political discourse declaring DEI illegal to frozen and removed federal funding, work that once symbolized progress is now being branded the enemy of “American Exceptionalism.”
For many organizations, this moment feels disorienting, but clarity begins with truth. DEI isn’t failing; it’s being punished for revealing what power looks like when it’s shared. The backlash is not about the merit of equity work; it’s about discomfort with accountability.
As a leader, your role is to stay grounded in that truth. This is not the time to retreat or rebrand your values; it’s the time to reframe and reinforce them. The organizations that weather this moment will be the ones that understand DEI not as a program or a policy, but as an ethical design for how people, systems, and decisions coexist.
Here’s how to navigate the landscape and lead through it with integrity.
Understanding the Roots of DEI Pushback
The current backlash didn’t appear overnight. DEI programs were built to address systemic inequities and expand access to opportunity. Yet, as they’ve become more visible, some have reframed these efforts as divisive, suggesting that equity somehow means exclusion.
Much of this resistance stems from two intertwined realities:
Polarization: In a politically charged environment, equity language can be misrepresented as partisanship.
Performance fatigue: Some initiatives prioritized optics over outcomes, eroding trust among skeptics and participants alike.
Leaders must recognize both dynamics without abandoning the moral and strategic imperative of equity work. The goal isn’t to defend DEI from attack, but to reclaim it as design, not ideology.
🪶 When DEI becomes an act of repair rather than reaction, it regains its power to unite instead of divide.
Budget and Resource Constraints: Protecting the Core
When budgets tighten, DEI work is often the first to go; labeled “non-essential.” But the truth is, equity and belonging are infrastructure. They shape retention, morale, innovation, and risk management.
Instead of framing DEI as an expense, leaders should reframe it as a value multiplier:
Equity reduces turnover costs.
Inclusive leadership drives innovation and market relevance.
Belonging boosts performance and engagement.
If cuts are unavoidable, protect the core: invest in training for managers, sustain internal equity assessments, and preserve transparent data tracking. These are the foundation stones that keep equity embedded even during contraction.
💡 When equity is built into the system, not the surplus, it survives every season.
Internal Resistance: Engaging Without Alienating
Resistance within the workforce often comes from fear, fear of losing opportunity, identity, or familiarity. As a leader, your job is not to silence that fear, but to contextualize it.
Strategies for engagement:
Communicate the “why.” Frame DEI as a path to shared wellbeing, not zero-sum gain.
Share data and stories. Evidence helps, but human stories move hearts.
Make it clear that equity is not a favor to one group; it’s the mechanism through which everyone benefits from fairness and psychological safety.
Political and Cultural Influences: Staying Values-Anchored
The politicization of DEI has made some leaders cautious or silent. But silence communicates complicity. The key is not to avoid politics, but to speak from principle, not partisanship.
Anchor your messaging in organizational values and outcomes:
“We believe in fairness, dignity, and safety for all employees.”
“Our equity work supports innovation and client trust.”
“Inclusion helps us serve our community more effectively.”
This kind of language transcends political binaries and centers purpose. Courageous leadership means holding space for complexity while refusing to abandon integrity.
✨ Values should not bend to political weather. They should guide you through it.
Finding a Path Forward: Leading Through the Noise
To move from defense to design, focus your DEI strategy around clarity, adaptability, and transparency.
1. Emphasize measurable outcomes. Use data to tell the story, retention rates, promotion equity, and psychological safety scores. Make impact visible and specific.
2. Evolve programs, don’t freeze them. DEI should shift with your organization’s needs. Regularly audit what’s working, what’s performative, and where the real learning is happening.
3. Invest in continuous education and dialogue. Create forums for honest conversation, even discomfort. Discomfort isn’t failure; it’s feedback.
4. Model the work. Equity leadership starts at the top. Make accountability public and personal, not just structural.
5. Build allies, not echo chambers. Collaborate across departments. Integrate DEI into operations, strategy, and budget cycles, not just HR or communications.
In Closing: From Pushback to Progress
The backlash against DEI is not proof of its failure; it’s evidence of its impact. Systems resist when they’re being asked to change.
For leaders, the question is not whether to continue this work, but how to evolve it with courage, clarity, and care.
DEI or, more precisely, Access and Belonging, remains the blueprint for the kind of workplaces we all deserve: ones rooted in fairness, accountability, and humanity.
When done with integrity, it’s not about checking boxes or quieting critics. It’s about building cultures that can withstand any political season, because they’re built on values, not trends.
🧭 Liberation-centered leadership isn’t about avoiding conflict. It’s about staying aligned in the face of it.
When the Masai greet one another, they do not ask, “How are you?” They ask, “Kasserian Ingera?” — “How are the children?” It is a measure of the community’s soul: if the children are well, the people are well.
By that measure, America is not well.
The National Picture: A Reversal of Progress
According to the Annie E. Casey Foundation’s new report, Measuring Access to Opportunity in the United States: A 10-Year Update, child poverty in the U.S. has surged, nearly tripling from 5% in 2021 to 13% in 2024. More than one in eight children now live in households struggling to meet basic needs.
This spike followed the expiration of pandemic-era supports such as the expanded Child Tax Credit, which in 2021 lifted more than 15 million children out of poverty. When those programs ended, millions fell back below the poverty line.
Without these policies, the rate would double again, and nearly one in four children would live in poverty today. As the report notes, 61% of children living in poverty have at least one working parent, underscoring that employment alone is no longer a safeguard against hardship.
“Poverty poses a serious threat to children’s development and long-term well-being,” said Leslie Boissiere, Vice President of External Affairs at the Annie E. Casey Foundation. “By investing in children’s well-being, through both public policy and employment practices that provide family-sustaining wages, we can enable more children to thrive.”
And yet, those investments are waning, precisely when families need them most.
A Mirror in Louisiana: The State of Our Youth
Here in Louisiana, the data paints a parallel and even more urgent picture. Nearly 1 in 5 Louisiana youth live in poverty, compared to the national 13%. The challenges are compounded: 96,000 youth are disconnected from both school and work, 30% experience major depression, and suicide attempt rates are double the national average.
Our systems are not separate silos; they are overlapping networks of strain:
Education: Louisiana’s graduation rate (80.1%) lags behind the national average (86.5%), while Black students represent 80% of suspensions despite only 42% of total enrollment.
Mental Health: Only 41% of schools have full-time counselors, and the average wait for adolescent psychiatric care is 64 days.
Child Welfare: With 4,127 children in foster care, our rate (5.7 per 1,000) exceeds the national average.
Juvenile Justice:68% of referrals involve non-violent offenses, and 60% of detained youth have mental health conditions.
Youth Homelessness: Over 12,800 homeless students attend school in Louisiana; 42% identify as LGBTQ+, and two-thirds are not currently enrolled.
These numbers aren’t just statistics; they are a portrait of disconnection, systemic failure, and policy neglect. They remind us that poverty is not simply about income, it’s about access to opportunity, belonging, and care.
“It Takes a Village”: Rebuilding Systems of Care
There is an African proverb that says, “It takes a village to raise a child.” In Louisiana, our “village” spans schools, churches, courts, nonprofits, and agencies. Yet too often, those systems work in isolation, each fighting fires rather than building fireproof structures.
Recent state initiatives point toward a path of hope:
The Louisiana Workforce and Social Services Reform (LA WASS) initiative aims to create a “one-door” model integrating workforce, child welfare, and behavioral health systems. While there are underlying issues that make this a problematic reform, we can contribute to the implementation to ensure it is as family and child-friendly as possible.
The 988 Crisis Lifeline, with mobile crisis teams in every parish, is expanding access to mental health response.
Family First Prevention Services Act expansion and school-based health center growth bring national policy into local practice.
These reforms embody what community-centered care can look like. But their success depends on whether we sustain the political will and the funding to see them through.
The Deeper Cost of Neglect
An old proverb warns, “A child who is not embraced by the village will burn it down to feel its warmth.”
When millions of children are left hungry, unhoused, and unseen, the consequences ripple outward: in crime, public health costs, and social unrest. Researchers estimate that child poverty costs the United States up to $1 trillion annually in lost productivity and increased public spending.
But beyond the financial toll is the moral cost: a society that neglects its children forfeits its future.
Reframing Success: From GDP to Well-Being
If we truly asked the Masai question, “How are the children?” our national and state budgets would look very different. We would measure prosperity not by the strength of our stock market, but by the stability of our families.
Children’s well-being is not a side issue. It is the clearest mirror of whether our systems are just.
It’s Time to Act
To state and national leaders, the path forward is clear; not easy, but clear:
Reinstate proven poverty-reduction measures such as the expanded Child Tax Credit and strengthen SNAP, SSI, and housing assistance programs that demonstrably lift millions of children above the poverty line.
Fund integrated, trauma-informed service delivery through initiatives like LA WASS that align child welfare, education, and behavioral health.
Invest in mental health infrastructure: ensure every school has access to counselors, and reduce the 64-day average wait for youth psychiatric care.
Address systemic inequities in discipline and justice that disproportionately harm Black and Brown youth.
Measure success differently by tracking the well-being of children, not just the wealth of the state.
These are not radical ideas; they are restorative ones. They rebuild the village we were meant to be.
The Moral Test of Our Time
The health of our democracy and economy depends on whether our children can thrive. As the Annie E. Casey Foundation’s data reminds us, public policy is not neutral; it either reduces suffering or perpetuates it.
If we are to answer the Masai greeting with honesty, we must ensure that in every parish, every household, and every child’s heart, the answer becomes: “All the children are well.”
Until then, our work remains unfinished.
References
Annie E. Casey Foundation. (2024). Measuring Access to Opportunity in the United States: A 10-Year Update. Available at: https://www.aecf.org
Nonprofits have become society’s conscience — but at what cost? It’s time to name the systemic imbalance that asks mission-driven organizations to fix the very systems that create harm, and to imagine a path toward shared accountability and liberation.
Nonprofits have long been positioned as society’s moral compass, feeding the hungry, sheltering the unhoused, protecting children, and filling the gaps left by systems that were never designed to serve everyone. They are the social infrastructure of last resort, the safety net under a safety net.
But let’s be honest: the nonprofit sector was never meant to be a permanent substitute for justice. It has become the patch on a system that keeps tearing itself apart.
The Paradox of the Nonprofit Promise
Established institutions are meant to ensure the continuity of society, while profit-driven businesses are meant to facilitate exchange and growth. But when both fail to include the public equitably, nonprofits are called to step in, not as innovators, but as first responders to systemic neglect.
Over time, this has created a moral and financial paradox: the very organizations tasked with repairing inequity are required to operate within inequitable structures. They’re expected to report on “impact” using resources so constrained that their employees often qualify for the very programs they administer.
Meanwhile, funders — governmental and private alike — demand transformation on a shoestring, confusing endurance for effectiveness. We gather in conferences, form coalitions, and celebrate collaboration while quietly designing around the same root problem: a system that depends on inequity to justify its own existence.
The Vicious Loop of Nonprofit Constraint
The nonprofit sector’s greatest challenge isn’t innovation, funding, or even burnout; it’s complicity by design.
Organizations are tasked with solving the very crises that government and industry perpetuate, while being bound by the same scarcity and precarity that define the populations they serve. Every grant proposal becomes an act of survival. Every reporting cycle is a negotiation for legitimacy.
Nonprofits are told to prove their worth in a market that undervalues care to justify their existence, while the conditions that make them necessary are left untouched.
It’s time to flip the script: the burden of accountability does not belong solely to nonprofits; it belongs to the systems that create the harm.
A Better Deal: Shifting the Weight of Responsibility
It’s time to stop pretending that the problem is inefficiency among nonprofit leaders. The real inefficiency lies in a funding ecosystem that rewards output over outcome and compliance over courage.
Funders and policymakers must be held to the same ethical standards that nonprofits are measured by: transparency, responsibility, integrity, and fairness.
💬 If your funding model sustains harm while measuring “impact,” you are not funding change, you are funding management.
When a housing nonprofit is asked to “reduce homelessness” in a market with no affordable housing stock, that’s not partnership, that’s performance. When workforce programs are funded in economies with stagnant wages, the results are predetermined.
It is unethical to demand outcomes that are impossible under current market conditions, and even more unethical to blame organizations for failing to deliver them.
Accountability Ethics Evolved
True accountability must move beyond audits and logic models to confront power directly.
Accountability ethics means that nonprofits, funders, and government bodies share responsibility for the social outcomes they claim to pursue. Nonprofits can, and must, redefine accountability upward: demanding that funders demonstrate how their investments align with systemic repair, not just service delivery.
It’s time for funding to come with a mirror, not just a mandate.
Are funders willing to change the systems that create the need for their grants?
Are governments ready to legislate justice, not just delegate charity?
Are corporations willing to reduce harm, not just offset it?
Until the answer is yes, the nonprofit sector will remain trapped in a loop of triage and exhaustion.
Justice Evolved: Liberation in Practice
Liberated nonprofits understand their dual role: to serve and to subvert. They meet immediate needs while refusing to normalize the conditions that create those needs.
They see their proximity to pain as a form of power, a vantage point for truth-telling, advocacy, and redesign. They use partnerships not to appease funders, but to challenge them. They measure success not only in services delivered, but in systems shifted.
✨ Liberation in this context isn’t rebellion; it’s repair.
Justice-evolved organizations recognize that their work is not charity, it’s a counterbalance, a commitment to equity that should not be outsourced but shared.
When nonprofits act with liberation at the center, they transform from crisis managers to systems architects, designing futures where the need for a “safety net” is finally obsolete.
In Closing: The Call to Collective Accountability
The nonprofit sector’s evolution depends on our collective willingness to ask harder questions: Who benefits from the permanence of inequity? Who profits from the dependency we mistake for service? Who is accountable for the gap between what we fund and what we fix?
Liberating nonprofits isn’t about dismantling the sector; it’s about freeing it from the burden of being society’s conscience alone.
🪶 It’s time for a new deal: one where care is not charity, justice is not optional, and accountability is shared at every level of power.
The most compelling grant proposals aren’t written to impress funders; they’re written to honor communities. Behind every winning proposal is a story of clarity, alignment, and integrity. When your project plan reflects a genuine understanding of the people you serve, your grant proposal becomes more than a funding request; it becomes an invitation to invest in shared transformation.
This guide will walk you through the core strategies for writing a grant proposal that resonates, rooted in human-centered design and liberation-centered leadership.
Strategy 1: Understand Your Participants’ Real Needs and Priorities
Effective proposals begin where good programs begin, with people. Before you write a single line, take time to understand the needs, strengths, and aspirations of the community you serve.
Use data from a participant-informed needs assessment, one that intentionally includes the voices and expertise of people with lived experience. If existing assessments don’t reflect that, host a focus group, community conversation, or listening session to ground your understanding in reality rather than assumption.
Then, write a participant profile that describes your community with care and context: demographics, environment, culture, and history. Use strengths-based language, focus on resilience and assets, not deficits.
Finally, craft a problem statement that explains why your organization and project exist. What gap are you filling, and why does it matter? If others serve the same population, clarify what’s distinct about your approach or relationship to the community.
✨ Liberation Lens: Avoid centering scarcity or “saving” language. Instead of proving need, demonstrate partnership and purpose.
Strategy 2: Describe Your Theory of Change
Your theory of change is the story of how your work creates change. It bridges the gap between problem and possibility.
Describe your approach in plain language; what you do, how you do it, and why it works. Include your service model (for example: home-based case management, center-based programming, or mobile outreach) and the evidence that supports it.
Evidence-based doesn’t mean expensive. You can access free or open-source frameworks through directories like the California Evidence-Based Clearinghouse for Child Welfare. Search for “evidence-based programs for [your cause]” to identify approaches that align with your mission and capacity.
Explain how you’ll adapt that evidence for your community, because liberation-centered programming honors both rigor and relevance.
Strategy 3: Use Local Data Thoughtfully
Local data makes your proposal relatable and real. It helps reviewers see the story unfolding in their own backyard. Draw from community-level statistics, local reports, or qualitative data (focus groups, interviews, testimonials).
If your program is the first of its kind, use data that illustrates why your approach fills an existing gap. Then, translate that data into clear, accessible language, no jargon, no acronyms.
🪶 Remember: Your reader might be a volunteer or generalist. Clarity is a form of respect.
Strategy 4: Provide a Clear and Values-Aligned Budget
Budgets tell stories, too. They reveal what we value. Start with a master budget that includes staffing, operations, and resources. Make sure it reflects your values (fair wages, accessibility, participant wellbeing) as much as your logistics.
From there, create funder-specific versions by adapting the master budget to meet each funder’s priorities and restrictions. Show how funds will be used to achieve outcomes, not just cover expenses.
💡 Tip: Think of your budget as an equity tool. It’s an opportunity to model transparency and care in how you resource people and projects.
Strategy 5: Create a Logic Model That Actually Makes Sense
Logic models often intimidate new nonprofit leaders, but they don’t have to. Think of them as a snapshot of transformation: how people move from where they are to where they want to be through your program.
Here’s what to include:
Goals: The broad vision your project supports (rooted in your community’s self-identified needs).
Objectives: Specific, measurable steps toward those goals.
Activities: What you’ll actually do — workshops, outreach, services, etc.
Inputs/Resources: The people, tools, and funding that make it possible.
Outputs: The tangible results (sessions held, people served, materials produced).
Outcomes: The meaningful change you aim for (skills gained, systems shifted, lives improved).
Indicators: How you’ll know it’s working (data points, feedback, or milestones).
🧩 Liberation Lens: A good logic model doesn’t just measure what you do, it measures what matters to the people you serve.
Strategy 6: Build a Master Program Guide
Your Master Program Guideis a living document that ties it all together. It serves as a roadmap for your team, aligning your program’s purpose, process, and funding opportunities.
This guide should:
Outline how your program connects to your organization’s mission and vision
Identify overlaps with funder priorities
Include standardized sections you can easily adapt for each grant application
The result? A resource that saves time, ensures consistency, and strengthens your team’s shared understanding of the work.
Grant Writing Best Practices
To summarize:
1. Plan Ahead: Give yourself time to think, not just write. Reflection strengthens proposals.
2. Use Data and Evidence Responsibly: Center stories and statistics equally — both matter in demonstrating impact.
3. Tailor Without Compromising: Align with funders’ priorities only when they align with your mission. Avoid mission drift disguised as opportunity.
4. Build a Repeatable System: Create a consistent application checklist and internal review process. This builds confidence, not chaos.
In Closing
The grant proposal is a mirror of your organization’s values, readiness, and relationships. When you write from a place of clarity and connection, funders see not just a project, but a partnership.
Your next step? Build the internal systems that make your process sustainable. We’ll explore that in Part Three of the series.
Basic Grant Writing Steps for New Nonprofit Organizations
You’ve built your nonprofit from the ground up — mission clarified, programs designed, finances mapped out. Now comes one of the most intimidating (and often misunderstood) steps: finding and writing your first grant.
Grant writing isn’t just about persuasion or perfect formatting; it’s about alignment, storytelling, and integrity. When approached with clarity and care, it becomes a practice of resourcing community power rather than chasing dollars.
Let’s walk through a liberatory, accessible approach to grant writing that centers relationships, readiness, and the people you serve.
Understanding the Grant Writing Process
At its core, grant writing is a form of storytelling, but one that must translate community need into institutional language. Funders, whether government agencies, foundations, corporations, or individuals, want to see how your work connects to outcomes that matter to them. Your job is to stay authentic to your mission while building that bridge.
Think of the process less as “applying for money” and more as “inviting partnership.”
The Grant Writing Journey Includes:
Building your internal system of organization and readiness
Researching funders that align with your values and programs
Understanding funder guidelines and funding priorities
Writing a compelling, evidence-informed proposal
Submitting with care and following up with the relationship top of mind.
Grant writing takes time, often several months, so plan ahead. You’re not just managing a deadline; you’re cultivating a cycle of trust and opportunity.
Step 1: Build Your Grant Management System
Before you write anything, create an infrastructure that supports you. A grant management system keeps your documents organized and accessible, reducing stress later.
You don’t need fancy software to start; a shared Google Drive or Dropbox folder and a spreadsheet can go a long way.
Include:
Organizational documents: IRS designation letter, articles of incorporation, board resolution, staff bios/resumes, and current board list
Financials: Current profit and loss report, balance sheet, board-approved budget, and a program-specific budget for each initiative
Program materials: Clear project descriptions, outcomes, and community impact statements
Keeping these up to date ensures that when opportunities arise, you’re ready, not scrambling.
Step 2: Identify Funding Opportunities That Fit
The best grants aren’t just available; they’re aligned. Start by identifying funders who share your values and serve similar populations.
Begin with advocacy networks or associations in your field (e.g., a health-based nonprofit might start with the American Heart Association).
Visit your local library; many provide free access to the Candid Foundation Directory.
Explore local community foundations, service clubs (Rotary, Kiwanis), or corporate giving programs at major retailers.
💡 A note on Grants.gov: Federal grants can be powerful, but they’re often massive in scope and demand extensive capacity. Think of them as graduate-level opportunities, something to pursue once your systems, staffing, and partnerships are solid.
Instead, focus on building collaborative partnerships with organizations already funded through these channels. Being a subgrantee or partner can provide vital experience and credibility while expanding community impact.
Liberatory lesson: You’re not “competing” for crumbs, you’re co-creating abundance. Strategic partnerships expand the pie for everyone.
Step 3: Analyze Each Opportunity for Alignment
Once you’ve found a potential fit, study the funder’s priorities and past grantees. Does this opportunity resonate with your mission?
Create a simple tracking sheet (a spreadsheet works perfectly) that captures:
Funder name and contact info
Alignment with your mission
Grant amount and purpose
Deadlines and requirements
Notes on relationships or introductions to make
Don’t just ask, “Can we get this?”, ask, “Should we?” Misalignment drains energy and trust. A smaller, well-fitting grant is worth far more than a large, misaligned one.
Step 4: Write with Heart and Evidence
Your proposal is your story told through data and structure. Funders want to know that your vision is sound, your team is capable, and your community is behind you.
To write a strong, human-centered proposal:
Lead with your why: What change do you exist to create?
Ground your case in both data and dignity: Include statistics, but also human stories and context.
Be specific about outcomes, not just activities: What difference will this make?
Use accessible, clear language; avoid jargon or inflated promises.
Show collaboration: Highlight how you work with others, not just for them.
And remember: brevity is a kindness. Funders read hundreds of proposals — clarity stands out.
Step 5: Submit and Follow Up with Intention
Review your proposal thoroughly before submitting; spelling, tone, and alignment all matter. Ask a trusted peer to review it or consider hiring a grant consultant for feedback.
After submission, don’t disappear. Send a brief thank-you note or update the funder on new developments in your work. If you aren’t awarded, ask for feedback — it’s part of your learning process and builds future relationships.
In Closing
Grant writing is a creative and technical skill; it’s a form of storytelling, strategy, and stewardship. By approaching it through a liberation and human-centered lens, you transform it from a transactional process into a relational practice rooted in trust, care, and alignment.
Remember: the goal isn’t just to get funded; it’s to stay rooted in your mission and build partnerships that sustain both your organization and your community over time.
