We are entering our eighth year at Kindred. In Pythagorean numerology, the number 8 speaks to victory, prosperity and overcoming challenges, all of which are representative of my journey as Executive Director. To date, we have partnered with over 30 schools in our local community serving nearly 7,000 students. This year, we launched our work nationally to serve school communities in New York City, California and Washington State. We honor the caregivers, school staff, and district and school leaders who have entrusted our team to facilitate brave conversations about the state of equity within their communities. We are grateful that, in addition to the technical fixes school communities have embarked upon to address equity, they have chosen to do the deep, and challenging adaptive work to shift towards more equitable practices with a goal of engaging in community-led change.
We are stronger as a team because of our partnerships with school communities across the country and we hope that our work together has been as transformational for their communities as it has been for us. We are fortunate to have captured these learnings in the Liberatory Collaboration Framework (LCF). The LCF serves multiple goals in our vision of communities collaborating to create antiracist and liberated schools: 1) it serves as a guide to school communities as they work towards building more equitable practices and policies; 2) a formative assessment; and 3) a tool to aid the community in determining the capabilities that are strengths and the ones that need developed in order to maximize their equity action planning and implementation.
At Kindred, we wholly believe that experience is one of life’s best teachers. In that vein, our school level work has only revealed and reinforced the idea that there are systemic issues and power dynamics at the city level that prevent school communities from becoming truly antiracist, liberated communities that prioritize the needs of all students; especially for Black and Brown students. Read The Rest Here
We want to wish all of our partners, old and new, a year filled with boundless opportunity. We are excited to share updates on the 5-year strategic priorities. By 2027, we have endeavored to:
- Deepen our Impact: 50 DC Schools
To date we have partnered with 25 DC public and charter schools. - Launch an Alumni Program: 500 Active Alumni
Our advocacy work will kick-off our alumni program! We will grow the alumni program by 20 caregiver alum to our program each year. Ultimately, we plan to develop an online portal for alumni to learn and share resources that center equity in their school communities. - Expand our Reach: To 3 Communities Nationwide
We have achieved the goal of expanding our work nationwide with partnerships in California, New York City, and Washington State! An essential next step in further expanding our work is the design and codification of user-friendly tools and resources that will support sustained equity work in our schools.
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Partner with Us!
We are always looking for new partnerships! Whether you are interested in learning more about how to partner with us, sharing best practices for community-led change, or looking to invest in the Kindred community, please reach out to us at info@kindredcommunities.org.
Onward!
Zakiya Sackor