In Summer 2024, we released a learning report detailing our lessons over the last four years of the Elevate Initiative. We detailed a number of recommendations and feedback gathered from grantees and our own staff experience. The Elevate Initiative: Alumni Learning Year is our response to those recommendations.

We were eager to consider what the next steps for this program could be. In doing so, we considered the feedback around maintaining an ongoing community of practice in which grantees could continue to deepen relationships, learn from one another, share resources, etc. We wanted to experiment and implement many of the recommendations offered to us by our grantees, including but not limited to:

1. – Continue to provide funding and non-monetary resources such as technical assistance and learning opportunities. programming, and innovation.
2. – Share more emerging learnings from the field with grantees to help inform their funding strategies and better equip them to approach other funders.
3. – Create even more space for reflection and connection at in-person engagements.

The Elevate Initiative seeks to sustain the momentum we have built over the last four years by inviting our 48 alumni organizations to participate in a 2025 Alumni Learning Year (ALY). The 2025 Elevate ALY is designed for former grantees to connect, learn from each other, and expand their impact. Through a hybrid model, participants will build relationships, share ideas, and examine challenges. We will design the cohorts to adapt to the participants’ evolving needs and changing contexts, while optional drop-in support offers additional problem-solving and strategic guidance. By the end of the year, alumni organizations will have strengthened their networks, developed actionable strategies, and built a foundation for long-term collaboration.

The 2025 ALY will operate like an economic mobility fellowship. We have curated three cohorts of alumni organizations to engage with each other over seven months (April to November). We curated the rosters based on each organization’s primary focus, as this was emphasized the most through grantee feedback (rather than geographic location or our previous Emerging/Established Organization framework). The below organizations opted into the learning year:

COHORT 1 
Entrepreneurship & Workforce Development
Latino Business Foundation Silicon Valley
I Be Black Girl
Change Labs
Casa de Salud
Enterprising Latinas
Custom Collaborative
Pupusas for Education
For Providers by Providers Louisiana
La Plaza de Encuentro
Collaborative Healing Initiative within Communities
Camden Dream Center
Indian Dispute Resolution Services
Valley Community Interpreters
510media Hope Foundation

Arts, Media & Culture
ANYxMEANS
On Location Memphis

COHORT 2 
Worker’s Rights & Worker Organizing
Power Coalition for Equity & Justice
WEPOWER
Migrant Justice
Venceremos
Coalition of Immokalee Workers
Arkansas United
National COSH
The San Diego Black Worker Center

Worker Cooperatives & Employee Ownership
Center for Cooperative Development & Solidarity
Northwest Bronx Community & Clergy Coalition
NC Employee Ownership Center
Uptima Entrepreneur Collective

COHORT 3 ROSTER
Reentry & Community Safety
Black & Pink
A New Way of Life Reentry Project
The Bambi Fund
Ujamaa Place
New Beginnings Reentry Services
The First 72+
Taller Salud
We Are Better Together

Farming, Food & Land Justice
Black Land Ownership Council
Gullah Farmers Cooperative Association
Black Farmers Hub
The Freedom Food Alliance
Hmong American Farmers Association
Black Farmers Market
Black Soil
FreshGreens Market
OurSpace World
Reuben V. Anderson Center

We are excited for the upcoming year of learning alongside our Elevate Alumni. Stay tuned for updates on our 2025 ALY.