Archstone Foundation is still accepting requests for proposals for its third round of grants from its capacity building program, “Supporting Diverse Communities and Advancing Racial and Health Equity for Older Adults through Capacity Building.”
Applications are due by noon Pacific time on August 17. Applicants will be notified by September 1 if they have been invited to submit a full proposal.
The purpose of this program is to assist nonprofits serving older adults in achieving new levels of effectiveness by strengthening their leadership and management. The funding is intended exclusively for organizations serving diverse communities and committed to advancing racial health equity. In an effort to reduce health disparities and advance equity, the current RFP is specific to organizations focused on serving racially and ethnically diverse older people, LGBTQ+ older adults, and/or otherwise diverse older people including women, immigrants, low-income older adults, and other communities that have been historically marginalized.
Ongoing Commitment to Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion-focused Grants
Addressing heath disparities and a focus on diversity, equity, and inclusion is a critical part of our strategic plan. More than half of funding for our Three T – Teams, Training, and Teams – work is supporting projects that serve diverse communities and aim to reduce disparities. Additionally, in our capacity building program, every other funding round has been dedicated exclusively to supporting diverse-serving and diverse-led direct service organizations in the field of aging.
The first round of Supporting Diverse Communities and Advancing Racial and Health Equity for Older Adults through Capacity Building grants, awarded in March 2021, provided support to the Downtown Women’s Center, the Little Tokyo Service Center and Somang Society. Now that their funding period has ended, we thought it a good time to review their projects and the lessons that will shape the Foundation’s future grantmaking. (We also recently updated the capacity building program with your important feedback.)
- Downtown Women’s Center (DWC) of Los Angeles hired a part-time public health coordinator to address the disproportionate impact of COVID-19 on older adults and women of color with histories of homelessness and trauma. The grant enabled DWC to make this a permanent staff position, allowing the Center to better address disparities in healthcare during the pandemic for its residents and participants, mostly older adults whose chronic health conditions make them particularly vulnerable to severe illness. The public health coordinator implemented a daily self-assessment, organized weekly COVID testing, and supported a vaccination education program. The vaccination program centered on “vaccine ambassadors,” community health workers with lived experience of homelessness, who coordinated educational sessions on COVID-19 and encouraged vaccinations in the community. The public health coordinator also codified public health- and safety-related tasks to better respond to ongoing public health crises.
- Little Tokyo Service Center of Los Angeles implemented a new customer relationship management software from Social Solutions called Apricot 360 to track and coordinate services for its clients, primarily Japanese Americans and Latinx older adults in the Little Tokyo neighborhood of Los Angeles and the South Bay area. The center was able to customize and implement its new system and provide training for staff. Its staff are now able to easily track outcomes, analyze demographic data, see trends in service needs, and aid in planning future services.
- Somang Society’s mission is to providing services and information to Korean American older adults and their caregivers, most of whom speak only Korean. These services include a Korean-speaking dementia care class, a social program for older adults with early-stage dementia run by volunteer retired nurses; educational seminars on end-of-life issues such as advanced directives and dementia caregiving; Korean-speaking family caregiver support groups; and information services for the community during the pandemic. The Foundation grant allowed the organization to complete staff training and a membership drive, hire a bilingual staff member, recruit and train additional volunteers, and increase its ability to receive grants and work in partnership with other organizations, educational institutions, hospitals, and government agencies to expand their reach in providing in-language services and education for the Korean American community.
A second round of Supporting Diverse Communities and Advancing Racial and Health Equity for Older Adults through Capacity Building grants was awarded in November 2021 to the Community Health Initiative of Orange County, the National Health Foundation, Alzheimer's Orange County, and the Watts Labor Community Action Committee. These grants will conclude in December.
Lessons Learned
In reviewing these DEI-focused capacity building grants, we identified some important lessons to help guide our future grantmaking:
- Need for Staff Training: Building the organizational capacity of staff through training and providing necessary tools are critical to reaching diverse communities of older adults. Organizations focused on serving racial or ethnically diverse communities are often the trusted source of health information and social service access, so continued support for them is necessary to reach marginalized communities.
- Need for Technology Support. Requests for capacity building grants to improve technology and customer relationship management continue to be popular. Requests for information technology support are sure to continue as technology updates are constantly needed to maintain security and comply with federal health privacy regulations, internet and remote access capabilities, computer replacement, staff training, and other related needs.
- Providing Support Beyond the Grant Dollar. Catchafire, a nonprofit that matches professionals seeking to volunteer their expertise with nonprofits who need their skills, has shown to be an asset for organizations who have completed projects, with survey results indicating a high level of satisfaction from Archstone Foundation users for Catchafire services. Access to the Catchafire platform is offered to grantees and declined applicants. You can read more about our Catchafire partnership here.
Open Request for Proposals
After this third round of grantmaking ends, opportunities to apply for capacity building support will occur annually. After this RFP deadline passes on August 17, the next opportunity to apply for a capacity building grant will be July 2023.
Organizations not selected for funding may have the opportunity to participate in future capacity building support from Catchafire. Most people say they heard about these funding opportunities from our Archstone Announces email or from our website, so be sure you are signed up to receive future updates from the Foundation.
Jasmine Lacsamana contributed to this post.
