Programs

As the entry point to FCYO’s GenPower Labs, the Organizing to Win Lab is a one-year grantmaking initiative that supports a broad range of youth organizing groups addressing the most pressing issues of the moment. This year’s Organizing to Win Lab is centered around transforming civic engagement practices for sustainable, long-term impact. Over the next year, 15 organizations will come together in a shared learning and practice community focused on harnessing the organizing opportunities afforded by an election year to advance a long-term strategic orientation.

YO-CARE 2 is working to strengthen the relationships between emergent and legacy climate and environmental justice groups, while supporting their daily work through the application of FCYO’s Power to Win Framework. Over the next two years, the cohort will undergo a capacity building program to expand their reach and influence, carry out short-term power-building experiments, and co-facilitate educational webinars with FCYO program staff to share their learnings with other youth organizers in the climate and environmental justice sector.

Praxis for Power supports a cohort of eight organizations with a high level of alignment with FCYO’s Power to Win Framework. Participatnts are working to advance their capacities for building transformative power while simultaneously playing a leadership role in organizing the youth organizing field toward greater alignment, strategic capacity, and power-building.

The youth organizing field has come a long way, yet meeting this moment will require us to build a new level of power. It will require us to face and transcend our current limitations with honesty and vulnerability. It will require us to Level Up.

The Organizing to Win Lab is a one-year grantmaking initiative and the entry point into FCYO’s GenPower Labs. It will support a broad range of youth organizing groups addressing the most pressing issues of the moment. Groups will be introduced to FCYO's Power to Win Framework, strategic political education, organizational assessment tools and a peer learning community rooted in vulnerability and transparency toward the building of meaningful power. It is intended for groups who are evaluating their strategic approach to strengthen their organizing methodologies.

The GenPower Labs is FCYO’s response to the charges we face at this moment. As the core of our new program, the GenPower Labs is a three tiered strategic grantmaking and capacity building initiative designed to build a more powerful, strategic, and aligned youth organizing field with the capacities to address the challenges of this moment.

FCYO is proud to announce our 2020 Moment to Movement Fund grant partners. The Moment to Movement Fund is providing one-year grants to youth organizing groups responding to the current moment in ways that build power for low-income young people, young people of color, and gender oppressed young people to advance a more just and equitable society. In 2020 we are focused on two critical issues: climate change and voter engagement. Now more than ever, we believe the leadership of young people who have been most impacted by injustice is critical to creating a more just world.

FCYO’s 20th anniversary poses a unique opportunity to reflect on the advances youth organizing has made over the last 20 years, to evaluate our learnings from the Healthy Communities Initiative, and to put forth a courageous vision where health, justice, democracy, and equity are core values. This one-year cohort will focus on generating opportunities for alumni organizations of FCYO’s Healthy Communities Initiative to strengthen their skills and deepen their analyses. In addition, FCYO will assess the health equity landscape for youth of color to ensure future initiatives are grounded in the reality of how young people experience the adverse impacts of inequity on their health. Drawing from assessments of previous initiatives, below are the strategic areas we see as necessary to create healthier schools and communities. These will be the focal points of the organizer training, webinars, and grantmaking.

The FCYO Learning and Exchange Fund will awarded grants of up to $5,000 across the country for youth organizing groups that articulated clear learning goals for Peer-to-Peer Learning Exchange projects with other organizing entities. Organizations that would like to learn from each other’s model and/or strategies received grant support to engage in a shared learning activity.

Pipelines to Power will support youth and intergenerational organizing groups in strengthening organizing strategies to build the power necessary to win meaningful change for historically disenfranchised communities across the U.S. In addition to providing grant funds, this initiative will create a national learning community of organizers focused on theories of change and political analysis, and will support organizations to experiment with new strategies for building power in the current moment. Pipelines to Power is designed to help young people play critical roles in building strong intergenerational social movements by helping build a regenerating base of young social justice leaders and by supporting youth organizing groups to develop new strategies to build meaningful power.