Events

Learning Community

Name: Movement-Aligned Funding Learning Community
Start: 2026-01-29T10:00:00-08:00
End: 2026-01-29T11:00:00-08:00

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Movement-Aligned Funding Learning Community

January 29, 2026 @ 10:00 am – 11:00 am PST

Systems change requires a deliberate shift in power. In a landscape where the industrial, consolidated, and corporate food system is well-funded, deeply entrenched, and politically coordinated, community-led movements must be equally robust—supported with consistent resources, strong social infrastructure, and long-term investment.

Shifting power means centering and following the leadership of those most affected by injustice—Black, Indigenous, and People of Color; immigrants; workers; 2SLGBTQIA+ people; women; disabled, low-income, poor, and other urban and rural marginalized communities. Movements for food justice and food sovereignty need sustained investment in the organizing, coalition-building, and leadership development that enable communities to build and wield power over time.

This requires resources that are distributed nationally, regionally, and locally to support base building, advocacy, and community-led interventions across local, state, Tribal, and national scales. Social and structural change is only possible when communities have the time, infrastructure, and capacity to organize—not just react.

Funders play a critical role in supporting this work. To be “movement-aligned,” funders must adapt practices and priorities to the values and leadership of frontline communities. This includes trusting community governance, supporting grassroots leadership, sharing decision-making power, and shifting traditional funder prerogatives—even when it is uncomfortable.

Who Is This For?

This quarterly, peer-led Learning Community is open to all SAFSF members. It is a space for honest dialogue, where funders can share practices, mistakes, uncertainties, and lessons learned with a shared intention of improving accountability to the communities most impacted by food system injustice.

We will read short pieces together and periodically invite movement leaders to ground the conversation. However, this is not a curriculum-based or exhaustive learning space, and we recognize that funders must seek learning directly, in non-extractive ways, from grassroots organizations and frontline leaders beyond this setting. Rather, this Learning Community is designed to help funders do the internal work to examine the power, privilege, and practices that shape philanthropy and assess how we can more consistently dismantle oppressive systems in our work and be a catalytic force for powerful movement building.

All SAFSF members are welcome, and we especially encourage funders who are newer to movement-building or movement-aligned grantmaking or investing to participate.

Why a Funder-Only Learning Community on Movement-Aligned Funding?

This space is intentionally designed for funders because:

Funders need a place to build internal discipline and accountability without placing additional burdens on movement leaders to constantly educate them.
Funders must examine their own power, habits, and practices—work that often requires internal organizing and strategy alignment.
Funders need to be prepared before meaningfully engaging with movement partners, so that conversations with frontline leaders are not extractive, repetitive, or centering funder needs.
This learning community complements—not replaces—direct engagement with movement organizations. The core purpose is to strengthen funders’ readiness to show up better in those relationships.

Our intention is to help funders transform their practices to be accountable partners in multiracial, frontline-led movements, not to create a bubble where funders only talk to funders.