BY TFN STAFF

In today’s complex social and political landscape, bold leadership is more critical than ever — yet those who take courageous stands often face backlash, diminished resources, physical threats, and pressure to water down their work.

Those challenges can be even more pronounced for leaders of color, especially those carrying multiple identities, amid concerted efforts to undermine and attack the values, policies, and programs that support intersectional diversity, equity and inclusion.

Are foundations truly ready, willing and able to ensure leaders of color not only survive but thrive in these tumultuous times?

Join us March 17-19 in Baltimore for TFN’s 25th Anniversary Conference: Be Bold Together, where we’ll welcome three powerful voices to our main stage to share their lived experiences and strategies for supporting courageous leadership in the face of internal and external adversity.

Our Monday Plenary Panel: Supporting and Protecting Bold Leaders of Color will feature Susan Taylor Batten of ABFE: A Philanthropic Partnership for Black Communities, Temi F. Bennett of iF, A Foundation for Radical Possibility and Alice Y. Hom of CHANGE Philanthropy

This plenary session will explore how and why organizations and individuals should step up to ensure bold leaders of color have the resources, networks, and environments necessary to not only survive but thrive — and build stronger and more effective teams in the process.

➡️Read on to learn more about TFN25 and our Monday Plenary Panel, and be sure to check out our learning agenda for a full list of plenary presenters and other speakers.

About the Panelists

Susan Taylor Batten
President & CEO
ABFE: A Philanthropic Partnership for Black Communities.

ABFE is a membership-driven philanthropic organization that champions responsive and transformative investment in Black communities. Since 2009, Taylor Batten has spearheaded ABFE’s philanthropic counsel and initiatives on responsive philanthropy for Black communities, aiding foundation leaders, donors, and partners.

Bringing over 25 years of leadership in both private and public sectors to ABFE, she previously held positions with the Annie E. Casey Foundation’s Community Change Initiatives Unit, at the U.S. Department of Agriculture overseeing research and evaluation of food assistance programs, and with the Government of the District of Columbia as an analyst focusing on child and family support initiatives.

She serves on the boards of the Caribbean Philanthropic Alliance and Giving Gap and regularly lectures at HBCUs about philanthropy in Black communities.

 

Temi F. Bennett
Co-CEO
iF, A Foundation for Radical Possibility

iF envisions a world where Black people and people of the global majority live powerfully, abundantly and beautifully in healthy, self-determined communities free of social, economic and ideological violence.

Bennett has been the driver of iF’s embrace of reparations as an essential element of any effort to advance racial justice. She co-led an effort in partnership with the National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy to create the 2024 report Cracks in the Foundation: Philanthropy’s Role in Reparations for Black People in the DMV.

The report developed and executed a methodology that examines D.C.-based foundation endowments to determine if Black communities were harmed in their creation.

She also co-founded and is a member of Resourcing Radical Justice (RRJ), a funders collective that centers Black liberation as the path to a thriving greater Washington region and s a member of the policy table and the reparations working group of Movement 4 Black Lives (M4BL).

 

Alice Y. Hom,
Executive Director
CHANGE Philanthropy

CHANGE Philanthropy is a coalition of philanthropic networks working together to strengthen bridges across funders and communities.They seek to  transform philanthropy from within by building knowledge, fostering diversity, and creating connections. Prior to joining CHANGE, Hom worked on educating funders on operationalizing racial justice with an intersectional lens as the Director of Equity and Social Justice at Northern California Grantmakers.

Hom currently serves on the board of the American LGBTQ+ Museum and on the Advisory Council for the Conscious Style Guide, a resource on inclusive, respectful and empowering language on ability/disability, age, ethnicity, gender, race, sexuality, and socioeconomic status.

Alice is a co-editor of two anthologies, Q & A: Voices from Queer Asian North America and Q & A: Queer in Asian America.
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