Slingshot Fund

Programmatically, this was a banner year for Slingshot. We launched our flagship program the Slingshot fellowship, bringing together 10 amazing young philanthropists who are poised for significant communal leadership (see more information and profiles below.) We started a mentoring program bringing accomplished funders together with emerging funders. We are exploring what it looks like to apply a racial equity lens to grantmaking and learning about new ways of responsibly holding power and moving money. We've trained board members, held book groups. We've pickled and shared dinner in a sukkah and we've wrestled with some of the biggest issues facing the jewish world.see schedule ooperationally, we are functioning more efficiently to deploy programs and resources. Slingshot's first director of community development, sarah strnad just celebrated her one-year anniversary with us. Having her on our team ensures that we have dedicated focus on program recruitment, connecting community members to one another and strengthening the Slingshot brand throughout the jewish community. Additionally, the Slingshot board is stepping up to lead us through these historic times with thoughtful and intentional governance and oversight. The global pandemic has changed how we all understand the work/life balance issue. It raised issues for us about our policies and practices. Without an office home life intersected with work life and the normal 9-5 workday became obsolete. No one understood this better than our board of young people who were also balancing work and home life. As a result, in september of this year the board passed two important and groundbreaking policies which we hope to see more of in the jewish community demonstrating true leadership from within the community of young donors.board leadership: we ran three board leadership trainings with pjsf x 2164 (the paul and jenna segal foundation and 2164), one in november 2018, february 2019 and november 2019. We had nearly 30 people take our course. In 2020, we will run 2-3 trainings in partnership with local partners. Potential partners include the communities of san francisco, atlanta, los angeles, detroit, new york city, and chicago. *resources for the field: Slingshot published money, gender, and power: a guide to funding with a gender lens in september 2019. This resource, a tool for young, jewish philanthropists and beyond, gives funders the necessary guideposts to incorporate a gender lens into their philanthropy. It also applies a jewish lens to the work, bringing jewish wisdom to bear in the call to gender justice. In the first month, we have already disseminated the guide to over 1000 people and hosted a launch party in san francisco. The response has been overwhelming and we are currently developing an associated curriculum and training to better help funders implement a gender lens into their work. We anticipate launching that training nationally in spring 2020. As we plan for the future, we are in initial discussions about our next publication - a guide to funding with a racial equity lens. This is a timely issue for our constituents, particularly in light of the recent study showing that nearly 20% of the jewish community are people of color. Action circles: in may 2018 our first action circle focused on anti semitism completed an eight-part educational series, learning more about how anti-semitism is playing out today. They learned from a wide range of leaders including rabbi jill jacobs from t'ruah, rabbis and others who engaged with the 2019 women's march organizers, researchers from the u.s. Holocaust museum, the executive director of the jcrc in boston, eric ward from western states center, and stosh cotler from bend the arc. We are moving into the next phase of the work where members of the group will take action together, collectively funding the creation of an anti-racism/anti bias training for jewish funders and community influencers. This inaugural pilot provides an opportunity to experiment with various facilitation models and test ideas. Our goal is to have a replicable model that can be deployed around any issue. Our second action circle will launch in 2020, and we are already in early stages of recruitment.board matching: we secured funding to develop a methodology for pairing trained young philanthropists with organizations that are looking to expand and diversify their boards. We hired rebecca youngerman of rgy consulting to conduct a landscape scan and needs assessment. We want to better understand what is working and what is broken in the jewish community so that we can employ the proper interventions to better integrate our populations into leadership positions. We are in the early stages of partnerships with several jewish organizations that have agreed to learn along-side us as they integrate young philanthropic board members onto their boards. These partnerships will serve as "pilots and help us develop the formal methodology for future placements. *10 to watch: in september 2019 we opened applications for the "10 to watch" list. This new resource is the evolution of our Slingshot guide and will feature an annual, unique list of organizations and projects that demonstrate a fresh approach to a current and timely need. Eligible organizations serve a north american audience, have been in the field for less than five years, and provide a fresh way to address a relevant problem. We received over 50 applications and are working with 30 young funders and emerging program officers to select the inaugural cohort. Website: in september 2019 we unveiled an updated website that showcases all of our new work. Young philanthropists are now able to learn about upcoming trainings and register online. Jewish organizations can plug into our board matching work and the "10 to watch" list. Other funders and community members will find additional resources, blog posts, and connections to partners. We are excited about the opportunities this newly designed site affords us to create conversation and showcase jewish innovation.