Akonadi Foundation is excited to announce that we have awarded a total of $2.23 million in grants this year to 15 organizations through our All in For Oakland fund. Each of the organizations is working to cultivate the power of young people and families who have been criminalized by the education and juvenile justice systems and to hold people in power accountable.
Started in 2020, Akonadi’s All in for Oakland fund is a five-year, $12.5 million initiative to end the criminalization of Black youth and youth of color in Oakland. The initiative invests in an ecosystem of movement organizations that are organizing and mobilizing directly impacted people to win police-free schools, fix school discipline, close youth prisons, and realize other critical outcomes to transform youth justice in Oakland.
“We are deeply committed to audaciously funding organizations that are resisting systems which historically and disproportionately criminalize Black youth and youth of color. As funders, we have the power to invest in movement leaders who are working to transform the youth justice and youth development system in order to achieve a racially just Oakland where youth of color can thrive,” said Ray Colmenar, our new President.
Since 2020, we have invested in the organizations listed below and added East Bay Family Defenders as a new grantee to the fund this year. Through the power of long-term, sustainable investments, we will continue to resource people of color-led movement, base-building, organizing, policy advocacy, healing, and research to fuel and win transformational systems change.
“We are deeply committed to audaciously funding organizations that are resisting systems which historically and disproportionately criminalize Black youth and youth of color. As funders, we have the power to invest in movement leaders who are working to transform the youth justice and youth development system in order to achieve a racially just Oakland where youth of color can thrive,”
Ray Colmenar, President
Learn more about our All in for Oakland grant partners, who have been leading this important work in Oakland.