G-2307-19220

The Partnership for Southern Equity (PSE) seeks to advance equity through an ecosystem-based model that focuses on four key areas: energy, growth, health, and opportunity. PSE promotes racial equity through policy advocacy and community power-building.

PSE is a returning grantee partner to CareQuest Institute and, in the organization's first grant period, found success in its efforts to launch YES! For Equity, an initiative aimed at building power among youth through skill building, critical awareness, and opportunity. YES! For Equity, along with PSE's Just Youth Circle, which also serves as a forum for advocacy education, training, and networking for BIPOC youth and adult leaders from across Georgia, hired 13 youth staff, partner with youth teams from four youth-serving nonprofit organizations across different geographic regions of Georgia who were interested in advocating for improved oral health access and outcomes for BIPOC communities. These community-based individuals and organizational partners carried out oral health community assessments and supported youth leaders to develop visual/photovoice advocacy materials.

By the end of the grant period, the youth leaders and their adult mentors, supported by PSE, engaged more than 15 new organizations at the grassroots and state levels and administered more than 500 community surveys (80% of respondents identified as Black or African American) that revealed multiple barriers to oral health access, stratified by geography. This work also resulted in PSE identifying three key policy recommendations for the state to consider as solutions to these barriers: 1) oral healthcare integration into primary healthcare, 2) increase Medicaid reimbursements for dental care, and 3) expand access and scheduling availability to ease time constraints for would-be patients.

The proposal for the coming year seeks to build on the community assessment recommendations identified and put forth by PSE and its youth-leadership cohort. That said, PSE plans to expand the number of partner organizations supporting policy and systems change advocacy from four to eight in Georgia. This expansion will include a broadened base of youth and adult advocates who will receive advocacy training and coordinated resources to host community teach-in events, engage with elected officials, and capture other community stories about barriers to oral health. In addition to creating and extending new youth advocacy opportunities to new areas of Georgia, PSE also aims to replicate its initial grant project's success in North Carolina, where the organization already has strong oral health partners from similar work it had initiated between 2014 – 2020. During that period, PSE provided grants to more than a dozen organizations to examine the impact of food access, tobacco & e-cigarettes, public transit, and school water access, on BIPOC communities in NC, and saw success in advocacy on these issues. With additional funding, the organization would be positioned to begin re-engagement of four youth advocacy organizations, and their adult ally partners, while continuing toward its commitment to tour all eleven states in the southeast region as part of its health policy work.

By the end of the proposed grant period, PSE anticipates several projected qualitative and quantitative outcomes that will help measure the number of youth and adults working to shift racial inequities and advance policy and systems change toward oral health equity. These data include numbers of staff hired, retained, and upskilled as well as the number of engagements with community leaders, policymakers, and states engaged in the organization’s broader, coordinated oral health advocacy efforts.

This proposal is being recommended for funding in the amount of $175,500. This funding will support six youth staff member stipends and six project staff salaries in addition to travel support, graphic design/videography, and mini grants to 12 partner organizations in GA and NC ($5,000 each). Match funding is indicated throughout the budget and is included in all staff roles for this project. PSE has immense potential to support oral health advocacy and interest in Southern states, which is critical given CareQuest Institute's limited philanthropic impact currently. Furthermore, as a BIPOC-led organization with expertise in advocacy training, youth organizing, and health equity issues, there could be a future opportunity to expand this partnership support to empower PSE as a convener of individual leaders and communities committed to oral health access and integration.