Racial Equity in Our Governance
In 2022 Deaconess engaged in community across Eastern Missouri and Southern Illinois to envision a new strategic aspiration. As a result, the community called Deaconess to imagine its role in seeding a future world with conditions no one alive today has ever experienced, challenging Deaconess to audaciously own its power in our collective journey of and to racial liberation. Liberation is not meant to simply describe an outcome — rather it is an intentional and conscious movement in which our community can freely exist, dream and thrive in the absence of oppressive systems in a culture of solidarity, respect and dignity.
We are willing to experience discomfort and overcome obstacles in the spirit of racial liberation. For the next seven generations, Deaconess will orient our abundant relationships and resources within a liberatory framework so that our community will together realize the joy of freedom from oppressed systems.
With the historic mission and faith heritage of Deaconess in mind, in 2017 the Foundation Board of Trustees affirmed that racial equity is a critical step to the effective pursuit of the health and well-being of the Eastern Missouri and Southern Illinois community and its people, It must, therefore, be integrated into the desired outcomes, processes, and rituals of governance for the Foundation and the varied expression of the Deaconess mission.
Honoring the necessity of racial equity for the sustainability of our work, the Board of Trustees of Deaconess Foundation commits to policies, practices, and procedures of governance which reflect our desired outcome of well-being by aligning actions and expressions of governance with the reality of the people and communities we serve.
These commitments include, but will not be limited to:
Diversity
Seeking a board demographic composition closely aligned with the community we serve and reflecting, through intergenerational membership, proximity of their perspectives;
Inclusion
Listening to and prioritizing the perspectives of indigenous and impacted people when making decisions; and
Equity
Monitoring organizational performance with goals for equitable outcomes, meaningful data disaggregated by race and metrics for success in historically invisiblized groups.
As consistent with Deaconess’ Stated Governance Approach accountability for pursuit of racial equity in governance falls to the entire board as a committee-of-the-whole. Functional stewardship of the policies, practices and procedures fall to the Racial Equity Committee and Executive Committee in its responsibility for board learning, personnel policy, and nominating work.
Racial Equity Dashboard
The Racial Equity Committee is charged with evaluating the initiatives, the efforts, the culture of Deaconess Foundation, and upholding our commitment to racial equity in the region within our organization and in all of our work.
To hold ourselves accountable, Deaconess uses the Racial Equity Dashboard to measure our progress. Our aim is to measure how well we are eliminating racial disparities and improving outcomes for people of the global majority which requires us to intentionally and continually transform our practices and policies. Racial equity is a pathway to liberation.
Governance and Staff Demographic Data
A comparison of the demographics of Deaconess staff and board to our peers in the philanthropic community:
Source: Greater St. Louis Inc, US Census Bureau; Change Philanthropy: 2020 Diversity Among Philanthropic Professionals Report
Financial Investments
Our goal is to provide operational dollars for the Foundation while ensuring the Deaconess mission continues indefinitely. As of 2022, nearly one-third of our $50 million endowment is managed by women or by people of the global majority. A comparison of the demographics of our investment portfolio managers:
Women
People from the Global Majority
Source: Knight Foundation Report: Knight Diversity of Asset Managers Research Series: Philanthropy 2022
Diverse Suppliers
A comparison of the demographics of vendor organizations (e.g. caterers, landscapers, building maintenance, etc.) owned or led by people of the global majority:
* Source: 2023 Supplier Diversity Report, 466 companies in 15 industries
Grantmaking
According to a study by New Profit in 2020, organizations led by Black, Indigenous, and Latino/a/x leaders receive only an estimated 4% of total grants and contributions. In comparison, 58% of all Deaconess Foundation grants in 2022 were made to organizations led by people of the global majority. A comparison of grants Deaconess awards to organizations led by people of the global majority:
Grants to organizations led by black, indigenous, & Latino/a/x leaders
* Source: New Profit in 2020.
Equitable Culture
Beginning in 2022, Deaconess joined a philanthropic racial equity roundtable for peer learning and sharing of best practices. We also partnered with Forward Through Ferguson to conduct a racial equity assessment. Below are goals identified from the assessment to help us measure our progress toward having a more equitable culture.
2023-2024
Codify existing practices of current leadership to endure beyond any one administration
Created and shared Guidebook with Deaconess team. Revisions will be made as needed.
Establish methods for radical listening and intentional collaboration (sharing power) that reject power hoarding behavior, paternalism, defensiveness, individualism, and the internalized idea that “I’m the only one” who can do something.”
Implemented on-going racial caucusing with Deaconess team and the Foundation's Racial Equity Committee; Broadened leadership team; Emphasized the importance of “weaving” as a standing agenda item during staff meetings.
2024-2025
Build metrics associated with priorities and habits to codify existing practices of current leadership, maintaining and building a culture of ongoing learning into job descriptions; alter subsequent performance evaluation systems that determine raises and promotions to materially reward desired behaviors by December 31, 2024.
Piloting revised process.
Conduct a policy and processes review in order to locate areas for improvement and formalize processes for addressing racial bias and inequities.
Revised compensation philosophy; Developed disaster relief / emergency assistance policy for piloting in 2025.
Build an all-staff led onboarding process for new staff and a cadence of staff and board retreats that centers Racial Equity in learning and development opportunities for the whole team.
Piloting revised process.
2025-2026
Establish clear & consistent communication that explicitly messages Deaconess’ commitment to Racial Equity and is made available to staff and board and external partners by January 31, 2025.
In Progress
Establish internal processes and systems that are accessible and accountable to people of color by December 31, 2025.
In Progress
Amplify anonymous feedback loops for staff to name racial tensions or dynamics of white supremacy culture, with the help of external mediators by January 31, 2025.
In Progress
Note: Goals developed after consultation and audit by Forward Through Ferguson in 2022-2023.
Environmental Context of Our Work
The land upon which we work in the St. Louis region, constituted by the East-West Gateway Coordinating Council footprint in Eastern Missouri and Southern Illinois, and the location where Deaconess Center, stands was first cared for and occupied by Native American people, including Osage, Miami, Sioux and Iroquois groups, whose populations were decimated by systematic displacement through unjust cultural practices including the institutionalization of children, government action and capital-driven land acquisition.
Families seeking to raise healthy children in this area continue to be negatively impacted by the racially inequitable and unsustainable results of climate change and environmental racism. In our region and our work, we have encountered these impacts in the Foundation’s attempts to address lead poisoning with partners in the city of St. Louis, supporting the organizing of mothers due to landfills in North St. Louis County and investment in responses to asthma and allergy disparities for Black and Brown children.
Deaconess’ Understanding of Racial Equity
Deaconess’ appreciation and understanding of racial equity is informed by our partners in mission, colleagues in philanthropy and community of service. Our learning journey has included:
- Deaconess’ engagement and leadership in several settings of the Ferguson Commission process (including Management and Volunteer service as Co-Chair, Managing Director, Legal Counsel and Loaned Executive) informing an expedited reflection process for the Foundation;
- Staff, trustees, board alumni and Community Advisory Board members being training in the ABFE Responsive Philanthropy for Black Communities Curriculum in March 2017;
- On April 4, 2017 (the 50th Anniversary of Dr. Martin L. King, Jr.’s famous “Beyond Vietnam: A Time toBreak Silence” speech at The Riverside Church (a UCC-congregation in New York). Management publishing Deaconess’ commitment to racial equity, entitled ”Building A Community Just for Kids“ on our website and on local publications, speaking to integration of racial equity into grantmaking and investment policy; and Establishing a Racial Equity Task Force, led by Trustee Rudolph Nickens, Jr., convened in 2018 to develop a plan for further integration into the Governance and Operations of the Foundation.
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On February 26, 2022, Deaconess Board of Trustees transitioned the Racial Equity Taskforce to a standing Racial Equity Committee.
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On August 15, 2023, Deaconess Board of Trustees affirmed the new strategic approach and aspiration of liberation in seven generations.
Founded in 1988 to improve outcomes for children and families through capacity building efforts, the Center for Assessment and Policy Development defines racial equity as:
The condition that would be achieved if one’s racial identity no longer predicated, in a statistical sense, how one fares. When we use the term, we are thinking about racial equity as one part of racial justice, and thus we also include work to address root causes of inequities, not just their manifestation. This includes elimination of policies, practices, attitudes and cultural messages that reinforce differential outcomes by race or fail to eliminate them.¹
A New York-based community change institution, the Center for Social Inclusion, founded in 2001, defines racial equity as both an outcome and a process.
As an outcome, we achieve racial equity when race no longer determines one’s socioeconomic outcomes; when everyone has what they need to thrive, no matter where they live. As a process, we apply racial equity when those most impacted by structural racial inequity are meaningfully involved in the creation and implementation of the institutional policies and practices that impact their lives.
¹ Truth, Racial Healing and Transformation Implementation Guidebook (Battle Creek, MI: W.K. Kellogg Foundation, 2016), 80
When we achieve racial equity:
People, including people of color, are owners, planners, and decision-makers in the systems that govern their lives.
We acknowledge and account for past and current inequities, and provide all people, particularly those most impacted by racial inequities, the infrastructure needed to thrive.
Everyone benefits from a more just, equitable system.²
² Center for Social Inclusion. Accessed December 28, 2018
In the Ferguson Commission proceedings, Deaconess' former Board Chair, Rudolph Nickens Jr., who currently serves as program director for Deaconess' Institute for Black Liberation, provided the definition ultimately adopted by the body in its final report. He labeled racial equity as a framework that promotes actions designed to address historic burdens and present-day barriers to equal opportunities through the elimination of systemic racially discriminatory policies and practices.³
We accept that these definitions are aligned with our mission and strategic aspiration. They express human intent which we interpret as deeply theological. Taken together, then, for us racial equity is both a stated, desired outcome and a process (a path of practice) for getting to racial liberation.
³ Forward Through Ferguson: A Path Toward Racial Equity (St. Louis, MO: The Ferguson Commission, 2015), 174.