Everyone connected to the act of giving benefits

Individualism drives much of what we know and experience, particularly in North America. The push to be excellent with the ever-looming pressure to either stand out or risk becoming obsolete informs behaviors like putting work above time with family or with community and care of self. In this “every person for themselves” world even practices that ostensibly contribute to thriving communities - we’ll call them acts of volunteerism - are often seen as opportunities to make ourselves or our companies stand out. Whether that is to make ourselves attractive to an employer or graduate program or to make working at our company more desirable I would argue that motivations rooted in a desire to stand out, while notable, detract from what is really happening when we take action for the well-being of others.

When we do participate in events that seemingly “give back” to the community we have been acculturated to perceive the benefits of our actions as one sided. This is often motivated by dominant culture and practices that inspire a need to “help” - particularly if you find yourself in a position of success or affluence - those who are less “fortunate”. While I agree that giving of time and resources is important and that we all share responsibility for our communities and the chasms that exist between those with access to resources and those who are excluded from access, I fear that too many of us stop there. Our individualistic tendencies cause a shortsightedness that limits our ability to see the full spectrum of what happens when we center our behaviors and practices around the well-being of others. A shortsightedness that can perpetuate harm in and on communities that continue to be marginalized.

Nonprofit organizations and the way that we frame the reasons that inspire adults to participate in our programs have an opportunity - and a responsibility - to expand the way we all think about the benefits of the work. We need to make a fundamental shift from a focus on numbers of people, numbers of hours, numbers of meals as ways to interpret benefits expanding these to include changes in thinking, behaviors, and practices of the adults who participate in our programs. I recently finished my doctoral degree and in my research I explored what inspired the adults who work for our sponsoring companies to participate in In4All programs.

While talking with adults who have been in In4All classrooms about their inspirations for doing so, the conversation naturally escalated to ideas about responsibility and benefits. Our vision statement explicitly names us all as being responsible for and beneficiaries of an Oregon where all students are accessing a future of possibilities that is limitless. As the adults who participated in my study explored this idea of benefits they were immediately able to name the ways in which In4All students benefit. This ranged from thoughts of the impact that seeing a person of color or a womxn in STEM has on students who identify as belonging to one of these groups to ideas of how getting to engage with career professionals in their community who care deeply about and believe in their ability to be successful might bolster how students feel about their potential. Eventually, though, the adults I connected with in the study began to name the benefits they were experiencing as individuals participating in In4All programs as well as the benefits to their companies. Thoughts about the benefits that investing in a future workforce and the need to begin that investment in elementary school were common.

When shifting inward, participants talked about the increased belonging they felt at their companies because of their time supporting In4All programs with their colleagues. This included the ways that participation sometimes prepared them for working with a new team at their company when transitioning to a new position. They connected this to knowing people beyond their current work groups through In4All programs. They also talked about the way that participation was shifting their thoughts on the reasons In4All students’ experience success at disproportionate rates when compared with white, affluent students and schools. Across all adults who participated there was an acknowledgement of personal growth. While thoughts about student and sponsor company benefits are critical to how we think about success in In4All programs - it is the personal benefits of the adults who participate that I am most excited about. Herein lies the potential to build on these shifts in thinking about student success in ways that begin to disrupt the systems that perpetuate it.

When we succeed in first looking for, then articulating and sharing the full scope of who benefits we begin to understand and then can honor the innate and specific assets that belong to the communities nonprofit programs exist for and with. It is in knowing and then acting based on knowing where the power lies. Power to amplify the specific assets representative in our communities as forms of cultural wealth that are central to what we all hope to achieve in a thriving Oregon. Researcher Tara Yosso (2005) has documented examples of cultural wealth in terms of the assets they provide, that are specific to communities of color. Things like familial, resilience, navigational and linguistic capital that represent the full extent of an individual’s accumulated assets and resources. The ways that community benefits when the full breadth of an individual is recognized for the innate value they add is what will get us to the overarching goal of a thriving Oregon. And the hope for all of us should be that we become an Oregon whose citizenry is aware of its history and practices that excluded communities of color from realizing their full potential and is committed to undoing the systems and practices that perpetuate this.

As I complete my thoughts on “who” benefits, I want to come back to my opening comments on our being developed as humans in and by a culture that tells us that we need to stand out or we risk becoming obsolete. What is most interesting to me is how this makes it seem as though we are all individual islands - our own little ecospheres where any and all of our behavior impacts only us. To believe that we truly stand alone when we stand out and that our individualistic tendencies to do so have no impact on others is myopic. This is what I love most about Chief Seattle’s astute comment about the web of life. It provides a visual, the web, to help us to understand how inextricably connected each of us is to the other. We are but a single thread within a larger web of past, present and future. Think about that! A larger web not only of what is true in the present but also what has been and what will be true. When you view “who” benefits, specifically when thinking about participation in activities that “give back”, through this lens you cannot ignore that an action that benefits one benefits us all. Even the one who has been defined by dominant culture as successful and seemingly not in need of any benefit. Because whatever we do to the web of which we are just a thread, we do to ourselves. Wherever you find yourself on the spectrum of thinking around who benefits from nonprofit organizations and programs, I invite you to look for the ways you are changing as a human being - in thinking and in practice - because of your connection to them. Ask yourself, “what are the areas in my life where I could do a better job of acknowledging this connectedness?”. And commit to unlearning individualism in your “giving back” practices.

Welcome to the journey. I am grateful to be connected to you.