“Our ability to make an impact on everything from the future of healthcare to full civil rights for all to the health of our planet hinges on the leadership of people of color.”
Lead staff at participating organizations share their thoughts on the impact of the Kairos Fellowship
At the Kairos Fellowship, we’re not just training the next generation of leaders of color in the digital organizing space — we’re also actively pushing legacy organizations to center racial equity in all aspects of their work, from their staffing model to the campaigns they run.
We talked with Mia Moore, the Chief of Staff at Democracy for America; Monique Teal, the Campaign Director at Daily Kos; and Cayden Mak, the Executive Director at 18MillionRising.org, to hear why they and their organizations took part in Kairos, and why the digital and civic technology spaces need a program like the Kairos Fellowship.
Why does the civic-tech and online organizing space need a program like the Kairos Fellowship?
Monique Teal, Daily Kos: Our relationship with Kairos has given us not just an incredibly skilled campaigner but also, on-going tools and support to identify and address issues of white supremacy within our own organization and community. Internally, we allow fewer excuses for harmful, repeated behaviors; we’re addressing systems that perpetuate inequality; and we’re uncomfortable regularly as we force overdue conversations and accountability. Externally, we challenge our community and coalition partners to also do this work. And the difference shows: retention of staff of color, particularly for Black women; an increase in POC-led groups interested in working with us; and wielding our power in campaigns that may otherwise be overlooked.
Cayden Mak, 18MillionRising.org: Many young organizers who start in our field begin at white-led organizations that talk a great talk about developing a “diverse” staff. However, it takes more than just hiring a few junior staffers of color to create real diverse teams. Having programs that honor these emerging leaders for their leadership is critical to broadening the horizons for them, and for our field. While not every fellow gets to be placed at an organization run by people of color, we benefit from building community together and creating not just a pipeline into the field, but a pipeline into leadership.
Mia Moore, Democracy for America: I don’t know where to begin! The Kairos Fellowship is critical to our movement. Our ability to make an impact on everything — from the future of healthcare to full civil rights for all to the health of our planet — hinges on the leadership of people of color. The Kairos Fellowship finds those people, supports their talent, and pushes movement organizations to center their voices for real, lasting change.
What did you and your organization hope to gain by participating in the Kairos Fellowship program?
Cayden Mak: As a small organization working with a relatively small community and new to the online organizing space, having the opportunity to both develop a new leader and build deeper relationships with larger, older peer organizations has been invaluable. We see Kairos as a space not just for the individual to learn and grow, but for movements to learn and grow.
We recognize that building networks and community is critical to the success of all of our work, and Kairos has been an essential center of gravity for that work. It’s often hard for organizations led by people of color in this space to find places where our leadership is valued and honored. Through the Kairos Fellowship program, we are able to grow as we help the field expand.
Monique Teal: Our overarching goals were for Daily Kos to gain trained people of color staffers, and for our organization to lead the way in how to attack the lack of diversity and inclusion in the digital organizing realm. And personally, leadership development is my favorite thing in the world, and this offered an opportunity to do that.
Mia Moore: We hoped to gain a smart, creative, strategic campaigner who could expand the frame of our campaigns to include the impact that racism and oppression have on people of color when it comes to everything from health care coverage to the criminal justice system to our nation’s response to natural disasters.
What concrete impact did your participation have on your organizational culture, especially around race and equity?
Monique Teal: Right now, our organizational culture around race isn’t great. But it’s not great because we’re actively dealing with our white supremacist culture, and challenging white supremacy is devastating and miserable — especially when you have to do it with people you only see occasionally and who are mostly very comfortable with how they move in the world. But we’re working on it. And I think it’ll be worth the growing pains when we’re able to show and see progress.
Mia Moore: Thanks to our work with Brie [the Kairos Fellow at DFA] and our equity coaches, we’ve been able to make small yet real progress toward greater equity in how DFA functions. For example, we’ve identified the need for greater transparency and intentional inclusion, particularly of people of color, in decisions both big and small, and we’ve begun (messily) implementing that.
What concrete impact did your participation have on your organization’s campaigns?
Monique Teal: Once we hired Irna [the Kairos Fellow at Daily Kos], we built out a racial justice email list. It still exists, and it’s growing. Our language around racial justice is unapologetic, and we push our members so much harder than we ever have before. Our racial justice campaigns are building on one another and, even better, Black and POC organizations trust us more and are more and more willing to work with us.
Mia Moore: We still have a long way to go, but our campaigns are measurably stronger for the perspective that Brie has brought to them. She has taken the lead in expanding our engagement to include mobile outreach, and I’ve lost count of the number of her email drafts that have made my heart skip a beat (in a good way!).
