blue dots background image

Uncategorized

Nonprofits connecting to public policy to reach a broader audience

I’m sharing here a link to a piece published this week on Huffington Post (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/billy-shore/us-child-hunger_b_884753.html) that I hope helps more sharply frame Share Our Strength’s key issue of childhood hunger in the context of the emerging national conversation about domestic priorities.

But it may also be a useful example for a broader range of nonprofit organizations when it comes to:

(1) The importance of having a public policy component to advance their mission, if in fact they want to be part of systemic and transformative change; and

(2) creating or at least illustrating the connections between what they do and the most pressing issues that donors, activists, stakeholders and others are reading about in the news, discussing at the water cooler, etc.

Too often non-profit organizations work not only in silos but in a kind of isolation from “the real world”. They assume that everyone will be interested in the issues they are interested in, but in practice we compete for mindshare not just against other nonprofits but against the broad range of issues, problems and needs that dominate the news, the Net, and the ever changing national conversation. To be part of that we have to adapt our message to fit into that conversation. To reach beyond the usual suspects to a larger audience we must help people see the connections between what we care about and what they are being told they should care about. The HuffPost article is an effort to do that with childhood hunger.

Related News

Baby Brain Development
22 April 2024
Release

RELEASE: Share Our Strength Provides Key Funding to State-Based Advocates to Support Food Security Policy Initiatives for Children and Families

Medicaid Food Security Network Addresses Food and Nutrition Insecurity with an Emphasis On Closing the Enrollment Gap in SNAP and...

Jeremiah Program: Baltimore Center
09 April 2024
Story

Helping Kids by Helping Single Moms

Can you imagine how far kids could go if their moms weren’t worried about affording groceries or paying the rent?...

young children shareourstrength.org
14 March 2024
Release

RELEASE: Share Our Strength Unveils Groundbreaking Investment of $6.7 Million to Advance Economic Mobility for Single Mothers and Their Children

Initiative to Address Root Causes of Food Insecurity and Financial Instability Through Partnerships with 28 Organizations [Media: For photos and...