The Racial Justice and Equity Fund (RJEF), a community-driven fund housed at the Early Childhood Funders Collaborative, is honored to announce its second grantee cohort, comprised of 10 community-rooted organizations advancing racial justice and equity across the full ecosystem of child and family well-being.
This cohort reflects what RJEF was created to do: shift power, trust community wisdom, and resource grassroots leaders who are building the conditions for young children and families to thrive. These organizations are led by and accountable to communities most impacted by systemic inequities, and they are deeply committed to creating meaningful change—often with limited resources and under sustained pressure.
The 2026 RJEF grantee cohort includes organizations working across maternal health and birth justice, immigrant justice, housing, food security, economic and reproductive justice, mental health, civic engagement, and community organizing. Together, they span rural, urban, Southern, Indigenous, and coastal communities, bringing lived experience, cultural grounding, and bold leadership to their work.
2026 RJEF Grantee Cohort
- A Luta Sigue (TN)
- Around Birth Collective (CA)
- BA NIA (IL)
- BEN Initiative (NM)
- Dreamers Mothers in Action (VA)
- Make It Work Nevada (NV)
- Mom.ME (MS)
- Native American Women’s Dialogue (WA; serving AK and MT)
- Sanctuary Now Abolition Project (LA and multi-state)
- SHINE Sisterhood (HI, NY, CA, GA)
Each of these organizations embodies RJEF’s commitment to the Social Determinants of Child and Family Well-Being, recognizing that children do not thrive in isolation. They thrive when their families are supported, their identities are affirmed, and their communities have the power and resources to shape their own futures.
Through participatory, trust-based grantmaking, RJEF provides unrestricted, multi-year support to organizations with budgets under $1 million, especially those under $500,000, so they can respond to urgent community needs while building long-term capacity and resilience. Just as importantly, RJEF invests in relationships across this cohort, fostering shared learning, solidarity, and collective power across states and movements.
With this second cohort, RJEF now supports a total of 20 grantee partners across 22 states, building a multi-state, community-led network of organizations advancing justice, care, and collective well-being for children and families.
At a moment when funding for life-sustaining programs continues to be cut and families face increasing instability, this cohort reminds us what is possible when philanthropy listens, follows community leadership, and invests differently.
We are deeply grateful to our grantee partners for their leadership, care, and vision, and to the funders and community members who make this collective work possible.
Together, we are building an ecosystem where all children, families, and communities can grow, belong, and flourish.