Community partners, including members of the Literacy Alliance of Metro Atlanta (LAMA) and Georgia Adult Literacy Advocates (GALA), gathered on Tuesday, Nov. 1, to celebrate and support the launch of Literacy For All (LFA), as well as begin discussions about legislative priorities. Literacy For All is a donor-advised fund of the Community Foundation for Greater Atlanta (CFGA). With statewide partners, LFA's role is to provide structures and resources for families to ensure that adults can read to children.
Tuesday's meeting kicked off with a welcome from Alicia Philipp, President of CFGA, highlighting the importance of strategic partnerships to accomplish LFA's goals. Additionally, she spoke of CFGA's role as a thought leader and resource. Lesley Grady, Senior Vice President of Community, CFGA, and an LFA steering committee member, followed Philipp taking a few minutes to elaborate on the Foundation's education initiatives and impact in their 23-county region, and how this community knowledge will help LFA.
Fellow steering committee members, Jany Brown and Jim Rodgers, shared their appreciation for everyone's participation and spoke about the origin and purpose of LFA, citing the initial funding provided by LFA steering committee member Dave Peterson as the basis of the LFA fund.
The Literacy For All name is a result of the work of Imbibe, an Atlanta design firm. Zia Khan of Imbibe, explained that Literacy For All, like the name suggests, is indicative of a collective movement, rather than a stand-alone organization. Literacy For All is a fund that will leverage new and additional fund-raising and provide grants to organizations that can demonstrate the ability to collect data, strengthen community partnerships to focus on family literacy, and measure outcomes.
Literacy For all is a campaign that will provide resources to advocate for a legislative and budgetary agenda, create new and strengthen existing alliances, and determine a communications plan to create additional awareness.
Joy Hawkins, LFA Director (left) and Jany Brown, Steering Committee member (right) After a small group brainstorm, Joy Hawkins, Director of LFA, led participants in discussions about priorities along LFA's focus areas of alliances, advocacy and awareness, sparking some productive conversation about future strategies and collaboration opportunities.
Partners left the meeting with a sense of momentum, which LFA will continue to build upon in the coming weeks.
Follow our blog, to stay up-to-date on LFA events and news.