In 2021, following a period of significant societal change that covered Covid and the Black Lives Matter movement, we at Blagrave prepared to develop our first ever strategy. It built on the learning developed through our first foray into policy change funding, and the first iteration of Challenge and Change, our programme funding individual young changemakers, in 2020. In consultation with the staff team, young people and external advisers, we developed a strategy that launched in 2022, covering the period until 2026.
It also coincided with the donation of £1m per year for 5 years from the Nineteen Eighty-Nine Charitable Trust Charitable Trust which would span the period 2021-2026, enabling us to significantly increase our grant-making resource. Our resulting ambitious new strategy held a new mission:
To bring lasting change to the lives of young people; investing in them as powerful forces for change and acting upon their right to be heard in pursuit of a fair and just society.
This mission was to be delivered though three objectives:
- Increasing civil society’s accountabllity to young people
- Investing in young people too create change
- Investing in better youth policy
This divided our work into three distinct areas, but something we’ve learned through this strategy review process (and will be taking into our new strategy) is that it’s hard to divide up social change efforts so neatly! If you truly want to make change happen, pressure needs to be applied at all different points simultaneously for a system to change.
We commissioned Natasha Adams and Joe Derry Hall to review our strategy against these goals and pull out learning like this. Read their insights here.
Our work is relationship-based so much of the golden information and learning we gleaned over this period was done through informal conversations. We also learned that too much of the strategy’s implementation was based on our team’s individual passions and interests; it was too easy to lose key learning or relationships. We learned that standardising and streamlining processes is key for effective implementation.
Headlines on each of our three key objectives
On funding organisations that serve young people
Successes
- Through the Listening Fund and through our Regional Programme we made a clear impact on the way organisations we fund listen and respond to young people, by making it part of the criteria for funding.
- We also had a significant impact on other funders, helping to ensure funders listen to young people and to the organisations they support.
- The way we funded (long term, and based on trust) increased the value of our support for our partners.
- We brought about many opportunities for collaboration, with and between partners, leading to a more collaborative sector.
What didn’t work
- We missed meeting the needs of young people facing the greatest barriers by focusing our funding on established organisations and across our wide South East of England region.
What we’re taking to the new strategy
- The importance of the way we fund (long term, non-bureaucratic)
- The knowledge on how to encourage and support true collaboration.
On funding young people directly
Successes
- We saw that our theory of funding worked – changemakers who received their first grant from us through Challenge and Change went on through our Pathways Fund to attain large scale funding from other funders and sustain as established organisations.
- We listened to the young people we funded, understanding what support they need alongside their grant and giving them the freedom to control how their support is determined.
- Through modelling this, we had a huge impact on other funders’ practice so that other funders started listening to young people directly. We learned how important our in person events are for connecting changemakers.
What didn’t work
- Some of our early programmes with the goal of sharing power such as the Opportunity Fund actually didn’t share power at all as we tried to micromanage the way young people were supported.
- Also, most of our network remains in London – potentially this means the same theory of change won’t apply in different places, and we have yet to test this.
What we’re taking into the new strategy
- Young people need significant non-financial support as well as a grant to thrive, including: development/capacity building, wellbeing, and a peer network.
- We have a better understanding of our grant manager roles, that cross grant management, youth work and capacity-building support.
- A greater understanding of the stages a young changemaker goes through, and we are holding a live question to see how this applies in different areas.
- We’re also bringing an expanded understanding of what system change looks like, which includes community led service delivery.
On funding change in youth policy
Successes
- Long term funding for organisations putting youth voice at the centre of policy making led to some significant wins.
- Funding organisations to do policy change proved more successful than trying to do it ourselves.
- Our learning programme (funding a broad cohort) deepened our understanding of what skills and resources organisations need to do this work well.
What didn’t work
- We didn’t have the capacity or resources needed to do policy change work well, especially not at a national level.
- As we’re not experts in any particular theme or issue area, we weren’t able to play much of a role within other collaborations or partnerships.
- Focusing on getting young people involved in democracy didn’t fit with our developing view of how system change actually happens.
What we’re taking into the new strategy
By funding young people with experience of, or who are challenging, injustice directly, we will be funding those leaders who really understand the issues to create change in ways they determine.
Conclusion
At the end of this strategy period, I’m proud to look back and pinpoint our funding as the initial seed of change for individual young people, collectives and groups. Read the review findings here.
At the start of the strategy we aimed to create change at three levels, for individual young people, for the charities that serve them and in policy and legislation. What we learned was that by empowering and trusting changemakers directly, we can achieve serious systemic change at all three levels and beyond. This review demonstrates how much we have learned about funding young changemakers well.
Our future strategy will build up young people’s power and capacity to create change, now, and for future generations.
Tessa Hibbert
Head of Grants