Awarded Grants

The 2020 Community Voices grant will support the creation of a social justice theatre piece about educators' and students' visions for educational transformation in Philadelphia. Stories will be collected via story circles that document the beliefs and experiences of students and educators about the dehumanization of the education system. Using storytelling and theater as a cultural strategy, Teacher Action Group and Philadelphia Student Union will propel the movement to rid schools of policing, cultivate intergenerational solidarity, and amplify the need for systemic change in education.

The 2020 Community Voices grant will support the production of a season two of the web series, Resistance: the battle of philadelphia, a six-part, short form, speculative fiction web series about a community's struggle against the surveillance and state violence of a powerful corporate government in a near-future Philadelphia.

Via the 2020 Community Voice grant, PhillyCAM will offer a virtual Latinx Multimedia Reporting Fellowship in Fall 2020 to train 12 Latinx producers in multimedia reporting skills and build stronger bridges for content distribution and collaborative production among the expanding network of new initiatives supporting and amplifying local Latinx stories and information. During the Fellowship participants will work in teams to produce stories for distribution on PhillyCAM television, radio, online and on other local Spanish language platforms. The opportunity will be available to emerging journalists and community media producers looking to sharpen their skills or explore a new medium.

The 2020 Community Voices grant will support “Just Love Stories,” a multimedia series that documents stories of love, justice, and culture that work towards social justice. Stories written by, as well as interviews of, community groups and individuals leading movements will be featured in a documentary web series titled “Just Love.”

The 2020 Community Voices Fund grant will support a “Spiral Q Community Cohort” using storytelling, art and artmaking toward collective justice and liberation through their participation in the Art for Action Pipeline and the Peoplehood Parade & Pageant in 2020 and 2021. Cohort members will amplify their own communities' stories and messaging, build community beyond their group with a wider demographic striving for justice, and educate themselves in new techniques and practices integral to social justice movements.

In support of ECBACC's Heruica publication, curriculum guide and documentary project exploring the memory and cultural history of the Black comics community.

The 2020 Community Voices grant will support a virtual rendition of Theatre in the X's “West Philly Play,” a social justice people's theatre. Via community play sessions on Zoom, stories will be shared by individuals involved in the 52nd Street standoff with police following the uprisings sparked by the murder of George Floyd. Community members will share their experiences with the gentrification of their neighborhoods. These videos will be recorded and be available publicly on Theatre in the X's website and will also serve as research for the creation of a 2021 in-person “West Philly Play.”

The 2020 Community Voices grant will support the creation of the Coatesville Black Media Renaissance (CBMR) project, which will use storytelling and media-making to heal and reconcile race relations in the city of Coatesville. Specifically, CMBR will provide local artists and storytellers a vehicle to amplify community voices through a variety of media platforms such as film, print media, and mural arts to create a community driven media model that activates change against unjust media narratives, policing, and other racist practices that continue to marginalize Coatesville residents.

The 2020 Community Voices grant will support a collaboration with Raise the Bar Philly and Mighty Writers to produce a four-week intergenerational storytelling project. West Philadelphia youth journalists will interview community members about topics related to the Black experience with policing in Philadelphia as well as the community's vision of a better future for Black Philadelphians.

The 2020 Community Voices grant will support “Report from the Future” a project to convene artists, designers, and community members to ask, “What does a Philadelphia look like that's designed for me?” Facilitated and curated by an “Afrofuturist-in-Residence” at The Village, the resulting multimedia responses will serve as reference points, learning aids, and lodestars for policymakers and stakeholders working to rebuild Philadelphia in the wake of COVID-19 and local and national uprisings for racial justice.