BY ERIN STOCK – Idonia Trotter and two of her classmates at the Clinton School worked for nearly a year in the southeastern Arkansas city of Pine Bluff, developing ways to reach children during critical after-school hours.
The students worked with a community challenged by population decline, job loss and poor educational outcomes. What they saw, however, was a place open to partnerships, full of untapped assets and ideal for the Clinton School’s Center on Community Philanthropy.
“We really felt there was a strong community there of partners that were willing to work together for the betterment of the community,” said Trotter, a former Pine Bluff resident who now works as the executive director of the Arkansas Minority Health Commission.
The center’s leadership agreed with the students, and partnered with the Arkansas Community Foundation’s affiliate – the Pine Bluff Area Community Foundation – to help. Together they are working with Pine Bluff residents and Clinton School students to improve quality of life in the city of 55,000 through the community philanthropy model.
It’s a model that says lasting social change in a community comes from within, by people giving of their “time, talent and treasure” locally, said Charlotte Lewellen-Williams, director of the Center on Community Philanthropy at the Clinton School.
“Pine Bluff is our sister community for looking at how community philanthropy is really built from the ground up,” said Williams, who is also an assistant professor at the school.
Their work began with an assessment of philanthropy in Pine Bluff. Despite its challenges, Pine Bluff has a lot to give financially – and does, the research showed.
“It was amazing how much people give in this community that has such a reputation for lack,” Williams said.
While residents with means are already actively giving, they are not necessarily giving locally, nor are they giving in a coordinated way. The challenge is figuring out how to optimize the impact of philanthropy on a local level, Williams said.
Community stakeholders, armed with data from the philanthropy asset mapping, met for a day to discuss their priorities. Later they looked at emerging and diminishing federal funds in Pine Bluff, and considered how to leverage them, Williams said.
“Now what you have is data, which is hard to argue with, and you have community dialogue,” she said.
Next came the strategy. The Center on Community Philanthropy agreed to long-term goals and spelled out roles in a memorandum of understanding with the Arkansas Community Foundation and its affiliate in Pine Bluff. Freddye Webb-Petett, a former Clinton School professor who founded the Center on Community Philanthropy and lives in Pine Bluff, was identified as a community liaison.
The first phase of her work included helping Pine Bluff groups submit proposals for Clinton School Practicum projects – two of which were accepted, Williams said. The projects are being completed by teams of first-year Clinton School students and serve as a key part of the field-work component of the Master of Public Service degree program.
One student team is working with the Arts & Science Center for Southeast Arkansas to engage diverse groups from the Pine Bluff community in the development of a new strategic plan for the center. Another team has partnered with the Pine Bluff Area Community Foundation to evaluate the group’s grant proposal process.
Christopher Castoro, the director of the Pine Bluff Area Community Foundation, said the partnership with students can help his organization further its goals of proactively engaging communities and meeting their needs.
“The student body at the Clinton school is in a very good position to both learn and contribute,” Castoro said.
Clinton School student Dustin Choate said his Practicum team will research best practices and formulate recommendations for the Pine Bluff Area Community Foundation, which has about $60,000 in discretionary grantable income. The group’s parent organization, the Arkansas Community Foundation, administers charitable funds with assets of almost $128 million, according to its website.
“If we can be a part of helping to find the best recipients to make a difference in the community, that’s a great takeaway,” he said. “Personally, that’s fulfilling.”
Williams said her hope is that the community uses the work from students and the data from the Center to improve Pine Bluff. She also wants students to come away with the knowledge set that community philanthropy is a means for social change. The lessons learned in Pine Bluff could help other small rural communities, too.
Clinton School Dean Skip Rutherford said Clinton School students can play a role in reenergizing the entire city. The community philanthropy work transcends a local level, too, he said.
“Through Center on Community Philanthropy,” he said, “we are helping pioneer the way people think about giving – that everyone can be a philanthropist, that you don’t have to be rich to give, that people can build their own communities through the generosity and help of neighbors.”
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