A slightly blurred collage of community photos. A march with yellow signs, two people hugging, a meeting, and a person talking on a megaphone are visible. There is a transparent blue overlay and a semi-transparent lighter blue box with the words "Headwaters Foundation for Justice e-newsletter" in black.

What's New this Month?
Karaoke Fundraiser for Headwaters
Thursday, November 13th from 5:30 p.m. to 9:30 p.m.

We're rallying our people (that's YOU!) to move money to Minnesota's BIPOC-led grassroots organizations in a time where big funders, government agencies, and corporate foundations are backing out. Believing in Minnesota's community organizers, centering BIPOC leadership, and resourcing bold strategies can only happen with our community's backing. Join us for a night of building power and belting out cheesy songs. Karaoke singers and supporters are equally welcome!

🔗 Get Your Tickets!
Black Radiance Network Quarterly Convening 
Friday, November 14th from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m.

Join the Black Radiance Network for a one-year post-election debrief, dinner, and a grant-writing workshop. Open to people engaged in Black movement and power-building work in Minnesota. We are excited to welcome you for a quarterly convening focused on building our tool kits and power mapping our movements.  
A Community-filled Celebration

We were thrilled to celebrate with you as we welcomed Migdalia Loyola Meléndez! Migdalia and Bilal are excited to build upon the values of shared leadership at Headwaters. We are at a time when an interconnected community, shared power, and a vision for collective liberation remain critical. As we continue to build a path towards collective liberation, we hope you consider supporting our work today.

🔗 Make a gift ​to support our ​work
Meet Miku, October's Featured Artist

Miku's piece brings back some warmth to this cooler weather! Miku identifies primarily as a person who likes to doodle. Inspired through their work with youth; they believe that creativity lives within us all. For them, creativity expresses itself through their practice of art journaling. Crayons, color pencils, digital art and poems find Miku on their way to comfort. When asked about a certain piece, Miku just remembers when and why they made it. Lighthearted in their approach; Miku finds joy in sharing their creations and celebrating what inspires others to create for themselves.

🔗 Learn more about Miku
Rapid Response Fund: Cycle 3 Opens 10/13

The Rapid Response Fund supports strategic organizing around new, rapidly emerging, or unexpected legislative or policy developments, events, and political moments. There are 6 more rounds of grantmaking in the 2025-2026 fiscal year. Inquiries for Cycle 3 will be accepted from Monday, October 13, through Wednesday, October 29, at 5 p.m. Details on our website. 
 

Community Events

🥬 Wellness Wednesday's
Wednesday, October 8 from 6 p.m.

Join F.T.P. Initiative and Keikosx every 2nd Wednesday of the month for a 10 part series focused on educating Black communities on holistic healing and cooking real food for the soul. Our mission with this series is to bring more awareness to the alkaline plant-based lifestyle to aid people's healing journey. Black communties face alarming health disparities due to diet-related ilnesses. Our goal is to educate families on health & nutrition to give them preventitive measures for dis-ease.

🌳 Deep Rest for Resistance: Celebrate ROOT
Thursday, October 9 from 10 a.m. to 12 p.m.

Building a just world is a marathon, not a sprint. Cultivating rest, spaciousness, and creativity isn’t just good practice; it’s a strategy for survival and radical renewal, giving us the freedom to dream, invent, and build the world we deserve. Join us online to learn about ROOT, practice rest, and hear from a panel of our rest-practitioner partners.

🏡 Lead the Fight 2025
Thursday, October 9 from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m.

Celebrate 30 years of Housing in Action at our 2025 Lead the Fight Fundraiser! We’re traveling back to 1995 to celebrate THREE DECADES of Housing in Action—30 years of dignified, affordable rentals; 30 years of community engagement; 30 years of homeownership opportunities; and 30 years of housing justice. From 6-9 PM at Mosaic Downtown, get to know values-aligned community members over a delicious dinner from Pimento Jamaican Kitchen and an open bar as we highlight some of the best moments from our history and our most exciting projects ahead! We’ll wrap up the night of entertainment, art, and celebration with dessert and opportunities to ensure our work continues for another 30 years. We hope to see you there!

🌟 Born to Lead
Tuesday, October 14 from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m.

Born to Lead is Ayada Leads’ annual community event dedicated to celebrating and supporting BIPOC women running for public office. This gathering provides a space for the community to connect directly with candidates, engage in meaningful conversations, and learn more about their visions and platforms. Attendees can enjoy a meal together while networking, sharing ideas, and uplifting the next generation of civic leaders. The event reflects Ayada Leads’ mission to empower diverse voices in leadership and foster stronger, more engaged communities.

💡 October Political Pedagogy - Economic Healing: Capitalism and Health
Wednesday, October 15 from 5:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m.

Political Pedagogy is a facilitated time to hold the truth – that another world is possible. These two-hour hybrid sessions use joyful arts-based activities to tackle complex visioning in playful ways. Contrasting a classroom, sessions are curated as a collaborative workshop in the practice of a pedagogy that values the method of collective wisdom and processed learning. Each session asks participants to cultivate an action to bring back to their community as a method of dissemination and power building. 

📚 9th Year Anniversary Fundraiser
Friday, October 17 from 8 a.m. to 9 a.m.

Start your morning off in an impactful way at our 9-year Anniversary Fundraiser! Our goal is to raise $120,000 to support our community and inspire the next generation of leaders. You’ll not only have the opportunity to connect with like-minded people who share a passion for making a difference but also be invited to help us grow futures: one book at a time, one child at a time.

🪧 Fall Housing Justice Forum: Mayoral Candidates & Housing
Thursday, October 23 from 12 p.m. to 1 p.m.

Our Housing Justice Forums are back! Join Housing in Action as we ask Minneapolis mayoral candidates questions on all things housing. This is a virtual event and will take place over Zoom.

🌌 From Constellations to Convergence: Mapping a Collective Agenda for Health
Friday - Saturday, October 24-25

Healthcare Reparations Cooperative is calling for care-minded individuals and groups from across the state to join us for a two-day convening this October. This event calls people committed to reimagining and building alternatives to the current healthcare system. In the United States, healthcare is a system that extracts wealth, reinforces violence, excludes people, and creates debt. This long-standing onslaught, coupled with recent policy shifts, has escalated the need to come together and respond. The US healthcare system is not broken–it is working exactly as it was designed.

🏮 Leaders are Readers
Saturday, November 1 from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m.

Join Leaders are Readers and unlock your child's growth through the power of literature, fostering leadership skills and a love for reading. Through captivating storytelling and interactive activities, watch as their imagination soars and their confidence grows. The theme for this program will be donuts with dads, featuring Thuba Nguyen, author of My Daddy Tells Me... Bring the whole family out for some food and fun.

🌱 2025 Native Cancer Care Conference
Tuesday, November 4 from 9:30 a.m. to 4 p.m.

A journey of reclaiming Native health and addressing cancer with our relatives, hosted by the American Indian Cancer Foundation. Conference includes expert speakers, interactive workshops, cultural learning, community connections, and addressing cancer inequities in Indian Country. Come learn, share, and be a part of a growing movement to strengthen native health and address cancer inequities for future generations! Registration is now open.

🌹 Paint the Town Red Gala
Wednesday, November 12 from 5:30 p.m. to 9 p.m.

The Paint the Town Red Gala fuels Rondo CLT’s mission—creating permanently affordable homes, supporting local small businesses, and revitalizing Rondo’s cultural heartbeat. Every ticket, every sponsorship, and every gift helps families and entrepreneurs build lasting opportunity right here in our community.

Job Opportunities from the Headwaters Community

Workers Confluence Fund
🔸 Co-Executive Director
Salary: $80,000 - $90,000

Workers Confluence was founded in 2021, growing out of the already-existing culture of collaboration between many of Minnesota’s labor unions and community groups, particularly worker centers. We help serve as the connective tissue that fosters powerful organizing partnerships, moves resources to where they’re urgently needed, and creates spaces for building worker solidarity across differences in sector and industry, race, ethnicity, and immigration status. Now we are in the early stages of expanding our impact to other Midwest states. 

MIGIZI Communications
🔸 Director of Development and Communications
Salary: $70,000 - $80,000
🔸 Sr. Director of Organizational Effectiveness and Management
Salary: $85,000 - $100,000
🔸 Cultural Support Specialist
Salary: $50,000 - $55,000

MIGIZI’s mission is to provide a strong circle of support that nurtures the educational, social, economic, and cultural development of American Indian youth. We are passionate about the success of our young leaders and make sure resources are available while using our voice to advocate for equitable education for our community. Our vision is for American Indian youth to be acknowledged and honored for their sacred gifts and boundless potential – which they share – as leaders – with their communities and nations. When you join the Circle, you join a tradition in investing in our future leaders for generations to come.

Board Opportunities from the Headwaters Community

Sown Emancipation
🔹 Board of Directors
Entrepreneurship gave Maliza Kalema a language for leadership, resilience, and self-sufficiency. Maliza created Sown Emancipation to give that language to the next generation. This is about more than starting businesses—it’s about equipping young people to author their own futures, not just follow someone else’s path. Too often, our youth are taught to survive systems instead of transform them. Entrepreneurship is how we teach them to do both.

Our Justice
🔹Board of Directors
Our Justice believes everyone deserves the autonomy and resources to make healthy decisions about sex, pregnancy, and parenting. We seek to build a world of full Reproductive Justice, a political vision developed by Black women that supports everyone's right to have a child, to not have a child, and to raise their families in safe and supportive environments.
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