#12DaysToShow Up Day 7: Working with Our Youth to Dismantle White Supremacy

What’s one of the most effective ways to dismantle white supremacy?
​Our SURJ Bay Area Youth and Families (Y&F) Committee starts at the roots by educating and mobilizing youth, parents, youth workers and educators, as well as partnering with local organizations with a child- and family-centered lens toward racial justice.

One of our major partners is Abundant Beginnings, a local community-based organization founded and run by Black queer freedom fighters. Abundant Beginnings uses a kid-friendly vocabulary — defining solidarity, for instance, as “the act of supporting other people (especially those who are not being treated fairly).” We are proud to stand in solidarity with Abundant Beginnings as we work toward a world in which children can grow up free from the injustices of white supremacy.

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The work of Abundant Beginnings is focused on community education and empowerment through social justice programs for students of color, genderqueer students, and differently-abled learners. Programs include summer camps, curriculum development workshops, community education, and school-building initiatives. Abundant Beginnings strives to create individual, community, and environmental change by fostering intergenerational, land-based learning practices. Abundant Beginnings’ Freedom Bus transports students who are part of their Forest Freedom Preschool and Camp Programs in which they are “growing children rooted in trust, love, and justice — blossoming in independence.”

Currently, one of the very active ways our SURJ Y&F team is supporting Abundant Beginnings is by providing workshops for the caregivers of white students at the school (and kids anywhere in the community) who are needing to do a little more of their own work to help them raise Race Conscious children. Abundant Beginnings has identified this as a critical need in our Bay Area community.
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Make a Tax-Deductible Donation Here
We invite you to join our #12DaysToShowUp campaign; 75% of all the funds raised during the campaign will go to local Black, Indigenous, and People of Color led organizations, including Abundant Beginnings. The remaining 25% will be sent to under-resourced, rural SURJ chapters mobilizing white people throughout the U.S to support the growing movement for racial justice.