The Pillar Community Impact Program (PCIPs) is designed to strengthen the capacity-building functions of community organizations. All eligible grassroots initiatives, volunteer-driven entities, social enterprises, advocacy groups, nonprofit organizations, charitable endeavors, or organizations committed to promoting positive social change that were facing financial barriers were eligible to apply.
Services offered in 2023 and 2024 to Pillar Community Impact Program recipients were customized based on the needs of each organization and may have included resources, consulting, customized workshops, training, or individual coaching. The areas of focus for 2024 PCIPs were Youth Engagement and Policy and Advocacy Planning.
Both program years were a great success, as we were able ot offer support to seven organizations with services and support valued at over $60,000.
Services offered
Recipients were selected based on an External Advisory Panel review and scope assessment by the Pillar Community Impact Program team.
Applicants could apply to receive one of the services listed below:
Youth Engagement Coaching in one of the following areas:
- Youth engagement and building impactful programming,
- Designing effective communications/marketing for youth, or
- Engaging youth with an intersectionality and inclusion lens.
Social Finance Coaching or Readiness Assessment in one of the following areas:
- Introduction to Social Finance:
- Social Finance: What is social finance and how does it differ from traditional finance?
- Importance and Purpose: Why social finance is relevant for social purpose organizations.
- How it can help address societal challenges, create sustainable solutions, and enhance overall impact.
- Types of Social Finance Instruments: Explore the various Social Finance Instruments and cases of how they have been implemented, or;
- Building a Social Finance Strategy: Assessing Investment Readiness: How to assess financial readiness for social finance initiatives.
Policy and Advocacy Coaching in one of the following areas:
- Evaluating and articulating the risks of advocacy work vs. the risks of not doing advocacy work,
- Designing an issue-based public policy and advocacy campaign for implementation, or;
- Embedding public policy and advocacy work into your organizational structure and processes.
Each eligible applicant were also invited to participate in the SDG Cities Online Academy. The Academy offered a variety of learning opportunities to deepen community impact using the shared language of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
A PCIP recipient also got the opportunity to receive a 3-5 minute video, produced and edited by rTraction for their organization.
Program Eligibility
- You are an employee of a grassroots, volunteer-run, social enterprise, advocacy, nonprofit, charity initiative or organization invested in positive social or environmental impact. You don’t have to be a registered charity or nonprofit.
- You have an operating budget under $1M and have a financial need for capacity building support.
- You are located in London, Elgin, Middlesex or Oxford Counties.
- You are not related to any employee or board member of Pillar Nonprofit Network.
- NOTE: by applying to this program, you consent to exploring storytelling/communications activities about your experience for Pillar’s platforms or in the media. You will have the opportunity to review prior to posting or remove consent at any time.
