Starting a major gifts program can feel overwhelming. We recently partnered with Awbury Arboretum to change that. In just a few weeks, we designed a major gifts strategy tailored to their mission, built the tools and systems to support it, and coached the team through implementation. The result? A values-aligned program that’s already deepening donor relationships, energizing the board, and unlocking transformational giving. Thinking about launching or reimagining your major gifts work? Let us help you. https://www.almapartners.net/

Even the most well-designed fundraising strategy can lose its effectiveness over time as fundraising conditions change, donor behaviour evolves, and institutional priorities shift. What worked a few years ago may no longer match your goals or your community’s expectations.

The question is: Why is your fundraising strategy no longer delivering the results it used to?

At Alma Partners, we help schools identify that gap and realign their strategy, messaging, and day-to-day practices to meet today’s challenges and tomorrow’s goals.

Congratulations to Alma Partners Co-Founder Randolph Carter, who was recently honored at the MCRC@ADVIS 2025 DEIJB Conference. Randolph was a founder of the Multicultural Resource Center (MCRC) and, at the April 25th conference in Philadelphia, spoke on a panel entitled Legacy, Strength, and Vision: Honoring the Past, Grounding the Present, and Shaping the Future of Equity in Education, alongside Sherry T. Coleman, Darryl J. Ford, and Blair Stambaugh.

In a time of political division, climate emergency, and rising rates of mental-health crisis among teens, we urgently need spaces where young people feel connected, inspired, and empowered. The Alma Partners SLC:

• Creates a space where student leaders can dialogue honestly across differences and adult supporters can model engaged, responsive leadership

• Builds students’ confidence, sense of belonging, facilitation skills, and leadership capacity

• Develops cross-school networks that empower youth and center their voices.

One of the most powerful shifts we see in schools doesn’t come from a new marketing campaign, a bigger ad budget, or even a beautifully redesigned website. It comes when the people inside the school start speaking with one voice.

At Alma Partners, we often work with schools that are moving at full speed. It’s a pace that’s familiar, even necessary at times, but it’s also unsustainable.

Last year, we partnered with a school that had been living in that reactive rhythm for a while. Every marketing effort felt like a last-minute sprint:
“We need a postcard now!”
“Let’s throw some money at Facebook ads!”
“Our open house is in two weeks, and we’re not full—help!”
Sound familiar?

In this month’s Resource List update, we’ve added several new articles, including two from Drugwatch on the impact of chemical hair straighteners on Black women’s health, since we aim for our this ever-evolving document to offer not only curricular support for teachers, but also to link readers to evidence-based information that they can use in their communities.

As we reflect today on the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., we offer our Resource List as a source of support, inspiration, and sustenance for everyone working to expand inclusion and belonging in their communities, for all those working for justice for marginalized peoples, for liberation for each of us. May our work honor the memory of Dr. King.

As a group and as individuals, we have been thinking and talking about the national election results for the past few weeks, as we imagine all of you have been doing. As you’d expect, we have questions and hopes and fears, but there’s one thing we feel clear about: our unwavering commitment to each other, to you, and to the work we all do together. In that spirit, we offer our big resource list, updated regularly and shared every other month here on our blog.

We hope that you are all settling into the school year. Here is the latest version of our big resource list, which we add to regularly. We hope it will serve you in your curriculum planning; in your conversations with students, colleagues, and families; and in your personal striving.

New this month: a section featuring some of our favorite picture books! (Starts on page 33 of the document.) Enjoy, and may this list support you in your summer planning!

Our big resource list keeps growing. In the past few weeks, we’ve added a link to our recent blog post written to help educators and other adults talk about the violence in Palestine and Israel with compassion and intentionality, included new books to the list, and further refined how the document is organized.