social impact

High-Impact Certification

It Matters How You Do It: NNSI’s High-Impact Networks Campaign

Today’s nonprofit landscape is full of social impact networks– but not all of them are effective. Even if a network is making a difference in their community, there is always room for growth. In a landscape saturated with networks addressing a plethora of wicked problems, communities want to see impacts that are beneficial and substantive. When a network engages in high-impact practices, their operations thrive. High-impact networks have strong theories

#SystemsofCare

#SystemsofCare: What is cultural competence, and how can we use it to battle health inequality?

By Brett Mayfield Health disparities in the United States continue to be an area of focus for many nonprofits. In 2021, NNSI Founder and Director Michelle Shumate focused on this area herself, partnering with leading researchers from renowned medical institutions, namely NNSI’s neighbor organization Northwestern Medicine. Following research1-3 that found that Hispanic medical patients “receive disproportionately fewer living donor kidney transplants (LDKTs) than non-Hispanic Whites” (Gordon et al., 2021), these

Nonprofit Capacity

Technology for Collaborating with Other Organizations

By Kate Zilke and Brett Mayfield The COVID-19 pandemic has made for a year of adjustments in almost every aspect of our lives to protect the health of our communities––including the ways we collaborate to make a social impact. From virtual staff meetings to working from our laptops, nonprofits have needed to implement a lot of technology to continue reaching their goals. After an entire year, what technologies have

Research Insights

Research Summary: Implementing culturally competent transplant care and implications for reducing health disparities

By Brett Mayfield Health inequalities continue to pose a significant public health problem, so nonprofit leaders often must intervene with this challenge head-on. However, these interventions are usually not widely practiced or not delivered as initially planned, even though effective evidence-based interventions are available today. Unfortunately, ongoing inequalities continue in the public health sphere because organizations often face significant barriers to implementing these interventions. To confront these health disparities,

Better Know a Network

Better Know a Network: Multi-Agency Alliance for Children

By Brett Mayfield In 1996, a group of six foster agencies joined together to try something different. In the wake of funding threats and a scarcity of resources, these providers united to continue pursuing their missions toward foster youth advocacy. Thus was the birth of the Multi-Agency Alliance for Children (MAAC). Based in Atlanta, Georgia, MAAC arranges home options and coordinates additional services for over 1,000 foster care youth across

Better Know a Network

Better Know a Network: The evolution of the RE-AMP network

In 2003, the Gaffield Foundation began an initiative for environmental advocacy by founding RE-AMP. Now a network of over 130 member organizations across the Midwest, RE-AMP has grown to contribute to multiple climate victories. Such achievements include blocking new coal power plants’ development in the Midwest, halting existing coal power plants’ operations, and even passing environmental legislation in multiple states. Today, the organization focuses on short and long-term campaign goals