This week's Democracy Notes

May 22, 2024

Welcome back!

Lots of exciting news this week…

Here’s what’s available on there:

If you’d like to join, accept the invite here. (No one will be automatically added — to anything, ever.)

Two neat items from the Joyce Foundation (they fund in the Great Lakes region and have a correspondingly ~great~ democracy program):
- Joyce recently highlighted the work of two grantees who are registering community college students to vote — the Campus Vote Project and Students Learn Students Vote.
- And here’s an informative Q&A with their democracy program’s leadership.
Funder briefing tomorrow (!) at 1pm ET on combatting voter suppression of immigrants, co-hosted by NEO Philanthropy’s Four Freedoms Fund, Carnegie Corporation of New York, the Ford Foundation, and the JPB Foundation.
- Registration required here.
Philanthropy for Active Civic Engagement (PACE) is hosting a series of salons over the course of this year, culminating with an in-person convening in December.
- Their second one was at the Media Impact Funders Forum yesterday.
- Learn more about the series and December 2024 convening here.

Minnesota just became the seventh state to adopt a state-level voting rights act!
- Minnesotans will now have state-law protections against racial discrimination in voting.
- In other election-related news, voters in Republican-majority South Dakota will decide this fall whether to adopt a top-two open primary system.
Want to engage Gen Z in your org’s work? Recruiting for your internship program? Check out this LinkedIn group run by the ActivateGenZ Project.
- You can also comment your email on this LinkedIn thread to be included.
The SNF Agora Institute at JHU has a new cohort of Visiting Fellows!
- Speaking of which, Hahrie Han, the institute’s director, gave the Tanner lecture at Harvard this year. Part 1 here, part 2 here.
Parks. They’re almost as cool as libraries. Hear what they have to do with democracy from the SVP of the Trust for Public Land in The Seattle Times.
- Hint: they help with segregation, trust in institutions, loneliness, and more.

What are citizens’ assemblies? How do they work? Q&A tomorrow hosted by DemocracyNext!
Save the (tentative) date! The 2025 Denver Democracy Summit will likely be January 23-24 (to be confirmed soon). Here’s the agenda from the 2023 event.
Check out the livestream of today/yesterday’s Global Democracy Conference at Notre Dame’s Kellogg Institute for International Studies here.
How can the leaders of cities work with DHS to counter hate and extremism? Podcast discussion here.

Uhhhhhh…Meta Misinformation Policy Manager — Austin, Menlo Park, DC, NYC, $119K-$177K
- Someone get this job and tell me what it’s like on the inside!
National Trust for Local News, remote:
- Director of Communications — $160K-$170K
- Director of Strategy — $160K-$170K
Center for Democracy and Technology:
- Policy Counsel, Security and Surveillance Project — DC, $65K-$90K
- Elections and Democracy Fellow — DC (remote possible), $65K-$105K
- Equity in Civic Technology Fellow — DC (remote possible), $70K-$115K
- Academic-year Externship — unpaid 🙁 (but a cool opportunity nonetheless)
Guides.vote Partnership Director — remote, full time contract role, $50K-$62K
Run for Something Chief Impact Officer — remote, $198K
Rhizome (youth civic engagement):
- Community Organizer — remote, $25/hour
- Regional Organizer — remote, $25/hour
- Organizer — remote, $18/hour
Emerge America:
- Deputy Affiliate Director — remote, $99K-$104K
- Senior Development Director — remote, $115K-$120K
- Colorado Executive Director — Colorado, $77K-$90K
- Washington Executive Director — Washington (state), $77K-$90K

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Thanks, as always, for your attention. If you found this valuable, please forward it to a democracy friend or colleague!

Take care,

Gabe

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