Each month, Independent Sector collects research with broad social sector relevance to share with you. February’s research contains important insights into vaccine equity, our writing education system, Pittsburgh’s clean water campaign, and ranking kindness by cities.

Vaccine Equity Cooperative Introduces Whitepaper on Health Equity Pillars

A new white paper has been released by the Vaccine Equity Cooperative whose members include Social Current, Partners in Health, National Association of Community Health Workers, and Health Leads. This work focuses on four key pillars of health equity that reflect the challenges faced during the COVID-19 pandemic: Access, Data, Power, and Resources. The authors believe following these pillars as guides can help build a more equitable health care system.

Access the report here: https://vaccineequitycooperative.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/VEC-white-paper-jan-2022.pdf

826 National Releases New Report on Writing Education

In their new report, 826 National set out to understand the barriers to effective and accessible writing instruction for students in the U.S. This field has not only been underfunded for years, but the disparities are exceedingly apparent. They report that three out of four 12^th-grade students and nine out of 10 Black and Hispanic 12^th-grade students are not writing at grade-level proficiency. But all is not lost as the report also provides where we can begin bridging gaps for students across the country.

More on the report: https://826national.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Writing-Eduation-in-America_Full-Report.pdf

Water Must Remain a Public Good: Introduction to the Pittsburgh Water Campaign

This case study follows Pittsburgh United and its partners in the Our Water Campaign as they seek to restore public governance over Pittsburgh’s local water authority. This is the first case study of four that examines how community leaders forced the city of Pittsburgh to provide safe and affordable drinking water. They also developed an accountability model in the process by which everyday people can oversee the public water utility.

Read the case study: https://www.demos.org/sites/default/files/2022-02/PGHOurWater_FINAL.pdf

VolunteerMatch Releases Kindhearted Cities Index 2022

VolunteerMatch launched its first ever data index that ranks America’s cities on characteristics of kindness — including crime rates, sustainability efforts, and volunteerism. They define kindness as being considerate, helpful, humane, charitable, or of service to others — all intrinsic to humanity. After combing through publicly available data, they ranked the top 50 most kindhearted cities in America for 2022.

Read more here: https://solutions.volunteermatch.org/kindhearted-cities-index-2022

Add Your Voice

The research summaries above are by no means an exhaustive list of the newest information out there to help us better understand the nonprofit landscape. Did we miss a report you think we should know about and share? Let us know by leaving a comment!