About 25 years ago, my aunt instituted an annual family reunion where all of my cousins, aunts, uncles and grandparents would get together for a week in a new location every summer. Because of this tradition and the time we committed to spending with each other, my cousins have always felt more like siblings to me, even now as we are all grown adults with busy lives, families, living across the country from one another.

Initially it took some time to narrow down the scope of interest amongst all of the cousins—we sent surveys, held Zoom meetings, and led research efforts to find organizations of interest to us. We discussed several ideas ranging from the environment to global impact to education until ultimately we landed on local education. We all agreed that in order to fix some of the larger issues our country and planet are facing, we need to invest in fixing the school systems to allow equity in, and access to, effective education.

Our decision to invest in CLI aligns with a core value we believe in so deeply: equality. CLI works to solve a fundamental problem in our education system, namely that students attending schools in affluent communities are afforded more opportunities than those in under-funded ones, a problem that disproportionately affects students of color.

We cannot deny the school system is failing. Our family’s philanthropy supports CLI’s decision to take a more focused approach toward addressing the immediate risk to these under-resourced communities. With our continued support, we believe CLI will be able to optimize their coaching methodology to go deeper in existing markets, expand to new markets, and continue to innovate on how to meet the needs of the ongoing virtual learning environment. While we were not able to predict the madness of the pandemic and its impact when we first decided to donate to CLI, I could not be more proud of the initial decision we made and of our continued investment in CLI’s ever-important mission. I am proud to be a part of the change our country needs so desperately, and I, alongside my cousins, am proud to invest in an organization having a positive impact on social justice.

As a result of this gift, I maintain regular communication with my cousins (who are located in 6 different states and 3 different time zones across the US) and we have bonded over the ability to make an impact in an area we mutually care about deeply. We are also learning how to measure impact with our philanthropy, which is an utterly intoxicating return on investment to each of us. We are more aware of the challenges in the education space and share news and updates as it relates to the world of CLI. I would encourage other families to consider implementing a similar tradition as the benefits of connectedness, meaningful discussion, and shared pride as a result of impact are boundless.