The Starbucks Foundation Announces MENTOR as a Recipient of Grants to Support BIPOC Youth
March 23, 2021
Building on a longstanding commitment to advance opportunity for all, in 2020 The Starbucks Foundation committed to invest $5 million in nonprofits that serve Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) youth. As a next step in this initiative, The Starbucks Foundation announced the first group of nonprofit grant recipients. MENTOR is honored to be among the five grantees, along with Big Brothers Big Sisters of America, Boys & Girls Clubs of America, City Year, and Junior Achievement USA.
The Starbucks Foundation grants will support initiatives that focus on:
- Diversity, equity and inclusion programs;
- Youth mentorship and leadership development; and
- Life skills, such as addressing financial health and mental health.
These initiatives will drive impact through national- and local-level programs in communities across the United States. “At Starbucks, we believe it is our responsibility to build bridges and advance social and racial equity on behalf of our partners and communities,” said Virginia Tenpenny, chief social impact officer at Starbucks and executive director of The Starbucks Foundation. “We are honored to partner with nonprofits that share our aspiration for thriving and equitable communities, and which have decades of experience empowering young people. The Starbucks Foundation looks forward to supporting continued innovation of programs that address systemic barriers to equitable outcomes and can contribute to closing the racial opportunity gap.”
MENTOR and its Affiliates drive innovation and collaboration across America in order to rewire youth-serving systems to more equitably serve all young people by prioritizing and ensuring supportive youth-adult relationships. The Starbucks Foundation’s grant will help fund MENTOR’s development of an online learning system and community trainings that will deepen the mentoring field’s capacity to incorporate inclusive mentoring practices and increase local access to trainings and resources through MENTOR’s Affiliate network. The impact and reach of this work will have ripple effects to thousands of mentoring programs, and to the hundreds of thousands of young people across the country connected to these mentoring programs, the majority of whom are BIPOC youth.
The grant will enable MENTOR to further invest in its Affiliates’ efforts to develop and deliver localized racial justice, equity, and inclusive mentoring resources. Abigail Ellis, executive director of MENTOR Independence Region, said, “We are grateful to The Starbucks Foundation for this incredible investment in youth mentoring. Locally and nationally, our Starbucks partners have been valuable collaborators, working with us to create meaningful experiences for mentors, mentees, and Starbucks employees. Our Starbucks partners truly believe in the power of connection, either in the simple action of getting a great morning coffee in the store, or through strengthening community with impactful events and this investment in our young people.”
The news follows the rollout of $1.5 million in Neighborhood Grants from The Starbucks Foundation in October focused on supporting organizations that are Black-led and/or serve Black and Indigenous communities and are dedicated to promoting economic mobility and opportunity and health and social services in local communities. The Starbucks Foundation’s 20+ year history of closing the equity gap for youth also includes grants totaling more than $7 million over five years (2015 – 2019) to organizations creating pathways to lifelong opportunity for youth and underserved communities.
About The Starbucks Foundation
The Starbucks Foundation strengthens humanity by transforming lives across the world, with a focus on enabling community resiliency and prosperity and uplifting communities affected by disaster. Established in 1997, The Starbucks Foundation is a Section 501(c)(3) charitable organization under U.S. law. Click here to learn more.