Strategic Roadmap

At John Rex Endowment (JRE), we’ve partnered with amazing nonprofits, community leaders, grassroots organizations, funders and fellow advocates for more than 25 years. During this time, we’ve learned so much from you. We’ve been inspired. And we’ve confronted increased opposition to the racial equity work that is so important to helping children and families thrive.

What is a strategic roadmap?

Our roadmap is exactly what it sounds like. It’s the plan we use to guide our work, from how we make funding decisions to how we center our mission in everything we do. It includes what we’re trying to accomplish, why we want to accomplish it and how we’re making it happen!

How did JRE create the roadmap?

Our team centered our roadmap updates around one key question: How can John Rex Endowment best support nonprofits that are helping improve the social emotional health of children in Wake County?

2018

We created our initial roadmap, focusing on building community capacity.

2023

We updated it with the help of community partners, board members, a team of racial equity consultants and more.

Looking Forward

In the next 20 years, we will have a resilient, equity-centered ecosystem that is better equipped to improve the social emotional health of children.

What is our vision through the roadmap?

What makes this roadmap so special is this 20-year vision – we’re truly working toward long-term change! We recognize solving systemic issues isn’t solely the nonprofit sector’s responsibility. Systemic change requires a long-term commitment from all of us.

Where is JRE’s focus?

Through our roadmap, we are:

Continuing the work we are known best for: building capacity and system-level improvements.

This includes supporting current and future partners like you to build capacities that support an ecosystem where all children thrive.
We fund and co-create efforts that align with our mission: strengthening organizations that center racial equity and justice to improve the social and emotional health of children living in Wake County.
We recognize solving systemic issues isn’t solely the nonprofit sector’s responsibility. Systemic change requires a long-term commitment.

Exploring new ways to support organizations doing great work for children.

Although we still won’t fund direct services, we ARE exploring new ways to work with organizations.

Supporting movement-building efforts.

We’re partnering more with organizations that are focused on movement building.
For example, we’re thinking about how we can partner with our peer funders to increase our impact. We’re part of groups such as Invest Early NC and the Triangle Capacity Building Network.
We’re also exploring ways to support the phenomenal community leaders and advocates who are on the ground every day, doing the good work that helps our communities thrive.

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How We Work

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