Changemakers Alliance: Media That Makes a Difference

Changemakers Alliance (CALL) was launched by Minnesota Women’s Press in 2022 to move our statewide community of engaged readers off the page and into connection and action together. We host discussions on core topics that can support legislative advocacy, story development, multimedia communication, and other ideas generated by CALL members.

A new model of collaborative media that is not simply reported FOR community but WITH community.

CALL takes the legacy of Minnesota Women’s Press — the longest continuously run feminist publication in the country — one step further. Together we amplify powerful everyday people who have solutions in order to co-create collective action.

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Support the Work

We have several multimedia series planned for 2023. These are stronger and deeper with your contribution. The more conversations we can have, and the wider we can connect around the state, the better. Please fund our unique new model of solutions journalism. We have a fiscal agent option for large tax deductible gifts.

We are gathering rural, suburban, and urban Minnesotans in conversation to create long-lasting change. Please support our work. 

Changemakers Alliance is a fiscally sponsored project of Tiny News Collective Inc, a non-­profit 501(c)(3) charitable organization. Tiny News Collective will receive grants for the charitable purposes of Changemakers Alliance, provide oversight to ensure that grant funds are used in accordance with grant agreements, and provide reports as required by the grantor. Contributions for the charitable purposes of Changemakers Alliance must be made payable to Tiny News Collective, and are tax-deductible to the extent permitted by law.

If you prefer to give a tax deductible donation to Changemakers Alliance by check, please make it out to “Tiny News Collective” with “CALL” on the memo line, and send to Fariba Sanakhatam, Minnesota Women’s Press, 800 West Broadway, Suite 3A, Minneapolis, MN 55411.

If you don’t care about tax deductible status, please contact [email protected] to make a CALL donation by check or credit card.

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Connect With the Work

We want to get to know your interests. The unique aspect of Changemakers Alliance (CALL) is that we connect people statewide to develop our stories. We do not simply ‘drop in’ to a topic and then move on. CALL is about deeper issues that deserve sustained attention, supported by community members who care about those issues. We go where the interests are. CALL is about developing teamwork and action steps WITH community, not simply FOR community. Please sign up for the topics that interest you in order to help us create the kinds of conversations, events, solutions, and solidarity that will lead to statewide change.

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Goals in Sum

• Elect diverse leadership
• Reduce the effects of violent patriarchy, trauma, and addictions 
• Offer statewide conversations about values and vision
• Support community-based economies, especially with BIPOC and immigrant entrepreneurs
• Maintain reproductive rights as a safe haven state
• Encourage supportive housing and minimize “not in my backyard”
• Support restorative justice and crisis response with policing alternatives
• Get common-sense gun legislation passed
• Encourage multicultural education
• Engage around restoring ecosystems

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2023 Multimedia Series

Defusing Patriarchal Violence
Underwriter: Valvoline of Northern MN, Family Tree Clinic

“Values & Vision” (started January) enables us to reflect on who we are and what we care about. How do we evolve statewide in curiosity and acceptance of people who have different experiences? How do we roll up our sleeves together to make our communities safer for all, including multicultural education, crisis response, supportive housing, gun-sense legislation, and anti-racism efforts? Underwriters welcome.

• January 5: “The Bonobo Sisterhood: Revolution Through Female Alliance.” Underwriter: University of Minnesota Press.
• February 23: solutions to gender-based violence
• March 25: “Bodily Autonomy” event hosted at First Unitarian Society of Minneapolis
• April TBD: “The Rights to Sex: Musings From Amia Srinivasan”

“Melanated Main Streets” (started in March)
Underwriters welcome.

• “The Brooklyn Center Journey”
• “Why I Left Corporate America”
• “Taking the Entrepreneurial Journey”
• “Facilitating Wealth-Building as a Reparations Practice”
• more to be determined in community conversations

“Being a Safe Haven” (March 25 in-person discussion)

Underwriter: Women’s Foundation

Minnesota is the only safe place in the five-state region for people who need to access their own reproductive health choices. How are we keeping it safe for visitors? What restrictions and access should we be talking about? How are advocates continuing to take action to try to address issues such as state-funded “pregnancy centers”? Reading list.

“Reimagining Public Safety” (starts May)

Underwriters needed.

• Gun violence is spiking because of easy access to guns.
• People in crisis need support rather than jail time, yet police tend to be the first responders for many difficult situations.
• Self-medicating to deal with trauma is leading to preventable deaths. Statewide overdose deaths hit a record high in 2021. The rate of Minnesotans dying due to excessive drinking has doubled since 2014; alcohol is the ninth-leading cause of death in the state, twice the number of traffic fatalities. In addition, of the 570 gun deaths in Minnesota in 2021, 393 were attributed to suicide.

This series is about exploring solutions, including legislative action.

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2022 Discussions

• Diversity in Politics
• Celebrating BadAss Minnesota Women
• Talking About Fear
• Statewide Equity
• Polarization in North Minnesota
• Healing Trauma
• Housing
• LGBTQ+ Voices: Then and Now
• Understanding Addiction
• Values & Vision with book authors

Participants thus far have included people from Apple Valley, Aurora, Babbitt, Blaine, Burnsville, Centerville, Crookston, Eagle Bend, East Bethel, Edina, Faribault, Hinckley, Lake Vermilion, Little Falls, Mankato, Maplewood, Minneapolis, Ortonville, Richfield, Roseville, Saint Charles, Saint Paul, Savage, Shakopee, Staples, Wayzata 

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Why We Are Developing Changemakers Alliance

In the 1980s, Minnesota Women’s Press featured articles such as:

• “Violence Against Women: Has Anything Changed?”
• “[Supreme Court] Decision Heats Up Abortion Debate”
• “Schools to Take Next Step Toward Inclusive Curricula”

It has been four decades, and we are still circling around the same issues.

In 2021, we quoted Melissa Scaia of Global Rights for Women: “My frustration is not that we do not know how to end violence against women. It is that we have not changed the thinking that women are less.”

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We Can Do the Impossible Together

Robin Wonsley’s comments at our “Celebrating Badass Minnesota Women” April event

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Thanks to Series Underwriters

Diversity in Politics

LGBTQ+

CALL Connections Newsletter

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