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, supported by CALL members.
A new model of collaborative media that is not simply reported FOR community but WITH community.
Media That Makes a Difference
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.
CALL Newsletter
Support the Work
We have several multimedia series. 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 sponsor option for large tax deductible gifts.
We are gathering rural, suburban, and urban Minnesotans in conversation to create long-lasting change. We cannot do this work without your support.
Changemakers Alliance is a fiscally sponsored project of Local Media Foundation, a non-profit 501(c)(3) charitable organization.
If you prefer to give a tax deductible donation to Changemakers Alliance by check, please send it to:
Local Media Foundation
P.O. Box 85015
Chicago, IL 60689-5033
Tax ID: 36-4427750
If you don’t care about tax deductible status, please visit our donate page for other options.
Connect With the Work
CALL is about deeper issues that deserve sustained attention, supported by community members who care about solutions and action. It is “Media That Makes a Difference.”
- 2023 was about developing content about core issues
- 2024 was about deepening our statewide network about those issues
- 2025 is about connecting people who want to take collective action and shift narratives informed by our unique first-person stories
Goals
- Elect diverse leadership
- Reduce the effects of violent patriarchy, trauma, and addictions
- Support restorative justice and crisis response with policing alternatives
- Offer statewide conversations about values and vision
- Encourage supportive housing and minimize “not in my backyard”
- Support community-based economies that also supports caregiving from birth to death
- Engage around restoring ecosystems
Thanks to Underwriters
Our stories and discussions are created independently, with the financial contributions of CALL members and underwriters.
2024-25
Addressing Gender-Based Violence
Underwriter: Minneapolis Foundation
Commentaries
Underwriter: Joan Gilles Financial Planning
Collective Health: mental and physical health, caregiving, housing
Underwriter: Women’s Foundation
NEW: Where Do We Go From Here? — statewide conversations about solutions and action
Underwriter: Valvoline of Northern MN
2023-24
Addressing Gender-Based Violence
Underwriter: Valvoline of Northern MN, Family Tree Clinic
Diversity in Politics
Underwriters: Vote Run Lead, Women Winning
Commentaries
Underwriter: Joan Gilles Financial Planning
Ecolution: Restoring Ecosystems and Economies
Underwriter: Seward Co-op
Reproductive Justice
Underwriter: Women’s Foundation
Mental Health
Underwriter: Minnesota Alliance for Children’s Mental Health
Hometown Values & Vision
More underwriters needed to expand statewide
Visits so far: Fergus Falls, Virginia, Chisholm, Ortonville, Worthington, Grand Rapids, Brainerd, Marshall
Underwriters: Valvoline, Vote Run Lead, Finishing Trades Institute
“Re-Imagining Public Safety”
Underwriters needed
- 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.
- Gun violence is spiking because of easy access to guns.
This series is about exploring solutions, including legislative action.
“The Foundations of Housing”
Underwriters needed
Changemakers Alliance events
- January 2023: “The Bonobo Sisterhood: Revolution Through Female Alliance.” Underwriter: University of Minnesota Press.
- March 2023: “Bodily Autonomy” event hosted at First Unitarian Society of Minneapolis. Underwriter: Family Tree Clinic
- April 2023: “Sex, Menopause, and Aging” event at Women’s Club, in tandem with The Edge.
Underwriters: Compassion & Choices, Our Lady of Peace, Rainbow Health - April 2024: Badass Minnesotans, including award ceremony, at First Unitarian Society of Minneapolis
- June 2024: Black Women and Mental Health
We launched a discussion guide about re-imagining public safety at our 2024 event. The goal in 2025 is to have funding and team to host conversations around the state about gender-based violence and other collective health issues.
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
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.”
We Can Do the Impossible Together
Coming: speakers from the 2025 40th Anniversary celebration
Nekima Levy Armstrong
Emilia Gonzalez Avalos
Nancy Lyons
Patricia Torres Ray
Yurie Hong
Winona LaDuke
For 2025 coverage, Minnesota Women’s Press earned a community leadership award, three photography awards, and four editorial awards, including for coverage of social issues and for our Spring 2025 “Know Your Rights” special section supported by Unidos MN. Our publisher was named Journalist of the Year by Violence Free Minnesota for gender-based violence coverage.
Your magazine and articles of Change Makers is so informative.! And reading about good ,hard working, achieving women encourage me to want to do more with my own life, and within my community. I wish everyone would read your articles on a monthly basis. Thank you.
Thank you for writing Patricia! Yes, we agree. 🙂 Please share our stories freely with your friends.