The Partnerships and Collaboration Fund
The Partnerships and Collaboration fund sees the J R McKenzie Trust proactively seeking opportunities to work with other funding partners to realise the aim of being an intentional facilitator of social change.
Established in late 2018, the Partnerships and Collaboration fund aims to operate flexibly and nimbly to embrace opportunities that support the Trust’s vision of “a socially just and inclusive Aotearoa New Zealand”. Through collaboration and partnerships with other funders, community organisations and government agencies, a greater collective impact can be achieved.
We believe that building on existing relationships, and developing new connections and collaborations provides us with opportunities for sharing research and learnings, assisting funding recipients with wider support, and through such collective endeavour can help amplify the influence of funding organisations.
For funding opportunities, please contact Eileen Kelly to discuss.
To build Pacific leadership through participation in the Mana Moana programme in 2019
Class of 2019, The Mana Moana Experience
The Mana Moana leadership course, run by Leadership New Zealand (LNZ), blends LNZ’s leadership training expertise with the benefits of Pacific wisdom and cultural knowledge, based on research by Karlo Mila. Participants are 18-20 mid-career Pasifika leaders; over a year they gather for six three-day residential retreats at which they learn from one another and a variety of external experts.
The course has been created with three-year funding from Foundation North, which was looking to contribute to a strong cohort of Pasifika leaders. As a result the participants all come from the Foundation’s catchment area – Northland and Auckland – and are all involved in the community sector, mostly as employees.
In 2019 the opportunity arose for the J R McKenzie Trust to offer a contribution that would allow Pasifika people from outside the Foundation North area and with strong community roles, to take part in the next course thereby reducing the financial barriers to participation for Pasifika people in community organisations.
FinCap – supporting their lobbying campaign for more effective law reform to reduce predatory lending
In 2019 FinCap, the National Financial Capability Trust, decided on a campaign to lobby the New Zealand Government to implement law changes that would generate the very best legislative outcome for low income consumers of high interest loans. Their primary campaign focus was to build on the intention of the Coalition Government announced in October 2018 to reform the Credit Contracts and Consumer Finance Act (CCCFA). It was their belief that the proposed law changes would be ineffective in generating the changes required.
In a collaboration with The Borrin Foundation which provided funding for financial and project planning support, and for research to support this campaign, the J R McKenzie Trust was able to contribute through OPC, to work that would highlight this research, and profile the lived-experience voices of those directly affected by predatory lending. Victoria University of Wellington, the Justice Innovation Centre (Christchurch), and Community Law Canterbury also became involved in this campaign as legal research partners.
FinCap itself also gained collaboration partners as explained by Tim Barnett, Chief Executive of FinCap. “We formed an early and relaxed grouping of like-minded national agencies, including the Iwi Chairs Forum and The Salvation Army, and made our lobby targets aware of the depth and width of that arrangement. That collaboration spread to joint media and approaches to politicians. With the local network of budgeting services, we encouraged engagement – well over half played some role in the whole process, supplying data and voice.”
While the campaign is still in progress, outcomes achieved that have most relevance and our goals are those around: upskilling the funding advisory sector in campaigning and storytelling, generating key research and resources, and giving voice to those affected by these laws.
Ara Taiohi – towards the establishment of Te Ngākau Kahukura – a National Rainbow Knowledge and Training Hub.
The establishment of Te Ngākau Kahukura in partnership with Ara Taiohi, the peak body for Youth Development and 23 rainbow (LGBTQIA+) member organisations is surely the most ambitious OPC grant made, and the most successful in its realisation of all the principles of partnership upon which the fund was set.
The J R McKenzie Trust had already been supporting Ara Taiohi in partnership with RainbowYOUTH for three years when in 2018 we were approached by The Tindall Foundation (TTF) and the Te Manatū Whakahiato Taiohi (MYD) to become funding partners with them in order to extend the work of the Rainbow Ready project, and help fund the establishment of a new national rainbow knowledge and training hub.
This partnership also gave us the chance to work together with TTF and MYD to rationalise and streamline our application, reporting and evaluation processes, thereby reducing the administrative burden on ngā kaikōkiri.
Stories from the Partnership and Collaboration Fund
