In celebration of our companions and the nice work they do to advance financial progress for all, we interviewed a few of our Nasdaq Foundation quarterly grant recipients about their roles, backgrounds and the significance of their work. We spoke with Ashley McLean, Senior Program Supervisor for Financial Alternative of Neighborhood Allies, on its mission to create actual, lasting alternatives for Pittsburgh residents by strengthening neighborhoods from inside and increasing entry to the sources wanted to create financial stability.
Inform us about Neighborhood Allies. What’s its core mission?
At Neighborhood Allies, we give attention to constructing relationships with Pittsburgh residents and organizations to supply revolutionary instruments and sources that uplift communities. We work to create actual, lasting alternatives by fostering collaboration, addressing wants, and driving optimistic transformation. Our mission is to strengthen neighborhoods from inside, making certain that everybody has entry to the sources they should thrive and construct lasting wealth, making a future the place financial stability and success are accessible to all.
Why is Neighborhood Allies’ mission so essential?
We’re guided by our North Star Objective, which is to broaden our sources to speed up, scale, and maintain the work of our neighborhood companions to create wholesome neighborhoods of alternative and transfer 100,000 low-to-moderate revenue Pittsburghers up the socio-economic ladder, over the subsequent 10 years.
We outline the socio-economic ladder as the degrees of financial and social positions in society, the place individuals can transfer up or down based mostly on elements equivalent to revenue, employment & entrepreneurship, schooling, housing circumstances (homeownership charges), psychological well being, and entry to sources. Neighborhood Allies helps residents in Pittsburgh’s underserved communities climb this ladder by investing in each individuals and locations.
This mission is significant as a result of it addresses the basis of systemic challenges which have lengthy hindered financial progress and stability in underrepresented communities. By offering residents with the instruments and sources to drive transformative change, we’re not simply specializing in instant wants—we’re serving to to construct pathways towards generational wealth.
When neighborhood members acquire entry to alternatives that foster monetary stability, they create a ripple impact for future generations. It’s about empowering people to not solely survive however thrive, giving them the means to spend money on their households and communities for years to come back. Financial wealth builds resilience, and by specializing in this, we’re actively working to make sure that progress isn’t short-term however long-lasting. Our mission is straight tied to serving to individuals understand this imaginative and prescient, increasing alternatives that result in monetary empowerment and stronger, extra sustainable communities.
Are you able to speak to us in regards to the Cash Talks coaching? What influence are you hoping the Nasdaq Basis’s Quarterly Grant can have on the Cash Talks coaching success?
The Cash Talks coaching is a singular, empowering area designed particularly for native Black girls, providing a supportive neighborhood the place individuals can brazenly talk about monetary challenges and alternatives. By means of common classes, knowledgeable steering, and self-paced monetary schooling modules, we assist girls of shade overcome the obstacles usually confronted in constructing generational wealth. By rising their information of cash administration and investing, we’re fostering confidence and monetary independence.
The Nasdaq Basis’s Quarterly Grant is instrumental in amplifying this program’s influence. With their assist, we’re in a position to broaden our choices, such because the 2024 Vacation Survival Program, and supply individuals with funds to use towards their investments and monetary objectives. This grant helps us attain extra girls, deepen their monetary information, and set them on a path towards lasting wealth. We’re giving them the instruments and sources to interrupt monetary cycles and create new, generational alternatives for themselves and their households.
Are you able to share one or two tales that illustrate the influence of Neighborhood Allies?
One of the significant tales comes from Zxalasjea, a participant in our Cash Talks program. Earlier than becoming a member of, she felt uncertain about managing her funds and didn’t know a lot about investing. By means of this system, she gained sensible information and the boldness to make knowledgeable selections about her monetary future.
In Zxalasjea’s personal phrases, “The Cash Talks Program opened my eyes to the world of investing. I now not really feel nervous speaking in regards to the inventory market, credit score, or financial savings. This system gave me the instruments I wanted, and now I’ve began investing and even turned a house owner.”
Zxalasjea’s expertise exhibits how Neighborhood Allies helps actual individuals acquire management of their funds, construct stability, and create the inspiration for generational wealth, making certain a brighter monetary future.
What’s on the horizon in 2024 for Neighborhood Allies?
In 2024 and 2025, we will probably be providing monetary schooling sources on school planning to the mother and father and youths concerned in Fund My Future PGH (FMF PGH), which is our financial savings program that incentivizes households to open and make deposits into long-term accounts for his or her kids. We’re additionally planning to broaden sources and help to Black and/or girls entrepreneurs, equivalent to entry to free monetary counseling with our Financial Empowerment Center and digital instruments to broaden their enterprise. We’ve additionally begun a partnership with our area people school to establish the scholars most in peril of leaving faculty as a result of monetary problem to supply them help that can allow them to remain enrolled and full a level.
