The Waymakers Collective began grantmaking in 2020 with a series of “Seed Learning” grants. These grants were focused on a set of nominated artists + organizations pulled from the existing Central Appalachian Assembly and represented in $406,000 in grant dollars flowing to 25 grantees across six states. 

In 2021, we established a “Grow With Us” Grants program that gave grants to 25 existing grantees + 25 nominated artists and organizations that applied, but did not receive funding in 2020. This round of grants represented $140,000.

In 2022, we focused on Appalachian Futurism and sought out new grantees creating “Just Futures” in the mountains through a nominations and applications process. That grantmaking resulted in $306,500 in grant dollars for 38 grantees across six states. 

And in 2023, we paused and reflected with our “Radical Rest” Grants. Acknowledging that between 2020-2022, our communities were impacted by a global pandemic and several of our members were deeply affected by natural disasters, including devastating flooding, our members needed time to process and integrate all that has happened and all that we learned. Collective members identified rest as one of the first steps towards integration and offered all members of the Waymakers Collective a “Radical Rest Grant” that was an automatic payment of $2,000 per member that members could keep or potentially re-grant to someone else they nominated. There was no competitive application process or formal reporting. 105 “Radical Rest” Grants were made totalling $182,000.

In addition to these numbers, the Waymakers Collective gives out $20,000 grants each year to our AppalCore members in recognition of their weekly labor serving on our governing body.  

Since 2020, the Waymakers Collective has distributed $1,188,000 directly to Central Appalachian artists and arts organizations making us the largest and only funder of artists in Appalachia located inside the region and controlled exclusively by Appalachians with the majority of our membership now representing people of color. 

Today, the Waymakers Collective has grown to be a community of 105 voting members including artists, culture bearers, cultural organizers, and arts and culture organizations.  We are becoming a powerful movement for the arts, healing, and equity. This is important as we seek to shift the power dynamics that center whiteness, paternalism, and outside financial and decision making control we see practiced by traditional arts philanthropy + large funding intermediaries.

Cumulative Impact <2020 to 2023>:

• Total Number of Grants: 241

• Total Grant Dollars: $1,188,000.00

• Impact Investments: $1,300,000.00 

• 2023 Demographics of Grantees: 40% of grantees were BIPOC artists or BIPOC-led arts organizations

Impact Investing 

Understanding that money can be medicine to do reparative work, the Waymakers Collective is committed to 100% mission-aligned investing with the resources we steward. 

We use all of the tools in our financial toolbox to help foster systemic change and, in 2020, we began making impact investments with our assets under management that were not needed for immediate grantmaking or operations. Our impact investing strategy is rooted in the values of reparations and rematriation. 

• $1,000,000: 2% impact investment with the Federation of Appalachian Housing Enterprises (FAHE) to support affordable housing for working class people in the region 

• $300,000: 0% impact investment with Oweesta to support Indigenous artists, entrepreneurs, and communities 

In 2023, we moved to Amalgamated so that our banking relationship was also in right relationship with our values.

Our full, comprehensive Impact Report will be published Spring 2024.