To improve racial disparities, NC business foundation ups funds to Black organizations
In the weeks after George Floyd’s death, NC IDEA, one of the state’s leading foundations for startups, said it wasn’t doing enough to support entrepreneurs of color.
The racial disparities among which companies got funded were just “horrible,” NC IDEA President Thom Ruhe told The News & Observer.
One report that is often shared found that just 1% of entrepreneurs receiving funding are Black, for example.
In response, Durham-based NC IDEA created a Black Entrepreneurship Council, a Black-led board that the foundation said would improve its outreach to the Black business community and guide dollars and programs to Black organizations.
This week, the first fruits of that effort were announced, with more than $360,000 in grants given to eight organizations in the state that support Black entrepreneurs.
“Equitable entrepreneurship is vital to our economic recovery,” Ruhe said in a statement. “Partnering with these eight worthy recipients creates greater opportunity to economically empower Black people with entrepreneurship and collectively work to combat inequalities that perpetuate racial imbalances.”
The eight organization receiving funds were:
- Knox St. Studios, a Durham-based maker and learning space for entrepreneurs.
- HELIUS, a business coaching organization in Durham.
- ACCESS Center for Equity + Success, a community of minority- and woman-owned businesses in Winston-Salem.
- ASPIRE Community Capital, a Charlotte-based business accelerator for under-resourced communities.
- City Startup Labs, a business incubator in Charlotte that offers programs for formerly incarcerated individuals.
- Genesis Block Labs, a coworking space in Wilmington.
- GRIND, an Asheville coffee shop that also operates as a coworking space for businesses.
- Triangle Entrepreneurial Leadership, a regional leadership network that hosts events and seminars.
The organizations were selected from more than 140 applications, NC IDEA said. Last week, NC IDEA gave out $1.5 million in grants to 17 other organizations in the state.
Since this summer, businesses have stepped up their financial commitments to Black institutions, as they began to wrestle with their individual failings in promoting a diverse workforce.
Black colleges have especially been targeted as recipients for a lot of these partnerships and gifts.
Last week, Raleigh’s two historically Black colleges, Shaw and St. Augustine’s universities, joined an Apple initiative that will bring more coding and technology education to those schools.
Earlier this year, IBM said it would invest $100 million into historically Black colleges to improve technology curriculum. Four schools in North Carolina were set to receive investments from IBM, including N.C. Central University in Durham.
And in September, Triangle semiconductor maker Cree created a $4 million scholarship program at North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University, the largest historically Black university in the country as well as the top producer of Black engineering graduates.
The state still has some ways to go to improve racial disparities, especially in high-tech industries.
North Carolina’s technology industry lags behind much of the country when it comes to representation, The News & Observer reported last year.
North Carolina ranked 22nd among all states measured by the percentage of tech workers identifying as people of color compared to the makeup of the state’s overall population, according to figures from the NC Tech Association.
This story was produced with financial support from a coalition of partners led by Innovate Raleigh as part of an independent journalism fellowship program. The N&O maintains full editorial control of the work. Learn more; go to bit.ly/newsinnovate
