On December 7th in New York, RPA brought together clients, valued donors, grantees, partners and former staff members in recognition of its 20th Anniversary. This was the last celebration of the year, following RPA’s Chicago celebration in March and San Francisco celebration in September. Hosted at the offices of Rockefeller Capital Management (RCM), the evening opened with powerful poetry by the recently named Artist Fellow of the Art For Justice Fund, poet Ian Manuel. The event featured a panel on social justice and philanthropy including:

Valerie Rockefeller, RPA’s Board Chair, shared RPA’s new vision and CEO Melissa Berman closed the panel with gratitude to everyone that came together to celebrate the milestone occasion.

RPA would like to acknowledge all of our invited speakers and our generous hosts at RCM including Grace Yoon, Head of Strategic Partnerships & Community Impact, for the warm welcome and continued partnership. We encourage our supporters to obtain a copy of the following books from our featured poet and speakers: Ian Manuel, My Time Will Come: A Memoir of Crime, Punishment, Hope, and Redemption, Ann Mei Chang, Candid, Lean Impact: How to Innovate for Radically Greater Social Good, Shawn Dove, Campaign for Black Male Achievement; New Profit, I Too Am America: On Loving and Leading Black Men & Boys.

To align with RPA’s new core principles the event featured catering, wine and florals from BIPOC owned vendors including Melba’s catering, Franz James florals and House of Brown wines. Audio-visual services were provided by Oxygen Eventworks.

To view or download photos from the event, click here.