JUSTICE SQUARED Launches Applications To Learning And Action Collaborative To Address Structural Racism In Healthcare Grounded In Joy, Trust, And Justice

Structural racism runs through the air we breathe and the water we drink. Depending on who and where we are, it can even be toxic and make us sick. And yet, when people turn to healthcare expecting to be healed, the air and water there, too, can be deadly. While many are working to ensure healthcare serves everyone with dignity and fairness, transforming complex systems is hard. It can feel overwhelming, especially in the face of active threats to justice–if we’re trying to tackle structural racism alone.

To support those committed to transforming healthcare systems and improving health equity, we are excited to introduce JUSTICE SQUARED—a powerful, two-year initiative led by Well-being and Equity (WE) in the World, a national program office of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, designed to equip healthcare and community leaders with the resources, training, and support they need to drive lasting change.

What is JUSTICE SQUARED?

Just Leaders for a Just Health System (JUSTICE SQUARED) is a groundbreaking initiative aimed at addressing structural racism in healthcare through collective leadership. Through transformational learning and action collaborative to advance racially just healthcare,

JUSTICE SQUARED will support teams of five from up to 12 diverse healthcare organizations and community partners experiencing racial inequities to:

• Share power and accountability across healthcare and patients/communities experiencing healthcare inequities.
• Engage in a guided learning and action journey to change their healthcare organization by shifting:
  • how we measure and account for racism (not just race); or
  • how we remove racism from clinical, operational and administrative diagnostics and algorithms through a guided journey.
• Build lasting change by shifting policies and practices and building trustworthy relationships between healthcare and the communities, grounded in joy, love, and justice.

What Will Teams Receive?

• A phenomenal support system built from people who bring decades of hard-won experience in addressing racial justice, health equity, and system change in healthcare and community
• A guided journey to advance racial justice through two powerful shifts:
  • Measuring and accounting for racism (not just race)
  • Removing racism from clinical, operational, and administrative diagnostics and algorithms.
• $300,000 in funding over two years ($400,000 for safety net institutions) to support their journey.

Who Are We Looking For?

JUSTICE SQUARED seeks up to 12 leadership teams from diverse healthcare organizations and community partners with five or more years of experience addressing health equity with a focus on racism. These teams can come from independent organizations or those part of a network, whether nonprofit or for-profit (for-benefit organizations preferred). Applicants should be actively delivering healthcare services and have a letter of sponsorship from their organization and co-funding if you are not a safety net organization.

By uniting a community of changemakers grounded in shared leadership and accountability, equipping them with effective tools and supports to address structural racism, and taking practical action together to change policies and practices, JUSTICE SQUARED seeks to shift healthcare into a system grounded in trust, joy, and justice.

Key deadlines

October 29, 2024 – Application portal opens
December 15, 2024 – Register your team
January 15, 2025 – Phase One applications close
April 2, 2025 – Phase Two applications close (invited only)
April 16, 2025 – JUSTICE SQUARED Teams Announced

Ready to Lead the Change?

If your healthcare organization is ready to create real system change in partnership with communities to advance health equity, we encourage you to apply for JUSTICE SQUARED. Together, we can dismantle barriers and build a healthcare system grounded in joy, love, and justice.
Learn more about the program and application process justicesquared.org.

Engagement Toolkit here.