OUR CHALLENGE:

Research is at the heart of the Institute's education and advocacy work. When there are questions about how new and existing policies affect low-income minority people, IRP often investigates and makes recommendations to help ensure fairness and justice for all.

This fits well with our mission, which is to identify and address problems caused when racial and economic discrimination combine to create barriers to opportunity for low-income communities of color.

Our long-term strategic goals are to:

• Define racialized poverty and its implications;
• Advocate multiple strategies, including research, policymaking, litigation and public relations;
• Reframe public discourse on race and poverty to improve conditions for low-income people of color;
• Increase opportunities for low-income people of color to participate in and transform our democratic
  processes and structures.

The Institute on Race & Poverty (IRP) was founded by john a. powell in 1993 at the University of Minnesota Law School. powell is a former national legal director for the American Civil Liberties Union and is currently the Earl R. Larson Chair of Civil Rights and Civil Liberties Law at the University of Minnesota Law School.

The Institute's ultimate goal is to change policies and practices that affect the well-being of low-income communities of color. This is not a goal that can be accomplished independently. Thus the Institute collaborates with many advocacy groups and community organizations, national, state and local government officials, as well as religious, philanthropic, and business leaders, and media representatives.

Few organizations focus on how the intersections of racism and poverty impact low-income communities of color. To fully understand and address these issues, we analyze communities where problems occur, as well as policies and practices at local, state, regional and federal levels, which are sometimes the sources of particular challenges communities of color face.

IRP's research strongly suggests that strategic solutions must address racism and poverty in a holistic manner. While low-income communities of color are capable of addressing many of their challenges, they cannot be expected to bear the full burden of repairing oppressive public and private systems and structures.

Policy makers and community leaders must do their part to ensure fairness and justice for all.

National Advisory Board

Michelle Alexander, Stanford Law School
John Calmore, University of North Carolina (UNC) School of Law
Roger Clay, Institute on Race & Poverty
Gary Delgado, Applied Research Center (ARC)
Nancy Denton, State University of New York (SUNY) at Albany
Gerard Fergerson, New York University
George Galster, College of Urban, Labor and Metropolitan Affairs, Wayne State University
Chester Hartman, Poverty & Race Research Action Council (PRRAC)
James Head, National Economic Development and Law Center
Paul C. Hudson, Broadway Federal Bank
Paul Jargowsky, University of Texas School of Social Sciences
S.M. Miller, Commonwealth Institute
Michael Omi, University of California Department of Ethnic Studies
Gary Orfield, Harvard University
John Red Horse, University of Minnesota at Duluth
Florence Roisman, Indiana University School of Law
Eric Saltzman, Harvard University
Frederick Smith, Center for Urban and Regional Affairs
Theodore Shaw, NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund, Inc.
Ada Shen-Jaffee, Columbia Legal Services
Maya Wiley, Consultant
Jack Willis, Open Society Institute
Dorreen Yellow Bird, Grand Forks Herald