Equitable Spaces’ Jimmieka Mills has been invited to speak on a panel entitled, “Advancing Equitable Research: Developing innovative and inclusive policy solutions” at the upcoming White House Conference on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health to be held at the Ronald Reagan Conference Center in Washington, DC on September 28th.

Mills will attend the conference, focused on eradicating hunger and nutrition-related health disparities by 2030, alongside ES Co-Founder, Diane Sullivan. Equitable Spaces applauds the Biden Administration for its on-going efforts to include the voices of those most impacted by hunger and nutrition-related health disparities in this conference.

Register for the upcoming All in National Meeting (AINM) to be held virtually on October 25-26. To reinforce this year’s AINM theme, “Centering Communities to Transform Shared Data Systems,” Equitable Spaces has been providing support to 12 community speakers with lived experience in preparation for their sessions at this year’s conference.

Join us and over 400 community members with lived and learned experience, organizational representatives, and other stakeholders interested in multi-sector data sharing at this year's meeting. Sessions will highlight successful efforts to promote health and well-being through a lens of diversity, equity, and inclusion. We hope to see you there!

In 2021, ES partnered with the Center for Health Care Strategies to co-author the report, “Fighting Hunger by Connecting Cross-Sector Partners and Centering Lived Expertise, “ which defines lived expertise as the experiences of individuals who know: (1) the realities of hunger, poverty, and other societal issues by living them daily; (2) how those experiences impact health and wellness; (3) the challenges of navigating public benefits programs for supports and services; and (4) that their perspectives uniquely qualify them as informed stakeholders who can help to shape more equitable policy.

Are you a community member with lived expertise interested in joining the growing movement to create more equitable spaces? Click the link below to submit a short form!

June 27 - Equitable Spaces was honored to co-host a listening session, with special guest Congressman Jim McGovern, Chair of the House Committee on Rules (MA 2nd District), and in partnership with the Massachusetts Law Reform Institute, Coalition for a Healthy Greater Worcester, and the UMass Worcester Prevention Research Center.

McGovern later Tweeted about the event, “The powerful testimony from experts w/ lived experiences of hunger at today's listening session hosted by community organizations will be sent to the @WhiteHouse to strengthen anti-hunger programs & build a hunger free America.”

The White House Conference on Hunger, Health, and Nutrition to be held in Washington, DC in September, 2022.

June 27 - Equitable Spaces is excited to team up with the Center for Health Care Strategies (CHCS) for a project to assist in the development of a framework for engaging Massachusetts Medicaid enrollees in program design, implementation, and evaluation. The team’s goal is to support MassHealth entities and other stakeholders to improve current approaches for engaging with individuals with lived experience through elevating best practices and opportunities to incorporate member feedback into policies and programs that serve MassHealth members.

Equitable Spaces consultants will serve as researchers, conveners, trainers, and report writers for this project. More to come!

June 23 - This September, for the first time in more than 50 years, the Biden Administration will host a White House Conference on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health with the goal of ending hunger and reducing diet-related diseases and disparities in the U.S. by 2030.

The Food Research and Action Center (FRAC), along with other national, anti-hunger organizations, underscored five priorities for the conference. To ensure these priorities are put into the forefront during the conference, FRAC nominated several people to speak about their lived experiences with hunger during a series of virtual, regional listening sessions hosted by the White House, including Equitable Spaces Co-Founders, Jimmieka Mills and Diane Sullivan. Jimmieka addressed the Southern Region on June 1; and Diane, the Northeast/Mid-Atlantic Region the following week.

May 25 - Last week, Equitable Spaces Co-Founders, Jimmieka Mills and Diane Sullivan, alongside their client Andreanne Breton-Carbonneau of ACBC Consulting, presented an energizing session titled, “Design Justice: The Integration of Lived Expertise from Systems Co-Design Through Evaluation,” at the 2022 Code for America Summit. In-person sessions were not recorded, but please go check out #CfASummit on Twitter for some conference highlights. Be sure to check back soon for additional coverage!

Equitable Spaces’ Jimmieka Mills and Diane Sullivan were joined by Alissa Beers of the Center for Health Care Strategies, as they presented their session, “Incorporating Lived Experience ‘Early and Always’: Actionable Ways to Involve Community Members in the Work to End Hunger.” Co-sponsored by the Food Research and Action Center (FRAC) and Feeding America, this annual event brought together thousands of anti-hunger advocates for two days of content-rich, virtual workshops and a virtual ‘day on the Hill.’ Those registered for the conference can still view the session through the conference platform.

"It has been an incredible honor to partner in this process with the amazing team at the Lumina Foundation," says Equitable Spaces co-founder, Jimmieka Mills, who played a key role in guiding, supporting, and administering the foundation's largest ever request for proposals (RFP) process. She adds, "I am thrilled that the Lumina Foundation continues to center its on-going equity mission by understanding, valuing, and intentionally incorporating the knowledge and perspectives of those who have faced historical and generational barriers to higher education in this funding allocation process.”

ES co-founders, Jimmieka Mills and Diane Sullivan, were joined by Breanca Merritt (Chief Health Equity & ADA Officer, Indiana Family and Social Services Administration) and Dan Haun (Director, Self-Sufficiency Programs, Oregon Department of Human Services) for a panel discussion* exploring opportunities to address hunger by increasing state-level coordination across Medicaid and SNAP and incorporating lived expertise in policy and program efforts as part of this national webinar hosted by the Center for Health Care Strategies.

This report, part of the Exploring Cross-Agency Partnerships to Address Food Insecurity initiative led by the Center for Health Care Strategies (CHCS) with support from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, offers four recommendations for policymakers to integrate individuals with lived expertise as partners in program and policy design, implementation, and evaluation to more effectively address food insecurity. These recommendations were drawn from conversations with individuals with lived expertise, interviews with state policymakers representing Medicaid and SNAP, and an environmental scan.

“This year, Jimmieka and Diane guided us on ways to intentionally set an environment where all AINM session presenters, particularly those with lived expertise, feel supported in their ability to participate in the planning and execution of their session. This was where Diane and Jimmieka shone the brightest by sharing insights gained through their own lived experiences, not only providing tips for community members, but also for co-presenters and session moderators on how to foster a supportive space.” All In Newlsetter