Welcome to The OC! If you don’t know us, we’re Clarise and Christi - the Co-Directors of The Organizing Center. We did not just find each other through job descriptions and reference letters; our relationship started long before this Co-Directorship. For years prior we were comrades in shared political work in Philadelphia-based coalitions and beyond—helping to hold group processes that brought strategic clarity. 

 

Christi comes with over 25 years of rigorous basebuilding experience in unions and community-based organizations winning housing, youth, and labor campaigns. And Clarise brings 15 years of experience winning campaigns against mass incarceration and anti-Black policing in a time where mass mobilizations reignited the political appetite of the masses.  In discussing our successes and heartbreaks in movement, we found common ground in our desire for organizing to be more rigorous and resilient, and have developed shared assessments about the conditions impacting our communities and movements. 

 

Our first time working together at The Organizing Center was co-leading a powerful and successful pilot year of our first organizer fellowship. We had no idea it’d become a testing ground for our future partnership. There was a smooth and easy flow to our collaboration, we got to practice giving each other grounded and thoughtful feedback, and tested out how we navigate power together. 

 

As Co-Directors we have found ways to balance out each other’s gifts. Clarise is a grounded visionary who leads us to be more resilient and rigorous. She supports us to take the time we need to make grounded decisions and can develop the long-term arc of our work. Christi can move quickly on ideas and has, over decades, developed the movement relationships that propel our work forward. She is thoughtful about building an organizational culture where all staff can lead and shine. Our shared vision is rooted in doing the work that supports everyday people to build and wield power; to be rigorous and resilient; and to move towards a longer term strategy that frees us from the oppression of racial capitalism.