Anchor Institutions Task Force News

June 2026

Values in Action – Annual Event

AITF's Annual Event will take place on November 5 between 10am and 3pm Eastern at the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) in Princeton, New Jersey. We are pleased to collaborate with RWJF on this important discussion, which will continue exploring our theme, Values in Action. This will be our second Annual Event on this theme, which reinforces AITF's values – a commitment to place and community; collaboration and partnership, including cross sector collaboration; democracy and democratic practice; social justice and equity, including racial justice and racial equity. The event will be an opportunity to illustrate how these values are being applied through anchor institution-community partnerships to confront some of our most pressing challenges. As place-based partnerships, these forms of collaboration are taking on issues (e.g. hunger, health) that have global resonance but are experienced at the local level. The event will also highlight some emerging issues in the anchor field. One important matter that we will prioritize at the event and in our work is the role of Foundations as Anchor Institutions. In recent years, an increasing number of philanthropic institutions are expanding their commitment to and engagement in the localities and regions in which they are situated. This event will include, led by our host, RWJF, voices of foundations from around the U.S. that have been employing a range of strategies to engage with local partners and develop creative ways to respond to community needs. We hope you will be able to join us for this event. If you expect to attend, please make sure to register.

Communications and Storytelling – Call for Essays

As you know, AITF has been paying greater attention to messaging on anchor institutions and telling the story of the value of anchor institutions to their communities and to society. With guidance from some communications officers in our membership, we are embarking on a series of new storytelling projects. The first effort we are pursuing is a collection of essays, which we expect to release at the end of the year. The essays should reflect an anchor institution's experiences communicating about and telling the story of being an engaged anchor institution locally. The essays can include stories about specific programs, projects and actions that illustrate the internal and external realities of being an engaged anchor institution. Please review the full call for essays and consider submitting. It is very important that we further illustrate the relevance of values-oriented anchor institution-community partnerships to grappling with the most pressing matters of our time. Submissions are due on September 15.

Member Profile – Augsburg University

Thanks so much for Augsburg University located in the heart of Minneapolis, Minnesota for our latest member profile. Augsburg takes a "hyper-local relationship-based approach" to its engagement in its surrounding community. The University holds a deep commitment to immigrants, which is reflected in its student body and its community partners. These principles and partnerships faced significant adversity during the federal Operation Metro Surge that included direct targeting of Minnesota's Somali American population – Augsburg's neighbors and partners. The University's and community's response to this crisis was significantly aided by the longstanding pre-existing relationships that have already been established. This experience illustrates the value of deep, consistent, and authentic collaboration to collectively solving local problems. Please make sure to read this profile. If you have a story you would like to share about efforts in your community that demonstrate AITF's values, please let us know.

AITF Member Spotlight

Augsburg University and its Community-Focused Anchor Work

Augsburg University's anchor institution work starts with a simple premise: that our most valuable resource is our people. It's a hyper-local, relationship-based approach that may look different than a more traditional emphasis on economic development. But over time it yields real dividends—particularly, as we saw this winter, in times of crisis. A Commitment to Place and Community Augsburg sits at the heart of Minneapolis in the Cedar-Riverside neighborhood, one of the most diverse zip codes between Chicago and Los Angeles. Founded by Norwegian immigrants more than 150 years ago, the university retains an immigrant sensibility today, both in our relationships with neighboring communities and due to our richly diverse student body. Two-thirds of Augsburg's undergraduate student body are students of color and more than half are first-generation students, many hailing from the Twin Cities' vibrant East African, Latin American, and Hmong communities. The Augsburg Local framework articulates the ways that Augsburg engages as an anchor institution through community engaged learning experiences, work experiences in our communities, engagement between the campus and our neighbors, placemaking and support of local businesses, and leadership in local and national networks. This work is not incidental to Augsburg's mission, but central to it; so central that it is explicitly named as a core strategy in our strategic plan: To partner with our neighbors as an anchor institution, place-making wherever we live, work, and learn.Cross-sector Collaboration The work of building trusted relationships with the immigrant communities that surround Augsburg has been sustained, incremental, and rooted in responsive listening rather than driving a specific agenda. One of the formal mechanisms for this work has been the Cedar-Riverside Partnership (CRP), a public-private partnership that Augsburg President Paul Pribbenow has chaired for nearly two decades. The CRP includes major institutions like Augsburg and the Fairview health system, as well as local government and key community organizations. Together, the partners work to mobilize long-term, strategic investments to promote a vibrant Cedar-Riverside neighborhood as a safe and healthy place to live, learn, work, and play, focusing on priority issues identified by neighborhood stakeholders. The concrete outputs of the CRP's work are visible in the neighborhood. Every summer, high school students attend Urban Scrubs Camp at Augsburg, an initiative designed to expose young people to careers in health care fields. At nearby Riverside Plaza, the large apartment complex at the center of the Cedar-Riverside neighborhood, a Safety Center was created to provide space for members of the Cedar-Riverside community to come together with law enforcement officials, crime prevention specialists, and cultural liaisons to improve community safety. A few blocks away, the Cedar-Riverside Opportunity Center is a workforce development hub that hosts job fairs, training opportunities, and access to employment resources. The CRP provided vital guidance to shape neighborhood infrastructure investments, including the Green Line light rail West Bank station, bike paths, and aesthetic and safety improvements to a major thoroughfare. Beyond the CRP, Augsburg's engagement with the surrounding community is likewise rooted in relationships. Neighbors develop trusted connections with Augsburg faculty, staff, and students at the Health Commons, health-focused drop-in centers that operate on principles of mutuality and hospitality. The Augsburg Community Garden hosts 64 individual plots that are tended by neighbors from many different regions of the world, with at least five languages represented by current gardeners. Augsburg students volunteer regularly at the nearby Brian Coyle Community Center, supporting youth programming and food access services. A "shop local" campaign leverages the purchasing power of the Augsburg community to support neighborhood businesses. With the establishment of its Interfaith Institute, Augsburg has deepened connections with local faith communities and integrated community-engaged learning into the Interfaith Scholars program. Social Justice and Racial Justice All of these activities are part of an underlying infrastructure of relationships that become activated in times of crisis or when there is urgent work to be done. That happened this winter, when Minnesota's Somali-American community became the target of intense scrutiny from the federal government and Operation Metro Surge brought chaos and uncertainty to Minnesota's immigrant communities, particularly in the Twin Cities. In early December, following verbal attacks on Somali immigrants by President Trump, more than 100 people attended an organizing meeting to plan rapid response networks and strategize about pushing back on false narratives about the community. As immigration enforcement ramped up, existing relationships helped folks to swiftly mobilize. Alongside many neighbors, Augsburg students, faculty, and staff joined safety patrols, volunteered to deliver food or escort food shelf visitors to their apartments, organized outings to support local businesses, and joined forces with a neighborhood church and mosque to set up coffee and tea outside Friday prayers to show solidarity with Muslim neighbors. In mid-January, when conservative influencer Jake Lang announced plans to march from downtown Minneapolis into Cedar-Riverside, guidance from local community leaders quickly percolated through the CRP network, leading to a shared set of expectations around protest activity, ways to support the Somali-American community, and appropriate roles for community members as well as allies. When a burst pipe caused massive flooding in one of the apartment buildings around this same time—creating a housing emergency when many neighbors were sheltering at home due to fears about ICE—an alliance of young professionals from Cedar-Riverside, including several Augsburg alumni, rallied resources to support the displaced families. Thankfully, the crisis of Operation Metro Surge has waned in recent months. But the lessons it highlighted about our interdependence and the value of building trust over the long term will linger, and our work to sustain deep relationships with our neighbors will go on. Watch Augsburg's feature in PBS' Rethinking College series here.

Other Resources

Anchor Fellows

Our Anchor Fellows Program continues to be a vital component of AITF's work. The Fellows have been provided an immersive learning experience designed to strengthen their pathways as anchor leaders into the future. Our latest cohort is about to begin their annual experience. As you know, we rely on AITF members to nominate future prospective Fellows. We are pleased to announce our latest call for applications in order to identify the 2027 cohort. Many of our Fellows have become active participants in AITF, and their voices and experiences are influencing the evolution of the anchor field. Nominate a Fellow

Publications

Our Leadership Guide series has been making informative and stimulating contributions to our understanding of the role of anchor institutions in strengthening communities through democratic partnerships. We produced the third volume in the series last year. We are now seeking essays from AITF members on leadership matters relevant to anchor institution-community partnerships. We require these essays to take into account AITF's Values in Action theme. Please let us know if you wish to submit an essay. We hope to release volume 4 at the end of the year. Also let us know if you wish to have your and your partners' work featured in a future Member Profile in this newsletter. The profile will return in the next newsletter. This is a significant way in which we will highlight the Values in Action theme in practice at the community level throughout the year. Download the AITF Leadership Guide, Third Edition

AITF Subgroups

Overall, we look forward to engaging with you over the course of 2026. Remember that there are many ways to be involved in AITF. Our Subgroups have been among the most vital forms of activity in AITF. As we have continued to experience some difficult barriers to progress in the field, Subgroups have been spaces for mutual encouragement, learning, and sharing. These discussions have generated stories of resilience and helped shape many aspects of AITF's work. Finally, stay tuned for some noticeable advances in AITF's approach to storytelling, as we are beginning a new series of discussions to enhance how we tell the story of the contributions of anchor institutions to the communities in which they reside. Learn More About AITF Subgroups

Resources from the Field

New Book: The Community-Centric Path to Rebuilding Trust in Higher Education

This new book, The Community-Centric Path to Rebuilding Trust in Higher Education, by Byron P. White reimagines community engagement as an essential operational driver for sustaining universities and offers a bold alternative to the customer-focused strategies many colleges seek to regain stability. Learn More

Higher education must be rebuilt to restore public trust. Here's how.

The heads of the American Association of University Professors and the American Federation of Teachers lay out their vision for overhauling the sector. Learn More

Impact Stories: Place-based Investing — CommonSpirit Health & Step By Step

CommonSpirit's Community Investment Program (CIP) seeks to create healthier, more equitable communities by connecting and catalyzing financial resources to address social determinants of health. Learn More

21st Annual Greater Philadelphia Leadership Exchange (GPLEX) Conference – Apply by Jul 3 | PHENND

Applications for the 21st annual Greater Philadelphia Leadership Exchange (GPLEX) conference – to be held in Philadelphia from October 14th to 17th – are now open. GPLEX has been building civic muscle since 2005, convening diverse cross-sector leaders for highly curated learning-and-networking experiences to advance equitable growth, civic leadership, and workforce development across the region. Learn More

The Curve: AI Leadership Readiness for Charity Leaders

This virtual session on June 5th demystifies AI and focuses on concrete, charity-specific use cases across practical framework, safety and strategy, real-world application, and governance aiming to help third sector organizations navigate the organizational change required for AI adoption, emphasizing people, process, technology, data, and governance. Learn More

Working on Wellness: The Rural Health and Employment Link

The latest edition of the Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond's Econ Focus publication focuses on this bidirectional relationship between health and employment that is intensified by structural and geographic factors unique to rural communities, including the connections between the health of workers and the health of labor markets. Read More

News and Articles

Willmott Dixon completes rebuild of former DLI Museum as new cultural venue 'The Light'

The building, which was once home to the Durham Light Infantry (DLI) Museum and Durham Art Gallery, was handed back to the council by Willmott Dixon, following its transformation into a multipurpose cultural space. The Light's location, at the heart of Aykley Heads, will also make the venue an anchor institution of Durham's Innovation District. Acting as a meeting place and a creative hub, it will support the game-changing ambitions of the new district and play a key part in the sustainable growth of the site. Read the Press Release

Innovation District expansion, new projects discussed

The St. Petersburg Innovation District, a public-private partnership that was established to encourage collaboration among scientists, educators, doctors, entrepreneurs, artists and community members, is continuing its ongoing efforts to connect anchor institutions and focus on six key pillars: marine science, life science, data and technology, entrepreneurship, art and education. Read the Article

Federal Approval Clears $319M for North Carolina Broadband Projects

North Carolina has received federal approval of its Broadband Equity Access, and Deployment plan, unlocking $319 million in funding. The projects will connect more than 93,000 homes, businesses, and community anchor institutions by 2030, the first phase of the state's $1.53 billion BEAD allocation. Read the Article

Loyola awarded $267,000 in grants to support improvements at location of future community hub

Loyola University Maryland has been awarded $267,000 in grants to support capital improvements to a small building on the Loyola-owned property at 5104 York Road in Greater Govans that is home to Loyola's York Road programming. The grant aims to leverage the intellectual and economic capital of higher education anchor institutions to positively impact their surrounding communities by assisting with strong community engagement, neighborhood revitalization, local hiring, and other economic development partnerships. Read the Article

Rutgers–Camden Marks Topping-Off of $60 Million Cooper Street Gateway Project

Rutgers University–Camden reached a major construction milestone in its $60 million Cooper Street Gateway Project, placing the final steel beam this week on a development that will expand academic space and strengthen community ties. The project is part of the city's continued redevelopment and partnership with anchor institutions. Read the Article

NYU Powers New York's Economic Base, Jobs, and Talent: One in Eight New NYC Residents Comes to Attend NYU

A new economic impact study examines NYU's role in New York City's economy, estimating that the university supports approximately 35,400 jobs and contributes to regional population and economic growth. The study also highlights NYU Tandon's role in the development of Downtown Brooklyn as a major business and innovation district, illustrating how higher education institutions can influence local economic and neighborhood development through their anchor presence. Read the Article

Research & Publications

Evaluating the Housing Market Effects of a Large Anchor Institution: The Case of the Obama Presidential Center

This study examines the housing market impacts of the Obama Presidential Center (OPC) on Chicago's South Side during the pre-opening period (2013–2024). Read the Article

Optimizing Maritime Security for Sustainable Blue Economy Development: A Strategic Framework for the Gulf of Guinea

This paper proposes a strategic framework in which a revitalized Gulf of Guinea Commission is positioned as a regional anchor institution for integrated maritime governance, supported by streamlined coordination with the Yaoundé Architecture and regionally owned maritime security operations. Read the ArticleView Marga Inc's AITF Publications

If you have updates about your work, resources, or articles that you would like to share with the AITF network, please email Mala Coomar at mala.c@margainc.com. Marga Inc. P.O. Box 4565 New York, NY 10163 Phone: (212) 979-9770 | Fax: (917) 591-1547 Become an AITF Member