On May 4, the House passed a health care bill that would, among other things, cut Medicaid by $880 billion and remove important protections for people with pre-existing conditions. Advocates across the country are working hard to convince their Senators to reject the House bill and to urge Representatives who voted for the bill to […]

At the state and national level, some policymakers are attempting to withhold public funding from localities (commonly called “Sanctuary Cities”) that choose to set their own law enforcement priorities regarding undocumented immigrants. In Texas, for example, the state legislature is currently working to reconcile the differences between its Senate and House-passed legislation to withhold all […]

In the March 9 newsletter, we talked about how right now the public is primed to understand issues and process information through the “separate fates” cultural model, the belief that what happens to an individual only affects that individual and their immediate circle. This perspective masks the collective benefits of human services, making it harder […]

Human service organizations have long relied on telling stories of personal success or struggle to convey the impact and importance of a service or policy. We often include these examples in our fundraising appeals, advocacy campaigns, and media outreach with the goal of inspiring the public’s engagement and support. But we’ve learned through our partnership […]

In the last newsletter, we talked about the cultural models that are dominating public thinking as a result of the current national discourse. Cultural models are “deeply held understandings that motivate thought and behavior in largely unconscious and automatic ways.” One of the cultural models that the FrameWorks Institute identified as being easily activated for […]