When we build from the grassroots up, when we include seniors, when we include mono-lingual Spanish speakers, when we include everybody from the community to come and campaign and fight for justice for our children, that’s how we win.
– Clarissa Doutherd, Executive Director, Parent Voices Oakland

Film has the power to not only tell stories, but catalyze, engage and transform in a way other media cannot. The Media Impact Funders share how this power is used to raise awareness and ignite advocacy, through the film ‘Clarissa’s Battle’.

“Driven by her own experience losing child care and becoming unhoused with her infant son, Xavier, single mother and organizer Clarissa Doutherd is building a powerful coalition of parents fighting for child care and early education funds, desperately needed by low and middle-income parents and children across the United States.

“As a result, Clarissa is seemingly everywhere at once—at hearings, election rooms, and rallies from Oakland, Calif., to Washington, D.C. But juggling this work with raising her son pushes Clarissa into a personal health crisis far too common among stressed, working mothers, especially women of color. When the lockdown pushes more families into desperate circumstances, Clarissa and her coalition redouble their efforts, with the stakes higher than ever.

“Clarissa’s Battle gives us insight into an erupting movement, as communities across the country follow Clarissa’s successes, setbacks and indomitable resilience. But this is about more than a movement. It’s about the tenacity of a woman who experienced the shock of financial insecurity after the birth of her son, and her determination to stop it from happening to anyone else. It’s about the unseen and unspoken struggle of millions of families. It is about what happens when a woman rises to grasp her power and says, ‘Enough.’”

Visit ParentVoices.org for additional information about Clarissa Doutherd and her work with organizing parents.