Racial Wealth Gap

Your financial decisions have the power to challenge systemic injustice.

This motivating course explores the roots of the racial wealth gap in the U.S. You’ll learn how systemic racism shaped our economy and how it continues to drive inequality today. Through guided learning and a supportive community of women, you’ll examine key policies, uncover hidden structures, and connect history to the present. Then you’ll turn to action! You’ll craft a personal plan to align your resources and financial choices with values of racial justice. Leave with clarity, practical tools, and a peer community to sustain your journey, all for only $250. 

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Course Structure

This course is open to all members of the IFB community and takes place over three live, 2-hour sessions across a 2-month period. You’ll join presentations with expert speakers and engage in both large and small group conversations. The structure is designed to give you the time and space to examine the entrenched systems that created the racial wealth gap and the economic realities that continue to uphold inequality. Throughout the course, the facilitators will be available to support your journey as you work to align your money with your race-equity-focused values.

LIVE MEETING DATES:

  • Sunday – October 08, 2025
  • Wednesday – October 22, 2025
  • Wednesday – November 05, 2025

LIVE MEETING TIME:

  • 4:00 pm – 6:00 pm PT | 7:00 – 9:00 pm ET

Outcomes

By the end of the course, you will:

  • Understand how systemic racism and economic structures work together to sustain the racial wealth gap
  • Reflect on the harms (and benefits) of the racial wealth gap on your ancestors, your current life and family
  • Explore investment strategies and approaches that contribute to closing the racial wealth gap
  • Develop a concrete action plan to advance your goals for closing the racial wealth gap
  • Join a values-aligned community to offer and receive support on this journey

Prerequisites & Level of Effort

  • 1 – 2 hours of work before each session, including short readings and videos, personal journaling, and meeting with your accountability group; 
  • Participants will make action commitments for 2+ alignment categories; 
  • Please bring a willingness to be vulnerable and honest with yourself and others to this course in order to more deeply explore old patterns and adopt new perspectives and ideas.

Course Content

Systemic racism and the racial wealth gap are very complex issues that cannot be understood, grappled with, or properly addressed over a three-month period. As a result, this course is not intended to be a comprehensive solution, but rather a beginning. As a participant, you will learn about a variety of frameworks you can use to begin to understand how systemic racism operates, how individuals play a role in this system, and how they can get started putting their assets to work to become part of the solution.

  • Meeting 1:

    Systems and Consequences of Economic Racism

    Goals

    • Participants begin to know and feel comfortable with one another, with CLTV, and with the course; 
    • Deepen understanding of the policies that created and uphold the racial wealth gap; 
    • Begin to locate yourself in the big picture of our economic system; 
    • Connect with the accountability group. 

    During the session we will look at Systems change framework, US Government Boosts and Blocks to Building Wealth, racial affinity group meetings.

  • Meeting 2:

    Map Your Assets, Articulate Your Values, Examine Access to Capital

    Goals

    • Continue to build connection and community; 
    • Understand the role of capital access on communities, individuals, and the racial wealth gap as a whole; 
    • Craft values statements that will guide actions for aligning resources. 

    During the session our expert Guest Speaker will introduce the mechanics behind access to capital and will discuss how race plays a role in who has and does not have access to capital for personal and professional needs, reflect and articulate your core values that guide you in aligning your resources, orient to our alignment areas, and begin to map your action planning process. In preparation for this session, you will Map your assets as well as do some deep journaling to explore elements of your race, class and gender stories. You will also meet with your accountability group to reflect on assignments and exchange support on action planning.

  • Meeting 3:

    The Wealth Management Ecosystem, and Action Planning

    Goals

    • Learn how to navigate and be empowered within the wealth management ecosystem; 
    • Receive guidance on investment strategies and approaches that contribute to closing the racial wealth gap;
    • Prepare to initiate and sustain action after the course completes. 

    Before this session participants will:

    • Clarify your wealth priorities; 
    • Explore JEDI investing and philanthropy opportunities; 
    • Learn about the different roles and functions of people who manage wealth, and think about your relationship to them.

    During the session – expert Guest Speaker: Interrogating Your Financial Ecosystem for Equity & Change, have work time and support to finalize your action plans for 2+ alignment categories. You will also meet with your accountability group to reflect on assignments and exchange support on action planning.

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Course Creators & Facilitators

Julia Johannsen.

Julia Johannsen

Course Creator and Founder and Executive Director, The Impact Collective

Julia is an organizer who works to leverage her privilege in the service of racial and economic justice. Driven by her belief that white people of privilege have outsized responsibility to activate their influence and affluence to impact positive change, she founded The Impact Collective, an organization that works to activate wealthy women to reduce the racial wealth gap.

Sara Narva

Course Creator and Lead Facilitator

Sara Narva is a dynamic educator and facilitator dedicated to creating environments that foster collaborative, embodied, and impactful learning. She prioritizes integrating theory with the personal experience, transforming challenging content into accessible material. For over 20 years, Sara’s approach to teaching about race, class, and gender ensures that participants absorb new information and apply it in their daily lives.

Ryan Coffey Keaton

Course Creator and Co-Facilitator

Ryan Coffey Keaton is a career long advocate for equity and inclusion with a background in higher education access, secondary school leadership and professional mentorship. As a first-generation college graduate and woman of color, she brings personal insight into the transformational power of structured support, self-reflection and intentional growth. Over the past 25 years,  Ryan has held leadership and advisory roles in both Philadelphia and New York, including college admissions recruiting, college advising, and Assistant Head of School. Quaker school trustee as well as diversity and equity consultant.  Her work is grounded in the belief that meaningful change begins with aligning values, purpose and action.  Drawing from her experience facilitating conversations in schools and community organizations, Ryan creates space for people to reflect, connect, and move toward justice. She lives with her family in the Philadelphia area.

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