Masaru Edmund Nakawatase

Paul Robeson Lifetime Achievement Award

This award is given to an individual who has made an outstanding contribution to social change throughout their lifetime.

Mas Nakawatase was born at one of ten internment camps where the US government detained people of Japanese descent during World War II. He grew up in Seabrook, New Jersey among many families who had been detained. In the mid-1960s, Mas had a formative political experience working in Atlanta for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee. 

Mas returned to rural South Jersey as a community organizer with American Friends Service Committee (AFSC), which launched his 31-year career at AFSC. His work there focused on supporting Native peoples and advancing Asian American voices and priorities. Within AFSC, Mas helped establish a caucus for staff of color and supported a successful unionization campaign. 

Mas has served on the board of Asian Americans United since 2002 and served on the board of Folk Arts-Cultural Treasures Charter School for twelve years. Since 2010, he has chaired the Racial and Social Justice Committee of Germantown Friends Meeting. In 2021, Mas began serving on the board of Seabrook Educational and Cultural Center. 

Patricia “Mama Patt” Vickers

Paul Robeson Lifetime Achievement Award

This award is given to an individual who has made an outstanding contribution to social change throughout their lifetime.

In 1988, Patricia Vickers’ 17-year-old son, Shakaboona, was sentenced to life without parole. Thirteen years later, Patricia became a founding member and leader of the Human Rights Coalition (HRC), a grassroots group of families, formerly incarcerated people, and activists. HRC advances and protects the human rights of incarcerated people, works to abolish the for-profit prison system, and fights for the freedom of their incarcerated loved ones. Through HRC, Patricia has grown into an advocate, organizer, and agitator, where she’s known affectionately as “Mama Patt.” 

Patricia co-founded the Coalition to Abolish Death by Incarceration (CADBI) and co-founded THE MOVEMENT magazine. She serves on the board of Reconstruction, Inc., an organization that supports people who were formerly incarcerated in becoming community leaders, and serves on the advisory board of The Real Cost of Prisons Project. Recently, Patricia traveled to the United Nations in Geneva as part of a delegation to expose the US prison system’s practices of life without parole and solitary confinement as human rights violations.

Rabbi Alissa Wise 

Trailblazer Award

This award is given to an outstanding leader in community organizing who has helped to pave the way for others. 

Rabbi Alissa Wise is a community organizer, strategist, and ritual leader with more than two decades of experience in movements for change. In October 2023, she founded Rabbis for Ceasefire, a group that has grown to over 330 rabbis & other Jewish clergy coming together to take action to protect the lives of Palestinians in Gaza. 

For ten years, Alissa was a leader at Jewish Voice for Peace, where she co-founded the Rabbinical Council, supported the Presbyterian Church’s divestment from the Israeli occupation, grew the organizing program from six chapters to over 60, contributed to an organization-wide racial justice transformation process, and supported the organization in raising over $3 million from more than 5,000 donors. 

She co-authored a book culling organizing lessons for other movements, Solidarity is the Political Version of Love: Lessons from Jewish Anti-Zionist Organizing, which will be published in September 2024 by Haymarket Books. She became a rabbi in 2009 at the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College. 

Nora Elmarzouky 

Emerging Leader Award

This award is given to an individual who is beginning to make their mark as a community organizer.

Nora Elmarzouky is an Egyptian-American organizer, educator, and urbanist. She brings people together across lines of difference to break down boundaries through arts and storytelling. Nora is a member of the Philly Palestine Coalition, demanding an immediate and permanent ceasefire and end to the occupation of Palestine. She is a member of La La Lil Jidar Collective, a group of artists and activists activating 20 years of Aisha Mershani’s photography and audio documenting the apartheid wall in the West Bank to shift the mainstream narrative on Palestine and Israeli state violence and draw connections among global and local struggles for justice.  

In 2020, Nora co-founded an Arabic-English community newspaper that is distributed for free across the Philadelphia region. She was introduced to the world of organizing locally with Our City, Our Schools Coalition. Nora has worked to advance climate justice in Philadelphia and Pennsylvania and is currently working with communities across the US to collectively advocate for energy democracy. She co-founded CaiRollers, Egypt’s first roller derby team, and she is an avid runner and proud auntie. 

Shuja Moore 

Emerging Leader Award

This award is given to an individual who is beginning to make their mark as a community organizer.

Shuja Moore is a filmmaker, community advocate, and fourth-generation West Philadelphian. At 22 years old, Shuja was arrested and convicted for an accidental homicide. During his 12 years in prison, he went on a journey of personal transformation and reflection. Upon his release, Shuja was determined to make positive change by telling new stories about community safety and healing. 

He created and produced the docuseries Walkies, which highlights people who have experienced poverty, trauma, crime, and incarceration, and shares their pathways of self-discovery and reintegration into society. His latest film, Pardon Me, follows three people who are seeking pardons so they can clear their records and expand their options for meaningfully contributing to their communities. Shuja was named a “Remodeled Citizen” by the Philadelphia Mayor’s Office of Black Male Engagement. He serves on the board of the Walnut Hill Community Association.

A J Scruggs 

Emerging Leader Award

This award is given to an individual who is beginning to make their mark as a community organizer.

A J Scruggs grew up in Trenton and Baltimore. His path to community organizing started in high school, when he helped establish his school’s first Gay-Straight Alliance. In 2016, A J founded Visible Truth 365, a national grassroots organization that connects trans and gender-nonconforming people to personal, spiritual, and professional growth. 

In his role as a Civic Engagement Fellow at T.A.K.E (Transgender Advocates Knowledgeable Empowering), A J works with the PA Coalition for Trans Youth to advance legislation to make Pennsylvania schools safe for all young people. A J serves on the community advisory board of the TransTech Summit, a free annual online event by and for the most marginalized members of the LGBTQIA+ community. He is a trainer with National Minority AIDS Council’s (NMAC) Elevate program, which develops leaders among people with HIV. Locally, A J serves on the Philadelphia HIV Integrated Planning Council.

Philly Palestine Coalition

Victory is Ours Award

This award is given to a community organization, union, or campaign that has advanced movements for racial and economic justice. 

The Philly Palestine Coalition emerged in 2020 in the wake of the racial reckoning. Black, Brown, and Indigenous organizers came together to talk about the intersections between the Palestinian struggle and liberation struggle in the United States. 

The coalition builds collective power by uniting groups working towards a shared vision of liberation for all. They organize direct actions including sit-ins, banner drops, encampments, and vigils to put pressure on decision-makers to end genocide in Palestine. They also provide political education through teach-ins, social media, press outreach, and poster campaigns to mobilize people to join the cause.

Gender Justice Fund 

Robin Hood Was Right Award 

This award is given to an individual or group making an outstanding contribution to social change philanthropy in the Philadelphia region. 

Gender Justice Fund was founded in 1882 as the New Century Guild to support women entering the workforce. Together, Guild members fought for equal wages, improved working conditions, and political representation. Many members of the Guild were also active in the suffragette movement. During the twentieth century, the organization operated as a social club for women. It became a private foundation in 2006, and in 2020 it rebranded as Gender Justice Fund. Under the leadership of the board and executive director Farrah Parkes, the organization’s work has broadened to fight all forms of gender oppression. Their core grant funds move money to systems change, culture change, trans communities, and to women and trans people directly impacted by mass incarceration.  

Gender Justice Fund grantees mobilize against state violence on a variety of fronts, including the fights for bodily autonomy, reproductive justice, inclusive schools, the decriminalization of sex work, and the end of mass incarceration. 

Plaintiffs and Legal Teams Responsible for West Philadelphia Community Fund 

Robin Hood Was Right Award 

This award is given to an individual or group making an outstanding contribution to social change philanthropy in the Philadelphia region. 

In December 2023, the West Philadelphia Community Fund, a special fund at Bread & Roses, made $500,000 in grants to organizations in West Philadelphia using community organizing to create change or provide mental health and wellness services to people impacted by police violence. The money for this fund came from multiple lawsuits that challenged the Philadelphia Police Department’s excessive use of force during uprisings in May 2020 and won a total of $9,250,000. Under the terms of the settlement, the city also agreed to disengage from a federal program, which arms state and local law enforcement with military weapons and equipment. 

Many of the plaintiffs are organizers and activists, and they chose Bread & Roses to administer the West Philadelphia Community Fund. Bread & Roses facilitated a community-led grantmaking process in which the funding decisions were made by a 20-person committee, the majority of whom were third, fourth, and fifth generation Black West Philadelphians.