PRESS RELEASE
Project Evident’s Report Highlights Nonprofit Leadership Development Supported by the Center for Leadership Equity in Philadelphia
Report Documents Early Evidence of Results From the Work of the Black Nonprofit Chief Executives of Philadelphia, an Initiative That Was Incubated By the United Way of Greater Philadelphia and Southern New Jersey’s Center for Leadership Equity
Boston, MA — November 6, 2025 — Project Evident released a report today that details a unique model for providing leadership support. The report, Center for Leadership Equity: A Community Model of Professional Development: An Early Exploration of Effectiveness, describes how the United Way of Greater Philadelphia and Southern New Jersey’s Center for Leadership Equity (CLE) incubated Black Nonprofit Chief Executives of Philadelphia (BNCEP), which was designed to deepen social connectivity and build relationships in ways that go beyond traditional models for leadership development.
“The aim of the program wasn’t just to connect Black nonprofit leaders to each other and provide leadership enhancement, though that did happen,” said CLE Executive Director Kelly Woodland. “We also wanted to create a capacity building infrastructure that centered the needs of proximate leaders, thereby strengthening their organizations and the nonprofit field as a whole.”
The Center for Leadership Equity commissioned this report from Project Evident to explore early evidence of the effectiveness of the model of leadership development emphasized by BNCEP. The report relies on focus groups, surveys, and a review of historical programmatic data to understand the results that BNCEP members reported for themselves and their organizations.
“We were excited to partner with CLE and the members of BNCEP to understand what results they were seeing from their collaboration,” said Project Evident Senior Advisor Gabriel Rhoads. “The stories we heard from members were inspiring – it is a testament both to the power of this community, and what is possible from supporting capacity building in this way.”
BNCEP marked its fifth year in June, with more than 350 active members.The report details connections made in the group, noting that not only were relationships forged and strengthened, but partnerships and funding opportunities were made as leaders found mutual priorities in their work. BNCEP was recognized as Nonprofit of the Year October 2025 by the African American Chamber of Commerce for Pennsylvania, Delaware, and New Jersey.
“Being a member of BNCEP and participating in CLE programming has been transformational to my leadership,” said BNCEP Member Loree Jones Brown, CEO of Philabundance, “Connecting with my colleagues has strengthened the way I lead my organization and given me new insights to nonprofit leadership as a whole. I’m grateful to have these connections because they make all of our work stronger.”
About Project Evident
Project Evident harnesses the power of data, evidence, and technology to achieve greater impact. We believe that by empowering practitioners to drive their own data and evidence building while also strengthening the surrounding ecosystem, we can increase the number of effective solutions in the social and education sectors and scale them faster, ultimately producing stronger, more meaningful, and more equitable outcomes for students and communities.
About the Center for Leadership Equity
The Center for Leadership Equity was officially launched in 2024 to drive sustainable change by reimagining capacity-building for Black nonprofit leaders. Functioning as a strategic intermediary between philanthropy and the nonprofit sector, CLE strengthens leadership, fosters cross-sector collaboration, and resets the power dynamic to build an equitable ecosystem. Recognizing that leadership grows stronger in community with others, the CLE has curated the development of the Black Nonprofit Chief Executives of Philadelphia (BNCEP) as the region’s only affinity group for Black nonprofit leaders.