Kareem Abdul-Jabbar Social Justice Champion Finalist: Juan Toscano-Anderson
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar Social Justice Award Finalist – Juan Toscano-Anderson
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar Social Justice Award Finalist – Juan Toscano-Anderson
Juan Toscano-Anderson, whose parents are Black and Mexican American, is focused on empowerment for Latino and Black communities and established the Journey to Achieve (JTA) Foundation to give back to youth and families of color in the Bay Area, Santa Cruz and Mexico. The Oakland native has continued to use his voice to advocate for social justice and equality in the Bay Area.
Toscano-Anderson participated in the Warriors’ VOTERS Win campaign – a PSA to encourage Black and Latino citizens to vote in the 2020 election and fill out the census – and led two Walk in Unity events in Oakland, bringing people together to combat oppression, police brutality and social injustice.
To create opportunity and empower young people of color this past year, he has discussed biases with 6th grade students in San Francisco, spoken to more than 3,000 African youth about his journey and overcoming obstacles and supported Digital Nest, a local nonprofit focused on empowering Latinx professionals, in a live Q&A where he discussed his childhood, basketball career and the pride he felt playing with the Mexican National Team.
In continued efforts to support the Latinx community, he addressed more than 2,000 people in Spanish at the Día De Los Muertos Film Festival in Watsonville and purchased equipment and materials for Fundacion Unidos Por Chavinda in his family’s hometown that provides medicine and food for senior citizens and supports development and life skills for youth.
The two recipients of Toscano-Anderson’s donation are the East Oakland Youth Development Center, an organization focused on the development of social and leadership capacities for youth and young adults, and Homies Empowerment, an independent, youth-development organization taking on an approach and a way of seeing, gang impacted youth through an asset-based lens.
