C O F E M 2 0 1 5 - 2 0 1 8 S T R AT E G I C P L A N

Creating Opportunities for Latino Immigrants in North America

ABOUT COFEM

The Consejo de Federaciones Mexicanas en Norteamérica (COFEM) is a non-partisan, non-profit 501 c3

organization lead by immigrant leaders to give voice to and serve immigrant communities. We are a member

driven organization representing more than 300 immigrant Home Town Associations (HTAs), Clubs (Clubes),

and other local immigrant organizations with more than 35,000 individual members.

The COFEM seeks to increase the capacity and voice of Hometown Associations (HTAs) and other immigrant

based organizations in order to facilitate the integration and full participation of immigrant communities in

the U.S. and abroad. We seek to increase their political power and advocate on issues that affect families,

equality, and the full participation of immigrants in American social, political and economic life.

• Since 2008, COFEM has helped to award more

than $265,000 in college scholarships to help

promote greater access to higher education for

immigrant families.

• We continuously promote U.S. Citizenship through

hundreds of naturalization workshops where we

have assisted close to 5,000 Legal Permanent

Residents with their application process. Since

the President’s Deferred Action for Childhood

Arrivals (DACA) was announced, COFEM has

informed and reached out to over 7,000 people

and through numerous workshops assisted 1,500

eligible families with their DACA applications.

• We also help clubs and federations to inform their

members and other immigrant families about the

different programs that the Mexican Government

has created to benefit migrants; as the SEDESOL’s

3 x 1 program and other binational programs.

• Increased the capacity of immigrant communities

to advocate for themselves on a variety of quality

of life issues by completing a comprehensive Civic

Promoters training with 250 aspiring immigrant

leaders/advocates.

OUR VISION

We envision a fair and inclusive America where immigrant communities have a voice, access to the Citizenship process and the ability to preserve their cultural identity.

OUR MISSIONThe mission of the Consejo de

Federaciones Mexicanas en Norteamérica

(COFEM) is to empower immigrant

communities to be full participants in the

social, political, economic, and cultural

life of the United States and their home

country. We accomplish this work by

uniting, strengthening, and expanding our

member organizations to better advocate,

educate, engage, and mobilize our

communities; to help realize the American

dream, preserve and share their cultural

traditions and help improve the lives of

families and friends in their country of

origin.

2014 - 2018 STRATEGIC GOALS AND OBJECTIVES

Strengthen and expand the capacity, reach, and presence of member organizations.

• Develop a comprehensive fundraising plan that will ensure the financial stability of the organization.

• Work to identify and develop subgranting opportunities to expand the ability of member organizations to engage in COFEM’s work and implement local initiatives.

• Develop a leadership institute to train member organization leaders and other community leaders on key policy issues affecting immigrant communities; connect them to resources to help mobilize their members and local communities; provide focused trainings on civic engagement, non-profit management and communications.

• Develop a membership recruitment and engagement training for COFEM member organizations.

• Create greater opportunities for members to be part of COFEM’s work.

• Assist with creation and incubation of new Hometown Associations and Clubs.

Promote the incorporation and participation of immigrants in all facets of social, political, and economic life in the Unites States through advocacy and civic engagement.

• Advocate for comprehensive

immigration reform that provides a

path to citizenship.

• Support implementation of Executive

Deferred Action (DACA, DAPA)

programs.

• Advocate for state and local policies

and programs that increase access and

services for immigrants.

• Conduct voter registration and voter

mobilization programs that will

increase voter participation in our

immigrant communities and among

our membership.

• Develop multi-sector (public/private)

partnerships to increase access

and education on critical quality

of life issues and services affecting

immigrant communities.

Empower members and immigrant families to advocate and impact policy issues that affect the pursuit of the American dream.

Promote, display and educate the general public on the rich social and cultural life of Mexico and its diverse states.

• Continue the Civic Promoters grassroots leadership program to create more local immigrant leaders and advocates.

• Continue to coordinate and host an annual expo and support other culturally relevant events.• Identify other opportunities for binational collaboration on cultural expositions and events

Communicate the work of COFEM to members and the public at large through a variety of media platforms and strategies.• Build a community and membership contact

database that will facilitate regular and rapid communication to inform and engage COFEM member organizations, partners and the community.

• Develop an annual marketing plan to move forward COFEM’s mission and programs by leveraging various media technologies and strategies.

• Prepare a communications tool kit to help member organizations and COFEM staff communicate the work of COFEM more effectively and with greater consistency.

• Conduct an annual media training for COFEM staff and member organization leadership.

• Develop a newsletter and expanded social media efforts to better inform members.

• Develop a plan to redesign www.cofem.org to make it easy to use and accessible on mobile devices.

• Develop partnerships with Spanish language media to help promote civic participation and immigrant initiatives (e.g. DACA, Citizenship, Education) that are important to Latino immigrant communities.

Communicate the work of COFEM to members and the public at large through a variety of media platforms and strategies.

Promote greater opportunities for member organizations to engage with their hometown or state.

Reporting on successes

• Host roundtable discussions to identify best practices and barriers to binational collaboration between member organizations and their home country.

• Produce a best practices toolkit on on engaging home country or state for member organizations.

• Advocate for binational collaboration programs that allow immigrants to stay connected and contribute to their home countries.

• Measuring our progress and successes is very important as we take on the next four years.

• For every program and initiative that we implement in support of our goals and objectives we will establish clear benchmarks to track our progress.

• In order to keep our members and the public informed about the state of the organization and our achievements and maintain accountability and transparency, COFEM will produce an Annual Report.

• The report will summarize and evaluate our progress in achieving the goals and objectives we have set out to achive as an organization.

125 Paseo De La Plaza • Los Angeles, California 90012 • (213) 417-8382 • www.cofem.org