LIVE UNITED Y’All!

By Christopher Locke

Wow, it’s that time of the year again! A time when young people of all ages have visions of cartoon-covered backpacks, reams of three-hole, loose leaf paper and bounties of yellow Number 2 pencils dancing in their heads… Which means it’s indeed time for school! With the return to school and visions in mind, I’m reminded of a Henry David Thoreau quote that says “It’s not what you look at that matters, it’s what you see.”

And while most parents and adults in the community are expectedly looking at purchasing items like sports and band uniforms, instruments, or even lab supplies to support their children’s education success in the classroom and school– a lot of well-meaning and caring adults have been spending a lot of time creating a compelling child-centered, community-based vision for young people to be successful outside the classroom and school. These caring adults and young people were callers, conveners and participants in a community effort called the Youth Vision. It was exciting to participate and witness the process of developing a vision that the community can be proud of that will also mobilize us to action.

The community response to an invitation from a group of youth development and education experts convened by Metro United Way to come and share their thoughts on youth success was overwhelming. When all the conversations were complete, 36 community conversations had taken place with residents from 30 of the 32 zip codes in the Louisville Metro area, from 11 other Kentucky zip codes and from 3 Southern Indiana County zip codes. The participant demographics revealed that the conversations had attracted broad and diverse participation from community residents interested in young people.

And as Thoreau said, they looked at some things. In fact, the participants looked at a long list of depressing challenges that often impede many young people’s paths to educational success.

• 1 in 4 freshman entering 9^th grade in JCPS don’t graduate on time and in four years with their peers.
• 65% of JCPS students are on free and reduced lunch.
• Worse still, last year JCPS reports that 10,500 students were classified as homeless.

In all three cases, a disproportionate number of the students are African American and Latino.

But again, like Thoreau wisely recommended, the community residents participating in the youth vision conversations did not get mired in pessimism. No, instead, this spirited group, led by Metro United Way and Metro Government, decided that the callers and the residents see what matters. So the optimists flipped the deficit-based reality that many of our students and families deal with everyday on its head and decided to engage resident voices in the process by asking three strengths or asset-based questions.

• Think about a young person in your life…What are your hopes and wishes for their success?
• What helps a young person be successful?
• If you could waive a magic wand, how would our community look different if ALL youth were succeeding?

After over 500 people had answered, the compelling Youth Vision emerged.

Louisville Youth…

• Have the skills and education to be self reliant, healthy, engaged and economically thriving.
• Have hope and show strength of character to achieve their goals, follow their dreams, respect others and contribute to bettering their community and world.
• Live in a caring community where everyone values, supports, invests in and fights for their success.

It sounds  pretty compelling to me, and we hope you agree! What are some of your ideas for our community’s youth? Would you be willing to act in creative ways to bring this vision to life in the community? How?

Advocacy, Education, General back to school, Children, Community, Education, future, High School Graduation, kindergarten, making a difference, Metro United Way, opportunity, parenting, Southern Indiana, students, success, youth, youth development, Youth Vision

By Jan Sherrell
One of Metro United Way’s goals is that:
By 2018, 87% of our community’s high school students graduate from high school on time. Currently our community’s graduation rate is 73%.

We sometimes refer to it as a BOLD GOAL. We recognize that we alone can not make that change for our community. We are working with partners to explore what out of school time programs are working and what areas they service. We know that food and housing and mental health are just a few of the factors that can also affect the success rate of kids in school. But just naming the goal and proclaiming it is a step toward making it happen.

I’ve experienced this personally –goal setting and proclaiming it.

As a youth it wasn’t emphasized to me that after high school comes college. In fact I didn’t even entertain ideas of college until a high school counselor, looking at my grades and scores encouraged me to think about continuing my education past high school. It was not an expectation in my family to pursue college. I didn’t even dream that dream. We were a middle-class working family with five kids and a stay-at-home mom.

This counselor sparked something in me and I began to consider college. By working from age 16 and with student loans, I was able to attend a local college, but I didn’t have a clear goal or major or career in mind. My motivation and commitment was lacking and I followed the classic “fall in love and get married” path — which has been good and I’m still married 28 years later — but it nagged me that I didn’t complete a degree.

I decided in 2008, that I would complete my degree. I set a goal. It certainly felt like a BOLD GOAL to me. I was 46 years old and pretty rusty at studying and taking tests. My days already seemed full, how was I going to fit college into my life and family budget? Fact is, I wasn’t very thorough in my planning. I didn’t forecast how long or how much money I would be investing. I just knew it was something I always wanted and I went for it.

I’m now 13 hours short of my degree; it is going to happen.

There are many, many youth out there just like I was. They need encouragement. They need to hear that great things are expected of them and that they can do it; it really is a culture thing. Children are being raised without the goal and expectation of completing high school. All families do not emphasize the importance of education..

Maybe it is your role to help a young person set a BOLD GOAL, and to help them reach that goal. It will take the entire community to increase the graduation rate to 87%, but YOU can help that one child recognize the importance of education and completing high school.

Do you have a story to share like mine?  Do you know a young person who had someone make a difference in their success?

General Education, goals, graduation

by Mary Ann Steutermann

I’ll admit it – I have few domestic skills. In particular, I absolutely, positively do not cook because 1) I don’t enjoy it and 2) previous attempts have resulted in blaring smoke alarms and upset stomachs. Fortunately for me, I am married to a great cook who both enjoys the process of creating a fine meal and actually produces dishes that people find not only edible but downright delicious. Over the years, I have watched him in the kitchen preparing a meal, and I’ve learned his secret to success – preparation.

The Right Ingredients

I was surprised to learn that most of my husband’s culinary efforts go into selecting the best ingredients and then spending quite a bit of time cutting, chopping, dicing, and seasoning them. In fact, he probably spends at least twice as much time preparing the ingredients as he does actually heating something on the stove or baking it in the over. Similarly, Metro United Way has been hard at work preparing to develop a strategy map that will guide our efforts in the coming years as we work to ensure that all of our children arrive at kindergarten ready to be successful and that at least 87% of them complete high school by earning their diplomas.

Just as it’s tempting to jump right into to turning up the heat on the stove without taking the time to chop and season the ingredients first, it’s tempting for an organization to jump too quickly to decisions about its future work without doing the necessary leg work in preparation. But we won’t make that common mistake. In fact, we’ve been hard at work in the kitchen for several months now.

Engaging the Community

Before settling on our specific strategies in support of educational progress, we have been doing a lot of homework. An essential part of this has been engaging the community in various ways in order to make sure we have all of the data and information needed to make good decisions. We have been working with various groups to get their feedback on our emerging role as leaders in community support of educational progress. So far we have engaged the community through:
• Donor conversations
• Colleague discussions
• CEO calls
• CSC committee discussions
• Council of Agency Executives discussions
• CI Cabinet conversations

Another major engagement opportunity we have embarked upon is an Education Research Project in conjunction with Kentucky Youth Advocates. In addition to providing the latest research on how to promote high school graduation and reporting on essential quantitative data by county, the project has also engaged superintendents, principals, government officials, business persons, faith-based leaders, parent organization leaders, service providers, and various other community movers and shakers on their perceptions of both strengths as well as perceived needs. This will allow us to not only identify what is going on in each county in each of the 5 “tipping points” of the UWW education framework (kindergarten readiness, 4th grade reading, middle school transition, high school graduation, and college/career), but it will also let us also know what the community feels they most need to see improvement in educational attainment.

We are in the process of planning community forums in each county to discuss the results and get further input during October and November. We’ll keep you posted on this!

Lessons Learned

Without a doubt, I will never cook a sumptuous meal that meets with the praise (and shock) of my family and friends. But lots of us at MUW have been hard at work in the kitchen doing the prep work on another masterpiece – a framework for moving forward as community leaders in support of greater educational attainment. Watching my husband prepare a wonderful meal has taught me that an ideal result to any creative endeavor takes patience, preparation, and persistence. Even though the thought of applying these traits in a real live kitchen gives me hives, I’m thrilled to be applying them to our emerging plan for helping our community meet its educational goals.

Advocacy, Education, General advocate, Children, Community, Education, engagement, future, Louisville, making a difference, Metro United Way, research, strategic planning, youth

By Judy Schroeder

Anybody play BINGO? I used to love Bingo on a Friday night, with my Grandmother in the church basement. Oh yes, the smoke-filled basement with gray-haired ladies who love a child who will fetch more cards for them! Easy tips. Especially from those lucky winners who heard the caller sing out that last number on their sheet, and it lined up so perfectly across the columns on the page: B-I-N-G-O.

Well, on some days I can still get that excitement – in much healthier, smoke-free church basements – when the right people come together for the right reasons, and discover ideas that are right for their families and friends.

Two weeks ago, I was at Greater Friendship Baptist Church, in the California neighborhood of West Louisville, with fifteen young mothers, their children and grandmothers, listening to their ideas and hopes for their children’s future. They are using a little tool called the Ages & Stages Questionnaire to learn more about how to help their children learn.

Ladies and gentlemen, we had a “B-I-N-G-O!”

Because trustworthy relationships take time, a few years ago when I had the pleasure of meeting Gwen Kelly from the California neighborhood I could only hope that our work together would begin to make a difference. At that time the neighborhood had one of the worst reputations in the City for youth violence. Could we expect to see more young adults owning their neighborhood in a positive way, as young moms, dads, and community workers just a few years later?

Never underestimate the power of people who care.

In this case those people were Gwen and her neighbors, Ms. Robbie Bell and Dreema Jackson with many others, with the help of a couple of great nonprofit organizations who had your support through Metro United Way. The Community Farm Alliance had just published the West Louisville Food Assessment (BridgingTheDivide.pdf) that revved up all of the community conversation you may be hearing about inner-city “food deserts” and healthy farm-to-community solutions. We started a Farmers Market that brought the community together around Victory Park, where many people had said no one even had enough money or interest for healthy food. The new California Collaborative hired Michael Dean, who also lives facing the park. Four years and many more people later, the California Farmers’ Market sells produce out of raised-bed gardens cultivated by neighborhood youth on land provided by New Directions Housing Corporation/Neighborhood Initiatives and sold at Victory Park every Saturday morning this summer.

Victory Park is being reclaimed for children and families. Community institutions like Greater Friendship Baptist Church and neighbors like Ms. Robbie, Michael Dean, and Gwen are going for a “cover-all” to turn their neighborhood around! Their children and grandchildren will have the benefit.

Ladies and gentlemen, that’s a B-I-N-G-O!

General, Giving, Health, Volunteering "California Neighborhood", "Community Conversations", "Farmers Markets", "Vital Neighborhoods", Ages & Stages Questionnaires, success

With school having just started back, education seems to be on everyone’s mind.  Getting over the anxieties and challenges of starting a new school year can be a big hurdle – especially if your child is entering kindergarten or a new school.  This year, my son is a 5^th grader at a school that he has attended since pre-school, but my daughter started at a new school as an incoming 6^th grader entering middle school.  At orientation, she remarked “This place is BIG!”  As a parent putting myself in her shoes, I couldn’t have agreed more.

When children have a supportive family and a stable home environment, doing well in school can still be a significant challenge.  Keeping up with all of their subjects, text books, assignment sheets, daily reading, and long-term projects can be a tall task!  However, there are much greater challenges being faced by large numbers of children in our community.

Last year, 10,555 students in Jefferson County Schools were homeless at some point during the year.  To me, that number is staggering, both in terms of volume, as well as impact for each child.  I think about how difficult it must be to try to focus on academics when you may not know where you are going to eat or sleep.  Even if you’re staying with another family, sleeping on a couch in the living room is a far cry from sleeping in the comfort of your own bed in a private space.  It’s also painful to think about the many situations which may have caused the unstable housing to begin with – the loss of a job, a serious illness or death in the family, a lack of financial resources, chemical dependency, mental illness, domestic violence.  Every situation is unique.

Fortunately for us, our community is thinking about some of these most challenged students and how we can support them to make sure they have a fighting chance in school.  Organizations like the Metropolitan Housing Coalition, the Coalition for the Homeless and systems like Jefferson County Public Schools, our Kentucky’s Department of Community Based Services (child welfare), and Family Courts are teaming up to discuss how we can better support homeless children and their families, and how all of our systems can work together to ensure all children have every chance to be successful, by addressing their holistic needs.  When organizations and individuals come together around common goals, amazing things can happen.

I invite you to consider what it would be like to be in a homeless child’s shoes trying to learn in the classroom.  What images does this evoke for you?  How could taking on this perspective help us all as a community to better support these children’s academic success and long-term stability? 

Education, General Add new tag, Children, Coalition for the Homeless, Education, future, homeless, Jefferson County Public Schools, Live United, Louisville, making a difference, Metro United Way, Metropolitan Housing Coalition, parenting, youth

From the Bridgehaven website

By Patty Belden

I was recently invited to Bridgehaven Mental Health Services to attend a “Bridge Builder” lunch and learn.  I wasn’t exactly sure what to expect.  I was aware of Bridgehaven, but I had never visited and didn’t know a great deal about their services.  All I really knew was that Bridgehaven worked with individuals suffering from mental illness.  What I didn’t know was that Bridgehaven offers much more than a service…they offer the chance to be part of a family.

Having never visited, I was not familiar with the campus and in true Patty-fashion I entered through the wrong door.  It was only seconds before I was greeted and offered assistance by two people (my confused look must have given me away as a visitor).  Everyone seemed to know that today was a Bridge Builder lunch and assumed that was why I was there.  To my surprise, I wasn’t just given directions to the room, but I was personally escorted by a client.  During the short walk I was thanked several times for visiting and asked repeatedly if I needed anything…what a great host!  Little did I know that later I would have the opportunity to hear this man’s personal story.

Upon entering the lunch room, I was warmly greeted again, offered a beverage and directed to my seat.  I was at a table with seven strangers…I assumed they were all here for the same reason that I was, to learn about Bridgehaven.  To my delight, the man, who had previously escorted me, came to our table and filled the eighth empty chair.  I also learned that of the eight, two were clients and three were volunteers.

The program began.  The welcome and thank you was nice and even included a personal story from the Executive Director…I was refreshed by her honesty and amazed that she was so comfortable to share her story.  However, nothing could have prepared me for the next piece of the program…several clients were going to share thier personal stories.

We sat captivated by this man and his story.  He was so open and so honest.  He talked about his struggle with alcoholism and his inability to form positive relationships.  He talked about hearing voices in his head.  Voices that put him down and made him feel worthless.  He drank alcohol to drown the voices, but it didn’t work.  They got louder and louder.  They became aggressive and threatening.  He drank more.  Because of his drinking, he was unable to keep a job, take care of himself, or build relationships.  He kept himself isolated.  What struck me the most was that this man didn’t realize that he was different.  He believed that everyone heard voices.  He didn’t know there was help out there.

When he talked about Bridgehaven, you could see the appreciation in his eyes and hear it in his voice.  He had found help.  He had found a family.

Bridgehaven’s services truly offer hope for the future by teaching the skills necessary to live, learn, work, and socialize.  These skills are taught through individual and group therapy as well as skill building activities.  Most importantly, Bridgehaven offers a family-like network of support.

Do you want to learn more about Bridgehaven or become involved as a volunteer?  Click here.

Do you know someone who could benefit from the services offered at Bridgehaven?  Click here.

Advocacy, General, Health, Volunteering Bridgehaven, mental health, Metro United Way agencies

by John Sands

Gather Round, Team…

Yesterday, our students returned to school (JCPS).  Like many communities that have recently started or will soon begin their school year, a lot of preparation has occured to get to this point.  Parents and students have gotten together the school attire and supplies.  Teachers and schools have spent the last few weeks preparing lesson plans and getting their facilities in top notch shape.  A lot of thought has gone into preparing the minds of students to be receptive to all of the knowledge that will be imparted to them this year.

What Tactics Are We Missing?

One aspect of the overall success of our students may not get as much attention, but certainly is very important to their overall well being and performance in school.  That is good health habits, coupled with good nutrition.  Getting your student off to a good start includes a good, healthy breakfast, plenty of sleep and some type of physical activity that gets the blood running and the heart pumping a little bit.

Executing the Play

Unless you have a devoted athlete on your hands, it can be challenging to get the average child out of the gaming chair and into some physical activity.  Studies show that childhood obesity has almost doubled in the last 10 years.  So it is becoming increasingly more important to get our children more involved in some type of physical activity.   You may never have a child that thrives or even enjoys organized sports or physical activity, but there are some creative ways to get your child physically active. You can read a little about United Way’s Kids Get Fit effort focusing on youth health and wellness and get some ideas on Metro United Way’s website.

How Could You Coach Your Team?

Can you think of some more fun ideas to get your kids moving?  If so, we’d like to see some of your ideas in the comments section.

Here’s to a great, healthy and safe School Year!

Education, General, Health back to school, Kids Get Fit, preparing for school, youth fitness, youth wellness

By Kelly Hutchinson, Donor Relationship Manager

Here’s a brief little quiz and my challenge to you. Take a moment as you read to think about these inspirational statements on education and as you do, see if you can match the correct statement to the person who made the statement. We will call our little game…“Who Said It?”  Here are your choices and you can use each only once:

Helen Keller, Mark Twain, Confucius, Aristotle, Ben Franklin, Malcolm Forbes, Lee Iacocca, John F. Kennedy, Steve ”Crocodile Hunter” Irwin, Eleanor Roosevelt, Michael Jordan, Anonymous, Socrates, Malcolm X, Proverbs 12:1

1.  Education’s purpose is to replace an empty mind with an open one.

2.  Our progress as a nation can be no swifter than our progress in education.  Let us think of education as the means of developing our greatest abilities, because in each of us there is a private hope and dream which, fulfilled, can be translated into benefit for everyone and greater strength for our nation.

3.  In a completely rational society, the best of us would aspire to be teachers and the rest of us would have to settle for something less, because passing civilization along from one generation to the next ought to be the highest honor and the highest responsibility anyone could have.

4.  If a man empties his purse into his head, no man can take it away from him. An investment in knowledge always pays the best interest.

5.  The habits we form from childhood make no small difference, but rather they make all the difference.

6.   I believe that education is all about being excited about something. Seeing passion and enthusiasm helps push an educational message.

7.    The highest result of education is tolerance.

8.   To learn, you must want to be taught.

9.   Great minds discuss ideas, mediocre minds discuss events, small minds discuss personalities.

10.   The man who doesn’t read good books has no advantage over the man who can’t read them.

11.   I’ve missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. 26 times, I’ve been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life.  And that is why I succeed.

12. I hear and I forget. I see and I remember. I do and I understand.

13. Education is our passport to the future, for tomorrow belongs to the people who prepare for it today.

14.  If you think Education is expensive, try ignorance.   

15.  Wisdom begins with wonder.  

Answers: 1. Malcolm Forbes, 2. John F. Kennedy, 3. Lee Iacocca, 4. Ben Franklin, 5. Aristotle, 6. Steve Irwin, Crocodile Hunter, 7. Helen Keller, 8. Proverbs 12:1, 9. Eleanor Roosevelt, 10. Mark Twain, 11. Michael Jordan, 12. Confucius, 13. Malcolm X, 14. Anonymous, 15. Socrates

How did you do? Is there one quote that you like the best of these? Thanks for playing!

Metro United Way focuses our efforts on the building blocks for a good life- a quality education that leads to a stable job, enough income to support a family through retirement, and good health. We know that helping children and youth achieve their potential will have a positive impact on our community for years to come. It all starts with Education and we have made a promise in our community. By 2018, we promise to make sure all children in our community are prepared for success in kindergarten and we are working to increase the high school graduation rate from 73% currently to 87%. To learn more about our work and the Education promise, visit our www.metrounitedway.org, check out Success by 6, Bridges to Tomorrow, Kids Count, or give us a call and together we will make a difference.

Advocacy, Education, General, Volunteering Bridges to Tomorrow, Community Youth Print, Kentucky Youth Advocates, Kids Count, Success By 6

By Natalie Harris

I came across this article,  The Case for $320,000 Kindergarten Teachers, by David Leonhardt, in the New York Times business section this morning, and with all the buzz about our recent Kindergarten Countdown event at Slugger Field, I thought the timing was too good to be ignored.

While the article is a bit of an opinion piece (ultimately treading into some potential education policy minefields), I thought the greater point of the study discussed was clearly worth mentioning:  kindergarten, when done well, has an incredible long-term impact.  As Leonhardt sums up:

Students who had learned much more in kindergarten were more likely to go to college than students with otherwise similar backgrounds. Students who learned more were also less likely to become single parents. As adults, they were more likely to be saving for retirement. Perhaps most striking, they were earning more.

An that “more” is nothing to sneeze at:

A student who went from average to the 60th percentile — a typical jump for a 5-year-old with a good teacher — could expect to make about $1,000 more a year at age 27 than a student who remained at the average.

The study discussed, “How Does Your Kindergarten Classroom Affect Your Earings? Evidence From Project STAR”, ultimately concludes that an outstanding kindergarten teacher is worth $320,000 a year.

This could definitely be viewed as depressing news in these days of budget cuts, school closings (i.e. bigger classrooms), and big challenges for even the best teachers — the ultimate toll all this can take on the community is alarming — but it should also be viewed as a call to action.

The work Metro United Way does in support of early childhood education (Success By 6, Gheens Bridges to Tomorrow, Born Learning and more) pushes us towards one goal:  making sure that our children arrive in kindergarten ready to succeed.  This moment of economic crisis makes it even more imperative that we do the work, with our community’s help, to meet this goal.

Education, Events, General early childhood, kindergarten, Kindergarten Countdown, Metro United Way, Success By 6

Stakeholder Relationship Team shows what's important to them!

I remember as a kid there always seemed to be someone on my block who would always tell  my mother or father what I did or did not do.  That individual was called a tattle tale.  Tattle taling is passing information through “word of mouth.” The saying goes that a person will tell at least 10 other people about a good or bad experience they had with a company, organization or an individual. And more often than not, those 10 people may tell at least 10 other people. I know I have experienced both giving and receiving that type of information.

Think for a moment about “word of mouth” or WOM. The simple act of conversing with another is a powerful way to spread a message. 

The June 23, 2010 edition of The Agitator discussed how WOM is a powerful way for non-profits to spread their message and build relationships. 

 Here’s a report from Online Media Daily on an interesting Yahoo study that has attempted to drill into WOM behavior. It notes that 76% of all WOM still occurs face-to-face … however, increasingly it just might be that two individuals are sitting side-by-side talking about something they are viewing on their respective smartphones! The study says that 38% of all WOM conversations, however they occur, are informed by internet-derived content.

No one’s really examined WOM specifically as it works in the nonprofit space, but there’s no reason to expect the underlying principles would differ. In our own DonorTrends surveys, we’ve seen that 15-20% of donors self-identify themselves as individuals who have recommended a specific charity or cause group to someone else.

In building relationships we know that personal contact is the best way to increase the depth of the relationship. In today’s world of social media, i-phones, i-pads, email and yes, the old standby face-to-face conversations, their are unlimited  opportunities to talk about experiences, causes, ideas and really almost anything. 

How do we utilize our WOM opportunities to connect with people we know, meet with, talk on the phone with, Facebook with, are LinkedIn with to spread our Metro United Way message? In this past week there were at least two opportunities to WOM with others about helping others. First is the opportunity to Adopt Camp Kindergarten Schools and the second is the need for Volunteers to Drive Cancer Patients to Treatments. What wonderful opportunities to use the power of WOM.

What is the power of WOM. I think the power of WOM is best described by doing the math. We can use the earleir reference about one person telling 10 other people about an experience, idea, opportunity to calculate the power of WOM.

I tell 10 people about opportunities to adopt Camp Kindergarten classrooms and the need for volunteers to drive cancer patients. If those 10 people will tell 10 other people, we now have 111 people WOMing about these opportunities. If the last 10 we  WOM with tell another 10 we are up to 211 WOMers. This is the power of WOM and the power of 10.

As Metro United Way works to forge lasting relationships with our stakeholders, let’s use the simple act of WOMing to Change People’s Lives.  Give, Advocate, Volunteer! Be a WOMer today!

General Community, future, give, Live United, making a difference, Volunteer, youth