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2019-01-01
Advocates for Children of New Jersey; Kids Count;
This data book assesses the well-being of children in Newark, New Jersey and provides the latest statistics and trend data in areas such as demographics, family economic security, food insecurity, child health, child protection, childcare, education, and teens. It also features a special section on young men of color in Newark in an attempt to identify how they respond to opportunities and challenges and understand the causes and implications of systematic inequality.
2019-05-01
Global Dialogue;
This research was commissioned by the Thomas Paine Initiative,with support from a group of UK trusts and foundations (including Barrow Cadbury Trust, the JMG Foundation, the Oak Foundation,the Open Society Foundations, Rosa, the UK Fund for Women and Girls, and Unbound Philanthropy) as a scoping study in advance of a Learning Exchange to take place in May 2019, bringing the strategic communications field together to facilitate cross-sector learning and to explore the appetite and feasibility for collaboration around commonlyheld values. This paper explores how voluntary sector organisations in the UK are developing, embedding and sharing their communications strategies. It provides an overview of where the field currently is, and poses questions and provocations.
2020-01-31
Healthy Schools Campaign;
This brief describes the multiple co-benefits of green schoolyards for communities; provides a case study of the Space to Grow model; and offers practical suggestions to policymakers and advocates interested in beginning, expanding and making the case for a green schoolyard initiative.
2020-07-01
S. D. Bechtel, Jr. Foundation;
With its long-standing commitment to STEM education, the S. D. Bechtel, Jr. Foundation viewed California's 2013 adoption of Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) as an excellent opportunity to support educators and their students as they transition to these rigorous and engaging standards. This opportunity aligned with the Foundation's overarching emphasis on supporting adult leaders as the most effective way to achieve our goal of providing students with high-quality STEM education.The Foundation launched the six-year NGSS Early Implementers Initiative in 2014. It supports eight diverse California school districts committed to implementing NGSS in their K-8 schools. All districts are incorporating the state's preferred integrated course model for science instruction in middle school. The K-12 Alliance at WestEd, a highly respected provider of professional learning and technical assistance services to school districts, leads the Initiative. Two charter management organizations also participate through funding provided by other sources.The broad goal of the Initiative is to successfully support initial implementation of the science standards in a set of districts to inform state-level decisions and set the stage for statewide implementation. The experiences of the Early Implementers, as well as the tools developed through the Initiative process, are expected to make it easier for other California districts as they implement NGSS. A separate arm of WestEd documents the Early Implementers' approaches, successes, and lessons learned in a series of evaluation reports. The Foundation has invested approximately $25 million in service of this goal.
2019-01-01
The RecoRa Institute;
The European Practice EXchange (EPEX) is a small international network of organisations and individual members working in the fields of primary, secondary and tertiary prevention of radicalisation and exit work both within and outside of prison. It aspired to take up the challenge of amplifying, strengthening and connecting practitioners' voices. This publication is the outcome of an intense three-year exchange, as a reply to the following questions: "How can we create a peer-to-peer network for those working in the prevention of radicalisation that offers a space to their (shared) topics and interests? What if, based on this, practitioners wrote a book together?". The document is written as much for other practitioners as it was for those who are curious to hear the voices of professionals with first-hand expertise.
2019-01-01
ThriveChicago;
This report summarizes findings from real conversations with boys and young men of color in Chicago as well as results from convenings with community-based organizations. The findings inform an Action Plan that includes opportunities for individual Chicagoans, community-based organizations, and institutions to act around the needs of boys and young men of color in the city.
2019-04-01
Community Foundation Water Initiative (CFWI);
California is moving toward a more holistic approach to managing our water and land resources as the 21st century unfolds. This perspective recognizes the interconnectivity between two traditionally fragmented sectors.In 2005, the California Legislature passed new laws that enable communities to join together to adopt Integrated Regional Water Management (IRWM) policies and practices. This comprehensive planning approach considers water resources in the context of an interconnected watershed with a network of regional governance, rather than as a combination of fragmented parts. Unfortunately, the IRWM program is dominated by the water sector and in most regions has not pursued alignment with land use.Similarly, the Sustainable Communities Strategies (SCS) mandated through [legislation] establish a framework for aligning land use practices (predominantly housing and transportation) across jurisdictions within a larger geographic region. Yet very few SCSs have taken water resources into account.While water management and land-use planning remain highly fragmented across the state, we are making progress toward a more integrated approach, especially when setting new state-level policies, regulations and guidance. The 2014 Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA) is a leap forward in this direction. For the frst time, local land use agencies have an opportunity to be full partners with water agencies in shaping groundwater governance. It is too soon to determine how well these two sectors are integrating under SGMA, but early results are promising.
2018-09-06
Citizen's Committee for Children of New York;
Citizens' Committee for Children of New York (CCC) has worked over the last year to gather quantitative and qualitative data about the North Shore of Staten Island to provide a comprehensive assessment of the needs of children and families in the area, as well as the resources available to them. CCC's model for community-based research utilizes existing government data on child and family well-being and complements it by mapping community assets and elevating the voices of service providers and community members through a participatory research process. This work builds on our experience maintaining the nation's most comprehensive municipal-level database illustrating the well-being of children and families in New York City, Keeping Track Online.In this report, we highlight both welcomed and worrisome trends districtwide and across the seven neighborhoods that make up the North Shore—Grymes Hill-Park Hill, Mariner's Harbor, Port Richmond, Stapleton, St. George-New Brighton, West Brighton, and Westerleigh—and compare these outcomes against borough and citywide averages.In order to address the challenges faced by children and families on the North Shore—and in Staten Island broadly—residents and service providers have come together to engage in efforts to improve outcomes across the range of issues impacting child and family well-being. This includes several collective impact initiatives, a term describing a systematic approach to collaboration among organizations aligned by a common agenda, shared measurement systems, mutually reinforcing activities, continuous communication, and support from a backbone organization tasked with coordinating the partnership.CCC's data collection and participatory research process are designed to inform and support efforts in the community to improve well-being for children and families. We believe that reliable data is a foundational element of effective advocacy, and that community engagement elevating the voices and concerns of residents is essential in identifying the challenges that need to be addressed. We are hopeful this report will be a useful tool as residents and service providers continue working to improve outcomes for children and families on the North Shore.
2018-05-01
Citizen's Committee for Children of New York;
Northern Manhattan reflects the diversity and cultural richness of New York City as a whole, while also reflecting the city's challenges, including pockets of high poverty and the associated risks to child and family well-being. In this report, we focus on the community districts of West Harlem, Central Harlem, and Washington Heights, and where possible, provide data on the eight neighborhoods within these districts. Our findings suggest the neighborhoods of northern Manhattan each face unique challenges. Manhattanville in West Harlem struggles with the lowest levels of employment among adults and lowest average household income; Central Harlem has the highest rates of homelessness and most worrisome child and adult health outcomes; and Washington Heights faces high levels of linguistic isolation and low levels of adult educational attainment. Though specific neighborhoods have unique challenges, there are also issues that are universal across the neighborhoods of northern Manhattan. The poverty rate in each northern Manhattan neighborhood is higher than the citywide rate, and at schools in each neighborhood (with the exception of Morningside Heights in West Harlem) students perform well below the citywide level in state-mandated English Language Arts and Math exams. The data also point to areas in which there has been significant improvement in northern Manhattan. The uninsured rate for both children and adults has decreased substantially—faster than it has citywide—and only 1% of children in West Harlem and Washington Heights lack health insurance. The teen birth rate has dropped considerably in each district, at a faster rate than it has citywide. Poverty rates are higher—and average incomes are lower—in northern Manhattan compared to New York City as a whole. However, each northern Manhattan community district has experienced greater increases in average income—and larger decreases in poverty—than the city as a whole over the last several years. Amidst the good news is the troubling fact that children and families facing multiple risks to well-being are disproportionately black and Latino. Where possible, we identify disparities in outcomes for these and other demographic groups, such as immigrant and single-parent households. Findings from these analyses point to the stubbornness of unequal outcomes, and the persistent need to further expose and combat discrimination in all its forms. In our research, service providers and community members pointed to several issues that should be addressed to improve child and family well-being in northern Manhattan. For example, both caregivers and youth are seeking more opportunities that will allow them to be economically secure and upwardly mobile. Residents feel they need greater protections in maintaining stable housing, and they expressed a need to eliminate access barriers— including lack of information and language—to ensure greater ease and accessibility in obtaining needed and desired programs and services. There was a desire for a more equitable distribution of resources in schools and more opportunities for parental involvement in their children's education. And community members felt they could benefit from shared spaces and co-located services where multiple needs and interests can be addressed. Below, we further explore the major themes that arose in our research and provide broad, community-informed recommendations to address the issues raised.
2018-04-01
FSG;
Many foundations are adopting new approaches for creating social change—approaches that aim to influence the actions and investments of the public and private sector, as well as address the complex conditions that hold social problems in place.Based on interviews with 114 practitioners representing 50 foundations and 8 philanthropic services organizations, Being the Change explores how foundations are applying their assets, knowledge, skills, networks, and people in new ways in order to create impact at scale and change systems.
