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Getting to Know the Catalogue Review Team: Part I

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At the Catalogue, we’re always so eager to tell people about our unique vetting process that helps us determine which small charities are the best in Greater Washington. Of course, our vetting could not take place without the help of our 100-person review team, which consists of experts from the local philanthropic community who each evaluate 10-11 charity applications during the months of March and April.

So, just who are these reviewers? Over the next three weeks, we’re pulling back the curtain and inviting you to get to know these members of our community of knowledge as they share their perspectives on the Catalogue review process and philanthropy in Greater Washington.

This week, we’re featuring Joseph Suarez, ‎a 6-time Catalogue reviewer and Executive Advisor, Community Partnerships at Booz Allen Hamilton, and Jade Floyd, Director of Communications at The Case Foundation. This year marks Jade’s 2nd as a Catalogue reviewer.

How did you hear about the Catalogue? And, how did you become a reviewer?

Joe Suarez, Booz Allen Hamilton: I originally learned of the Catalogue having received a copy at home in the mail. My home fell into one of the targeted zip codes the original Catalogue was mailed to a few years ago. I contacted the Catalogue and eventually Booz Allen became one of the corporate supporters. We were impressed with the concept of the Catalogue and the potential impact it represented for smaller area nonprofits. Eventually Barbara Harman asked me to serve as one of the Catalogue reviewers.

Jade Floyd, The Case Foundation: I have served on the board of directors and development/fundraising committees for two nonprofits in the Catalogue portfolio, the DC Arts and Humanities Education Collaborative and Project Create. This opened the door to becoming a reviewer for the class of 2013 and 2014.

What do you enjoy most about reviewing nonprofits for the Catalogue?

Joe: Having spent the better part of my career in the non-profit community, mostly with large national non-profit organizations as a development professional and now on the corporate grants side of the house, what I enjoy most about reviewing non-profits for the Catalogue is the opportunity to learn about the many smaller organizations in our community. Many of these non-profit organizations I was not familiar with, but who across our community provide vital services to those in need or add to the richness of the region. In many cases these organizations are not household names, but the Catalogue provides them an opportunity to showcase their services and the diverse constituents they touch. This platform — the Catalogue for Philanthropy — plays an important role in helping member organizations build their brand and name recognition while also helping generate new financial support.

Jade: Learning about the vast number of quality nonprofits across the region is one of the most enjoyable parts of this process. These organizations are providing critically needed services to disadvantaged populations. The quality of candidates we review is enlightening because each organization is so unique and dedicated to their missions.

What is one piece of advice you would give to future Catalogue applicants?

Joe: Take the time to apply! It is a lot of work to apply for admission to the Catalogue, but it is worth every bit of it. The return to your organization for the time invested is priceless. Over the years, recognition in the Catalogue for Philanthropy has been the “Good Housekeeping seal of approval” in many ways. Individual, Foundation and Corporate donors understand the high standards the Catalogue places in their selection process. This rigor in reviewing the mission and impact of the nonprofits selected for the Catalogue along with the auditing provides a high level of confidence that any donation given is going to be well used and have maximum impact. In addition, the Catalogue provides a tremendous platform to help member nonprofits build their name identification and in competitive markets, this can mean the difference in gaining that financial support or not.

What is one piece of advice you would give to new/future Catalogue reviewers?

Joe: Enjoy yourself, wade into the pool, it’s not deep, but use it as an opportunity to learn a little more about the community that we live in and those we might not see or know too much about. Your role as a reviewer will give you greater insight!

Jade: Venture outside of the box and get to know these nonprofits personally. Don’t simply rely on the application. Visit their websites, follow them on twitter and Facebook, or take the time to attend a performance. You are not only a reviewer; you are becoming an advocate and sometimes a patron for life for many of these organizations.

Given your experience as a reviewer, when you see a nonprofit with the Catalogue’s “seal of approval” what does that mean to you?

Joe: When I see the Catalogue’s “seal of approval” I know right away, the rigor and consistency that went into reviewing these nonprofit organizations and clearing them for their impact, performance and good fiscal stewardship. This high standard provides a level of confidence that any contribution or grant being made will be well used by the organization to address the need in the community they are focused on.

Jade: Individuals who donate to an organization want to be assured that their dollars will make an impact and be used wisely. The Catalogue’s “seal of approval” gives donors the confidence that these nonprofits are delivering on their mission to the community. As a reviewer, we have an insider’s look at the data and program outcomes that the general public may not have access to. It is our responsibility to evaluate their programs to the best of our ability and make very tough decisions about each nonprofit that determines their entry into the Catalogue family.

How has being a reviewer had an impact on your views of philanthropy in Greater Washington?

Joe: The diversity of organizations represented in the Catalogue stands out to me right away. For an affluent community, there is tremendous need and opportunity across the region. The Catalogue touches many communities and focus areas ranging from social service activities, to educational, environmental and arts and culture to name just a few. To me this diversity speaks to the richness that these organizations bring to the region, helping those needing a hand up so that they do not fall through the cracks in the system to helping bring or improve the vitality to the community as a whole.

What do you feel your unique background brings to the Catalogue review process?

Jade: For several years I have used the Catalogue as a tool to find reputable nonprofits to support in my own philanthropic endeavors. Years of board service have given me an inside look at the best practices and fail forward moments at several organizations that are within the Catalogue family. I also work at the Case Foundation and have gained a deepened knowledge of the social sector. Each day I see the impact a grant or large-scale donation can have on an organization and its mission.

When reading applications, have there been any industry trends (i.e. program design, donor engagement, ways of measuring impact, etc.) you have noticed since becoming a reviewer? Or, what trends in the nonprofit sector have caught your attention in the past year?

Jade: Several trends are catching my eye. The first is organizations who are failing forward.Often, the social sector is hesitant to admit their failures, fearing damage to their reputations or that funders will be dissuaded from supporting their efforts. Many organizations are taking the exact opposite approach and sharing their fail forward moments, tweaking programs and learning from them. For example, when the DC-based GlobalGiving Foundation University Scholarships for Women program failed, the nonprofit shared their learnings with the sector. Similarly, when the DC-based Cause “philanthropub” closed its doors after just one year, owner Nick Vilelle reflected on their challenge?publicly.

Second, nonprofits are reaching beyond their bubble.When nonprofits can work together with others in the sector on programs you often see greater returns and more impact on larger segments of the community. Collaborating spurns innovation and enables these organizations who partner to move the needle on the serious problems we face within our communities. The DC Arts and Humanities Education Collaborative partners with nearly 70 cultural institutions across the city — from Kennedy Center to National Geographic — to provide quality arts and humanities education for nearly 30,000 DC public and chartered public schools each year. Without their members it would be a challenge to provide this much access for students in the region.

And lastly is diversification of income. Nonprofits have learned a big lesson post-recession and are no longer reliant on just two or three sources of income. When I see an organization that has five or six areas of revenue (i.e. foundation grants, individual donations, earned income, in-kind, board giving, etc.) this is reassuring that they can sustain for the long term.

Stay tuned next week when we hear from two more members of our review team, Catalogue donor Sandra Hoehne, and Maegan Scott of The Meyer Foundation!

Guest Post: Thinking Like a Business

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We’re eager to kick off our three-part workshop series on Marketing & Communications this Thursday. This series is made possible by Integrity Management Consulting, Inc., a friend of the Catalogue and to several of our charities. Before kicking off the series, we asked Integrity’s Communications Manager, Tracey Wright, to share a few ideas and examples of how nonprofits can communicate to a corporate audience.

Could Thinking Like a Business Help Non-Profits Connect With Business?

By Tracey Wright, Integrity Management Consulting

Non-profits are in the business of helping people. That means that for many, especially small non-profits, their primary focus is on service delivery, with little time or resources to spare. Just like any business that wants to grow its market share though, non-profits that need to fund their missions or that want to expand their services, need to secure more support. Could thinking like a business help them connect with potential corporate givers? Here are five ideas, gleaned from my experience working at the small but growing business and Catalogue for Philanthropy sponsor – Integrity Management Consulting – where I help manage the company’s non-profit partnerships.

1. Think about your audience: Integrity is sponsoring a three-part Catalogue training series beginning this Thursday on how to better tell non-profit stories. In the first session, Catalogue President and Editor Barbara Harman will discuss the need to consider your audience when designing your outreach. It’s one of the first things communications professionals are taught: don’t focus only on the message you want to convey, but also what your audience wants to know. For example, Integrity’s staff-led Community Impact Group reviews small non-profits when approving employee applications to support their favorite charities in our 5x$500 program. Often, a website review doesn’t give us all the information we’re looking for — such as the Form 990, a list of board members, short- and long-term goals and the strategies for achieving them. When we don’t find this information, it requires us to call the non-profit — another step for us and a potential roadblock to the organization securing business donations. Think about the audience and give potential supporters a one-stop information experience to speed decisions in your favor.

2. Make it easy: Of course you have a website, but how user-friendly and attractive is it? Analytics on our own website show that visitors can spend from mere seconds to just a few brief minutes on our site. The information people want to see should be easy to get to, with your story highlighted on your homepage to hook people and keep them there. It’s incumbent on all of us to ask whether we’re making it easy for our visitors to digest information and take an action, such as watching a video, downloading a report, clicking on an email address, or making a donation.

3. Use metrics to demonstrate impact: In her four-part blog series on ‘the evaluation problem,’ Barbara Harman pointed out that while it’s difficult to measure some kinds of impact, there’s a growing requirement by government and donors for metrics that measure results. Many of us respond from the heart, but just as businesses need to show potential customers how they fix problems, improve lives, or save money, non-profits can strike a chord by showing that they are results-driven organizations. For example, longtime Integrity partner Homestretch provides housing and other services to homeless families with children, many of them fleeing from domestic abuse. The simple fact of homelessness and abuse should be enough to convince the public to support the cause. Beyond the emotion though, what demonstrates good stewardship at Homestretch are the numbers it recently added to its new website, highlighted in large, bold type: 92% of last year’s graduates employed a year after graduation, $681,352 of debts repaid in the last six years, $1,157,921 in client savings deposits over the past six years. The numbers validate the Homestretch claim of transformational change in the lives of desperate families.

4. Use creativity and speed to cement a relationship with business: Meeting, or even better, exceeding customer expectations is a goal of most businesses, including Integrity. So when a non-profit exceeds expectations, business leaders notice. In 2013, Integrity used the Catalogue to find a new charity to support with a back-to-school drive. We chose Child and Family Network Centers (CFNC) based on the Catalogue’s review. Before our team returned to the office after delivering the new books and shoes we collected, CFNC had already posted a short, simple video clip to its Facebook page, which Integrity then shared on its own page. Days later, CFNC followed up with an unexpected “Stewardship Report” which recapped the project, the need for shoes among its pre-school population, photos of our team and the children, a child’s quote, screen captures of Facebook and Twitter traffic between us, and of local press coverage that CFNC’s media outreach had generated. We were blown away that they would make such an effort to demonstrate the value of Integrity’s contribution. CFNC’s enthusiastic response led directly to Integrity’s Community Impact Group choosing to adopt 11 adults and 14 children during CFNC’s subsequent year-end holiday gift drive. From a business perspective, it was clear that CFNC really “gets” the interconnection between corporate goals, employee engagement, traditional and shareable new media.

5. Market your strengths: Every business is looking for its differentiators. Whether it’s a unique product or service, a new award or a customer testimonial, a good marketer will use these assets to describe the business in a way that will stand out and make potential customers feel like they’re choosing a winner. The Catalogue stamp of approval achieves this and the logo is likely proudly displayed on your website and materials. Are there additional superlatives you can use? At a Catalogue reviewer function in 2013, one executive director casually mentioned that his non-profit had been chosen for the print and web versions of the Catalogue three times. I said he must have “three-times named ‘one of the best’ by the Catalogue for Philanthropy” in bold on the website. It hadn’t occurred to him. My advice – think like a marketer!

A final suggestion is to repurpose all the hard work you put into your Catalogue application. You have analyzed and clearly stated the need, measured your impact, and described your goals. That’s all good information to help you reach more individuals and more business donors.

There’s still time to register for this Thursday’s workshop, on Telling Your Story in Words, with Barbara Harman (4/3 @ 10am). Registration is full for the second workshop, Communicating via Imagery, but registration will open this week for the third workshop, Telling Your Story by Building Your Brand.

Integrity Management Consulting, Inc. is a rapidly growing small business that delivers acquisition, financial, and program management support services to Federal customers. Based in McLean, VA, Integrity has grown from two to about 100 employees and now supports a range of Federal agencies. An award-winning company for innovation, and job growth, in 2013 it also received the Outstanding Corporate Citizenship – Small Business award from the Fairfax County Chamber of Commerce. Integrity has been a corporate sponsor of the Catalogue since 2009. It’s employee-led Community Impact Group and company matching program use the Catalogue to find new non-profits and are guided by its standards when approving donations.

Tracey Wright is the Communications Manager at Integrity Management Consulting, Inc., where she is in charge of all internal and external communications. She also leads the employee Community Impact Group and manages company partnerships with non-profits. A former television journalist and an ongoing advocate for children with special needs, Tracey was also a Fellow at Georgetown University’s Center for Social Impact Communication. She connected with the Catalogue in late 2009, when she and a team from Georgetown helped rebrand and plan the Catalogue’s Inspiration to Action event. On behalf of Integrity, Tracey was a reviewer for the 2013 and 2014 editions of the Catalogue.

Guest Post: Mentoring Today

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As Mentoring Month draws to a close, we’re excited for today’s guest post from Mentoring Today! Since 2005, Mentoring Today has served DC youth both before and after they are released from incarceration to support their successful reintegration into their families and community. Advocates and mentors from the Washington College of Law help youth with critical issues such as education, employment, and housing as they enter adulthood. Through these comprehensive, client-centered services, Mentoring Today strives to improve the juvenile justice system and empowers our young people to recognize their dreams and realize their aspirations.

About the Author: Sasha Garcon is a third year law student at American University’s Washington College of Law. Sasha is currently interning with Mentoring Today and hopes to pursue a career in juvenile defense.

A Mentor, An Advocate, And All That Is In Between

by Sasha Garcon

I have been a mentor in the past. And as a law student, I am developing skills to become a better advocate. But rarely have these two roles merged, until I started working with Mentoring Today. Mentoring Today is a DC-based organization that serves youth both before and after they are released from incarceration to support their successful reintegration into their families and community. Mentoring Today, through a partnership with Students United, a student organization at American University Washington College of Law, sends mentors to meet weekly with incarcerated youth at New Beginnings Youth Development Center in Laurel, Maryland. Once the youth are released, mentors continue working with the youth in the community by maintaining a mentoring relationship and by helping with critical issues such as education, employment, and housing.

“What is a mentor?” I asked my mentee on the first day we met. He explained to me that he had had a mentor before and that this individual gave him advice on life and staying out of trouble. I thought about this a little more and thought about how I wanted to define my role and my relationship with him. I knew that I was not there to tell him what to do and what not to do. My role, as I saw it, was to be a support to my mentee — to help him define goals and to help him in accomplishing those goals. While I wanted to provide emotional support and advice on how my mentee could grow as an individual, I also wanted to make sure that I fought for things that my mentee wanted or needed to grow as an individual. I wanted to be more than a mentor; I wanted to also be his advocate.

The idea of being both a mentor and an advocate may seem foreign but they work quite well together. I could see change in our relationship the first time I shifted from my role as a mentor to being an advocate for my mentee. My mentee had what is called a “Youth Family Team Meeting” (YFTM) meeting scheduled. At this meeting, New Beginnings staff members, service providers, and family members came together to prepare for my mentee’s release and to discuss what services needed to be set in place once he was in the community. In preparation for the meeting, I discussed with my mentee what to expect. We talked about his goals, what he hoped to accomplish in the meeting, and any issues that he wanted to raise. I reassured him that I would also be there at the meeting on his behalf to help make sure his goals were met and that he accomplished what he wanted to accomplish. As I said this, he stopped and looked at me with a look that I can only describe as pure shock. “What? You didn’t expect me to come?” I asked. His answer, “No.”

After this meeting, I could see how my role as a mentor-advocate shaped and defined my relationship with my mentee. It was encouraging to see that he was not only comfortable sharing his goals with me but also wanted to include me in his pursuit of accomplishing those goals. I had the ability to not only advocate on his behalf, but also to help him learn to advocate for himself. One cannot truly advocate for someone, if they do not teach them to advocate for themselves. It is the assurance that I will not only advocate for him as best I can, but that I will also provide him with the confidence to advocate for his own needs that I believe will truly make a difference in my mentee’s life.

Learn more about Mentoring Today at: www.mentoringtoday.org, or check out their Catalogue webpage for more ways to get involved.

Guest Post: Washington Youth Garden

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Today we welcome the Washington Youth Garden to GoodWorks! Using the garden cycle as a tool to enrich science learning, inspire environmental stewardship and cultivate healthy food choices http://iga.edu/best-paper-writing-service-essay/ in youth and families, the Washington Youth Garden is in its 40th year to service to local youth and families.

Today’s post is from Mel Jones, the Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) Coordinator at John Burroughs Education Campus. Gardening is hard work. So is being a public school teacher. It’s no surprise then that school gardens are such an uphill battle for DC teachers and administrators. This letter from one of the Washington Youth Garden’s partner schools helps show why partnerships are so valuable.

Growing Green Dreams at Local Schools

by Mel JonesDisplaying Mel Watering.jpg

Since beginning as a science teacher here over ten years ago, I have made repeated attempts to start a garden. I knew my students would have a better understanding of science if there was more hands-on learning. However, despite my efforts, I didn’t have the expertise or the time to develop a real, working garden.

In 2011, our partnership with the Washington Youth Garden made the dream of a school garden come alive as third graders filled new raised beds with soil and transplanted lettuce, which they later harvested for salad pitas. Since then, the garden has become a part of every student’s experience, from compost investigation projects to school-wide sweet potato tastings.

The garden continues to expose students to new fruits and vegetables and provide an outdoor science laboratory. With grant funding, we’ve hired a School Garden Coordinator who regularly teaches our Early Childhood classes and collaborates with teachers to integrate the garden into science and literacy lessons. Plans are in progress to install a kitchen classroom to give our students year-round opportunities to cook healthy foods and learn about science and nutrition. The Washington Youth Garden has made a truly wonderful difference for our students and our school!

How does the Washington Youth Garden support school gardens?
The Washington Youth Garden provides multi-stage school garden partnerships that help schools integrate their school garden into the curriculum, teach garden-instruction best practices, seek independent funding, and plan for long-term sustainability. Currently, we support thriving school garden programs at four low-income partner schools in Ward 5.

How can you support this?
A pledge of $500 supports the cost of closely collaborating with a teacher to deliver four hands-on, curriculum-aligned garden lessons.

Learn more about the Washington Youth Garden on their website, blog, Facebook page and current Indiegogo Online Fundraiser.

Guest Post: LearnServe International

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Today’s post comes from LearnServe International, whose programs spark high school students’ passion to make a difference and equips them with the knowledge, tools, and relationships to effectively drive local solutions to pressing global challenges. Bringing together students from across the DC area, LearnServe prepares them with the skills of business leadership, innovative problem-solving, and cross-cultural fluency. Then students are challenged to lead community-based change in their schools, across the DC region, and around the world.Empowering high-schoolers who have the motivation to make a difference, the Fellows Program guides them through the creation of their own “social venture.”

LearnServe Fellows Prepare to Speak Out

by Scott Rechler, Director & CEO, LearnServe International

When is the last time you saw someone teased, harassed, or picked on simply because of who they are? Did you recognize it as bullying? Stand up to the perpetrator? Console the person these attacks were directed towards?

Madison and Alichea, both students at Parkdale High School in Prince George’s County, ask these questions every day. Both Madison and Alichea have seen bullying first-hand. And both are ready to do something about it.

In September we challenged Madison, Alichea, and the other 70 members of the 2014 class of LearnServe Fellows to articulate the injustices they witness or experience, that they would like to put an end to. As LearnServe Fellows, Madison and Alichea and their peers will spend the year developing business plans around their respective causes, then mobilize teams to get these “social ventures” off the ground.

Madison herself has been bullied. She knows the sting of teasing and intimidation, which she has endured for more than a year. She appreciates all that her school — through counseling and peer mediation — has done to address the problem. But she feels that students can also do more to support their classmates who have been targets of bullying.

Madison plans to create a peer-to-peer support network for targets of bullying and their allies. With additional guidance from the school’s counselor, students would support each other in working through some of the emotional effects of bullying.

Alichea, a member of Parkdale’s JROTC squad, sees it as her responsibility to intervene when she sees other classmates being bullied. She wonders why more students don’t step in. Do they see it all as a harmless joke? None of their business? They’re too afraid to respond? Or they simply don’t know what bullying looks like – and feels like – in all the forms it can take?

Alichea would like to help would-be bullies and would-be bystanders better understand what bullying is and why it must stop. Through school outreach she hopes to shed light on bullying at her school and build a network of allies ready to step in and stop it as it happens.

Each year, the LearnServe Fellows Program offers leadership and social entrepreneurship training to 70 high school students like Madison and Alichea – students who represent more than 30 public, private, and charter schools in DC, Maryland, and Virginia. LearnServe guides these students as they translate the causes they are most passionate about into community impact.

LearnServe invites you to meet Madison, Alichea, and the other members of the 2014 class of LearnServe Fellows as they debut their social venture ideas at the 7th Annual Innovators Coffee House, tomorrow, December 12, 2013. The LearnServe Fellows will offer a series of 30-second “elevator pitches” on the causes they have chosen to address and the solutions they plan to design and implement this spring.

For more information about the LearnServe Fellows Program visit www.learn-serve.org/fellows.

For details or to RSVP for the 7th Annual Innovators Coffee House, visit http://learn-serve.org/learnserve-fellows-events/.

Guest Post: One World Education

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Today we welcome Eric Goldstein, Founder & Executive Director of One World Education (OWEd) to GoodWorks. OWEd provides middle and high school common core literacy programs and publishes student essays about cultural and global issues, promoting peer-to-peer learning and building skills for college and career writing. Founded in 2007, the teacher-created nonprofit has been recognized throughout the Capital Region as an outstanding literacy program that improves and celebrates student writing. Nationally, OWEd has been featured on Edutopia, ASCD’s Education Blog, Huffington Post, Comcast Newsmakers, and CBS News. In 2013, OWEd was selected as the first writing program to be adopted for all DC Public High Schools.Prior to One World Education, Eric was a middle and high school teacher in a DC Charter School. We’re delighted to welcome Eric & the OWEd team as a new 2013/14 Catalogue partner!

Step Back & Move Forward

by Eric Goldstein, Founder & Executive Director, One World Education

Sometimes the most effective step an organization can take toward improving its programming is to improve the organization behind its programming. Seven years ago in an 8th grade Charter School classroom, where One World Education (OWEd) was created with my 8th grade students, thinking about anything other than involving more students in our successful writing project wasn’t even a speck on the radar.

The success of that classroom project propelled OWEd’s expansion into a citywide organization. Now the organization provides in DC middle and high schools. As students strengthen the skills needed for college and career-level writing, they learn to write and frame arguments about cultural and global issues that they care about. The organization then on its website with aligned curriculum, so students can read and learn about these topics from the perspective of their peers.

Just as our programs ensure that teachers have strong plans for their students, OWEd followed suit and used the last school year to preparing its own strategic goals. The results have spearheaded program improvements, expansion, and more efficient partner collaboration. As a new member organization in the Catalogue of Philanthropy Community, I’ll use this blog post to share some of One World Education’s goals for long-term success and sustainability.

First, schools had asked OWEd about offering more in-school, professional development (PD). We realized that a higher quality of writing was coming from students whose teachers had participated in our trainings. In response, OWEd developed a Teacher Trainer Academy where our educator team trains a teacher from each partner school. These teachers then lead OWEd’s PD in their own schools – creating leadership opportunities, fostering collaboration, and ensuring program expertise exists in each partner school.

Second, OWEd needed to change its partnership model to be more effective. This year the organization transitioned from working with individual schools to working with school districts and Charter school networks. For the 2013-2014 school year, OWEd partnered with DC Public Schools (DCPS) to implement a citywide, high school writing program. Every 9th and 10th grade DCPS student and teacher has the opportunity to participate in the One World Writing Program this year.

OWEd’s third goal was to deepen its commitment to evaluation. With the DCPS partnership in place, OWEd needed a strong evaluation partner to assess our work with 3,500 DCPS high school students and their teachers. This summer, OWEd contracted the Trachtenberg School of Public Policy and Public Administration at George Washington University to lead this citywide evaluation.

The importance of having a strong, long-term plan is often overlooked in the face of short-term gains. As OWEd programs have demonstrated the ability to create successful teaching and learning experiences in classrooms, the organization was also successful in accomplishing its own goals over the past year. I want to thank those of you who have been a part of this accomplishment.

Thank you for your commitment to education and philanthropy.

To learn more about One World Education, please visit, www.oneworldeducation.org and keep up with Eric’s monthly blog here.

Guest Post: ArtStream

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Today we’re delighted to have a post from Patricia Woolsey, Executive Director of ArtStream, Inc., about their Allies in the Arts program at Walter Reed Medical Center, in honor of Veterans Day earlier this week. ArtStream, Inc. provides specialized arts opportunities to people who often lack access to the many benefits of arts involvement. Serving the greater Washington region and the Raleigh-Durham area of North Carolina, ArtStream supports people who are dealing with a variety of life challenges, including those with intellectual, developmental, and physical disabilities; youth who are adopted or in foster care; children and adults in hospital and hospice settings; individuals and families who are bereaved; wounded military personnel, veterans, and their families; and senior citizens.

by Patricia Woolsey, Executive Director

In honor of Veterans Day, I want to tell you about ArtStream’s Allies in the Arts Program at the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center. ArtStream was founded on our belief in the healing power of the arts, and we take our programs into the community where the need is. Wounded servicemen and women can’t come to us, so ArtStream artists go to Walter Reed two evenings per week to work with wounded service members, their families, and caregivers.

Some patients love a visit from Jude, a musician. Others prefer writing with Roseanne or storytelling with Ermyn. Still others enjoy making things with Nancy, a visual artist. One of the highlights of my job as Executive Director of ArtStream is reading the artists’ reports of their work at Walter Reed.

For example, musician Jude Crannitch writes:

“I played/demonstrated harmonica techniques to one patient — how to bend notes, breathing techniques, single note isolation, music theory-chord structure, keys — all in response to his questions. I played Rev. Gary Davis’ You Gotta Move, with and without guitar accompaniment. The patient showed me a bracelet with the names of his buddies who had died and described his vision of honoring and consolidating their memory and presence through mastery of the harmonica. He told me he was “shaky” before I came, about his surgery in the morning, but was empowered and focused by the visit.”

Storyteller Ermyn King works with words instead of music.

“The patient was cringing, wincing, and moaning with nerve pain in his injured leg, yet he welcomed the Allies arts session in determination to use it for pain distraction. He chose to work with the magnetic poetry board and “Healing Words.” After concentrating on this and maneuvering words on the magnetic slate, he said that the set didn’t have the words needed to express his thoughts and feelings adequately. I quickly gave him a tablet of paper and pencil so he could use all the words that he needed. He poignantly expressed the guilt that he feels in having survived the attack that killed three of his comrades. He said he feels this guilt “every second of every day.”

We are so grateful to be part of the Artist-in-Residence Program at Walter Reed and proud to be on the cutting edge of the “Arts in Healthcare” movement. ArtStream’s work at Walter Reed is featured as a model program in The National Initiative for Arts & Health in the Military’s report, Arts, Health and Well-Being across the Military Continuum: White Paper and Framing a National Plan for Action, presented to every member of Congress before Veterans Day.

The paper is a result of a growing number of military leaders recognizing that art helps heal the wounds so prevalent in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan: traumatic brain injury, post-traumatic stress, depression, and lost limbs. Fortunately, they also understand that artists have expertise and training worth investing in. At the moment, ArtStream supports this program entirely, but one of the findings of the report is that a public/private partnership benefits the military, artists, and the community. “Today, with only 1% of our population in the military, many individuals have no connection to the military yet are concerned and eager to help,” said Judy Rollins, lead writer.

Community support is important to the seriously wounded servicemen and women we work with. Many of them are very young, yet have given so much. Their lives are changed forever in ways that can’t always be expressed in words or treated with medicine. We are honored to share the healing power of the arts with them.

To learn more about ArtStream and the Allies in the Arts program, visit our website at: www.art-stream.org.

Guest Post: Yellow Ribbon Fund

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In honor of Veterans Day, we welcome the Yellow Ribbon Fund to GoodWorks. While Walter Reed National Military Medical Center and Ft. Belvoir Community Hospital provide world-class medical care for gravely wounded service members, the Yellow Ribbon Fund provides the programs that make daily life more manageable for the wounded and their family caregivers. YRF serves over 1,000 soldiers and their families annually through practical, hands-on assistance during recovery at the hospital, and ongoing support during reintegration to civilian life back home.

by Kristin Henderson
Communications Director, YRF

It’s Veterans Day again, a time to honor and thank those who’ve served in uniform. Be sure to thank the families, too. Every week, we hear stories like this one from the injured service members and families we serve:

“The Yellow Ribbon Fund took care of us when no one else would. I arrived at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center on a weekend to greet my wounded husband, with a newborn son and 3-year-old daughter in tow. No one is in the offices there on the weekends and my kids desperately needed a place to rest other than the hospital. YRF paid for our hotel room for those first few nights until the Army had cut us orders to stay at the hotel on base. Later in my husband’s recovery, when he could leave the hospital, they took us to baseball games. This seems inconsequential but it gave our entire family a break from the hospital environment. It made our daughter feel special and let us smile and laugh together. We’re eternally grateful for that. Our daughter’s best Walter Reed memories are going with the Yellow Ribbon Fund to see the Nationals play. And my husband’s first solo trip without me was on a Yellow Ribbon Fund tour of a battlefield. That trip gave him confidence that he could do some things on his own despite his physical limitations. Yellow Ribbon Fund provides not just assistance for wounded warrior families, but they build hope as well.

Through the Yellow Ribbon Fund, our supporters are able to offer real thanks to injured service members and their families for their sacrifices. Since 2005, we’ve been listening to what the injured and their family caregivers tell us they need. Then we fill those gaps in support with practical help for the whole family, because when the service member is wounded, the whole family is wounded. Our focus on the family sets us apart, especially the services we pioneered for family caregivers — mostly moms and wives who sacrifice jobs and put their lives on hold to help care for their injured loved ones. It can take years to recover from a devastating combat injury. Family caregivers are truly America’s unsung heroes.

So while injured troops are recovering at Walter Reed and Fort Belvoir Community Hospital, YRF provides free rental cars, taxi rides, hotel stays, and apartments for visiting family members. We arrange for family-friendly activities and stress-relieving massages for the family caregivers. We organize more than 100 social events and outings yearly for the injured and their families, including free tickets to sporting and cultural events. These events and outings nurture family relationships during a difficult time. We also offer career and education mentoring. Even after they return to their hometowns, our nationwide network of volunteers continues to provide practical support.

The needs of our injured heroes and their families will go on long after the wars are over. But with the help of our donors and volunteers, we will ensure they don’t fall through the gaps. We’ll keep on saying thank you in ways that make a real difference.

Learn more or get involved at: www.yellowribbonfund.org

Guest Post: The Barker Foundation

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November is National Adoption Month! Today we’re excited to have a guest post from The Barker Foundation, whose mission is to serve all members of the adoption circle – birth parents, adoptive parents, adopted persons, and anyone whose life is touched by adoption. A licensed adoption agency serving DC, Maryland and Virginia, The Barker Foundation supports teens and women as they consider an adoption plan, places infants and children with carefully selected, local adoptive families, and provides lifelong support and education to all adopted persons.

Reflections by Beverly Clarke

Director, Project Wait No Longer

I have 9 year old twins who are full of questions, and we are always discussing new words and looking up definitions on-line. Recently, we were looking up the definition for the word “inspiration.” There were many definitions, but the ones that I felt most drawn to were “divine influence exerted directly on the mind and soul of humankind” or “to spur on, impel, energize or motivate.” My kids began making up sentences based on this new found understanding of the word and all the things that are “inspirational” in the life of a 9 year old. My favorites were “I am inspired to eat my broccoli so that I can have a brownie,” or “I am inspired to read three books so that I can watch an episode of Scooby-Doo.” Listening to them was entertaining but also got me thinking about what inspires me.

I realized that I am fortunate to feel inspired on a daily basis while working with Project Wait No Longer, Barker’s older child adoption program. I am inspired by the children and teenagers that still have the audacity to hope for a forever family even after surviving years of abuse and neglect at the hands of adults. I am amazed when I see them begin to break down their protective walls, change their behaviors, and develop trust for the members of their new families. I am inspired by the parents who come to our program, determined to provide loving and stable homes for older children who oftentimes don’t know how to be a part of a family – by the families that stick it out, even when the going gets unbearably tough.

This is what drives me to work harder every day to find placements for older children who are often languishing within the foster care system. The needs of the children weigh on my mind and soul, inspiring me and the amazing team in PWNL to be a part of the solution.

Recently, I had the pleasure of helping to facilitate the placement of a little guy (Bobby) who is 10 years old into the home of Sue and John. Bobby has been doing really well with his new family, but has come from a long history of being rejected by former caretakers, so making the leap to calling Sue and John “mom” and “dad” has been really hard. Last week my phone rang, and John was on the line. I was surprised to hear from him because Sue (the more emotional one of the pair) is usually the one who calls me. In a very excited voice, John said to me, “Bev, something pretty cool happened. Bobby was talking about me to one of his friends, and I overheard him call me “dad.” This is the first time he has ever done that! Isn’t that great?” Through the phone I could hear the pride, joy and excitement in John’s voice. After several months of patient and consistent love, his son has begun to claim him as “dad.” This is what we work for at Barker. These are the true moments of inspiration.

Beverly Clarke, LCSW-C, LICSW is the Director of Project Wait No Longer at the Barker Foundation. For more information on our work, visit us at: www.barkerfoundation.org.

 

Guest Post: Girls on the Run

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Today’s post comes from Girls on the Run – DC whose program teaches over 2,000 girls in DC’s eight wards about self-esteem and healthy living through running.

by Kelsey Lyle, Program Coordinator GOTR-DC

“My daughter, who usually complains about walking even a few blocks, came home last week after running almost 2 miles and was so energized and proud of herself that she asked to run around our block a few times. Running a 5K seemed impossible to her when she started, but now she’s figured out that she can run further and longer than she ever knew. I’m looking forward to an improved outlook on fitness, which I hope will serve her throughout her life.” – Dawn, GOTR-DC Parent of 3rd Grader

This is one of many stories that parents of Girls on the Run DC participants can tell. Girls on the Run DC is an afterschool program that inspires girls to be joyful, healthy and confident using a fun, experience-based curriculum which creatively integrates running. The program takes place over the course of 10 weeks and concludes with a 5k event to celebrate the hard work and accomplishments of the girls in the program.

Our volunteer coaches are the key ingredient to our success as an organization. Volunteer coaches empower girls to appreciate who they are and encourage them to take on a healthy lifestyle. They are what make the program happen- a role that is a blend of teacher, mentor, and friend. Each practice session offers a lesson on topics that include peer pressure, self-esteem, cooperation, and more. In addition to running during practice, the girls are asked to give a thoughtful reflection to the topic of the day. At the end of the program, each team creates and completes a community service project.

This Fall season Girls on the Run DC is in more than 50 schools and has over 70 Girls on the Run teams. Each year we serve over 2,000 girls in the DC metropolitan area. Approximately 60% of our sites receive scholarships, and we, as an organization, fundraise on their behalf.

We rely on volunteers to assist with many different aspects of our organization. We need over 200 volunteers to make our November 24th race day possible. If you would like to help out with Girls on the Run 5K as a race day volunteer please sign up on our website: http://www.gotrdc.org/get-involved/volunteer.

Find out more about Girls on the Run DC at our website, or Like us on Facebook!

photo: Emily Weiss (emilyweissphotography.com)