Columbus Foundation Fellowship Programs

As I continue my evaluation research with three additional site visits this past week, I have been thinking about how I will later frame all of this information in a convincing and compelling way to justify the funding of AmeriCorps VISTA Summer Associates. I happened to just finish the book Made to Stick by Chip & Dan Heath, which explains why some ideas persist throughout time, while others aren’t remembered after 10 minutes. Hoping to be bring this core idea of future funding for Summer Associates to the attention of key stakeholders and to stick, I’m trying my best to keep these tips in mind as I begin to analyze and write about the data that I am collecting. Getting an idea to stick and last the audience must: pay attention, understand and remember, agree or believe, care, and be able to act on it. A large majority of the book is spent explaining how to do exactly do all of that, and is explained through the acronym SUCCESs.

SUCCESs

1. Simple: Find the core of an idea and make that most important. People remember simple, they don’t necessarily remember details.
2. Unexpected: Get attention the attention of the audience; create a sense of surprise and hold attention by creating interest in the idea.
3. Concrete: Help people understand and remember the idea by framing an intangible or ambiguous concept into a concrete example,
4. Credible: Help people believe by showing credibility of source. Using an anti authority, qualifying with details and statistics, and having an extraordinary example.
5. Emotional: Make people care. Tapping into existing emotion (using associations), fighting semantic stretch (the change of word connotation or meaning with over-use), appealing to self-interest, and appealing to identity are a few ways to add the emotional component to presenting an idea.
6. Stories: Get people to act; “a story is powerful because it provides the context missing from abstract prose.” We want an un-passive audience.

Beyond that, the book also focuses on the ‘Curse of Knowledge’, which is knowing things that others don’t know, and not remembering what it’s like not to know those things. It’s a curse because you are not able to explain the idea clearly in a way that those who don’t know will understand, and from the beginning the Curse of Knowledge causes an idea to fizzle out quicker than birthday candles at a 6th birthday party; no one would be able to even understand what you are talking about!

While my little synopsis does not do the book and concepts therein justice, I do think that for my project it will be very useful as I will need to frame my information, ideas, and suggestions in such a way that the audience will be able to understand, remember, and most importantly want to act. I’ll need to really hone in on the emotional realm of an idea, and pull on the stakeholders’ heart strings. Also creating a story by putting my information into a narrative form that really focuses on individual experiences will greatly help with encouraging action. The book quotes Mother Theresa, who said, “If I look at the mass, I will never act. If I look at the one, I will.”  I will want to keep that in mind and really show how each Summer Associate impacts the operations of the Summer Feeding Program that it serves and, hopefully this will add the emotional component that will cause action.

I hope everyone has a good week!

Melissa

It has been a long time since a blog post for me–I’m sorry!  For the past 3 weeks we have been working on our biannual event at AIDS Resource Center Ohio, Art for Life, and it has been insane.  We are drowning in pieces of art at our warehouse and office.  It is also really cool :)!

Since I’ve come on board at ARC Ohio, I have cold called artists, tracked down a few of my own, managed an auction submission data base, arranged art, and taken so many pictures.  I have also seen the future layout of our event at the Columbus Museum of Art–it is going to be a beautiful evening! Overall, it has been a lot of fun!  I have never been a huge visual arts person (music has been where my strengths lie), but  I have grown to appreciate the process of creating a piece of art and, of course, the final product.  It has also been really awesome to match names to faces and titles to pieces after looking at spreadsheets and databases for so long.

This Friday we will be having our jury select what pieces will go to the live and silent auction; so after weeks of gathering art we will finally known which will be in the event.  It is a really great feeling to see an event come together that I have been a part of.

Below I have the link to our event page.  I think it will draw art lovers; supports of AIDS prevention, advocacy, and care; and those who are active in their Columbus community.  More or less, any and all are welcome and it is definitely an event to check out and track!

artforlifecolumbus.org

–Katie

I was able to help strengthen our existing social enterprise, Street Speech, by making a Secret Shopper Survey.  This survey will involve trained volunteers going out in the community where the vendors sell their papers and interacting with them.  The two reasons we are doing this is to make sure that the vendors are adhering to the Code of Conduct because we have received complaints from companies about inappropriate behaviors and to determine the level of sales professionalism.  Ultimately, we could use this information to help establish grants.  For example, 90 percent of our vendors were able to successfully explain Street Speech to customers.

This week I went to Dogwood Glen, a supportive housing unit funded by the Community Housing Network.  Since one of the workers at the Columbus Coalition for the Homeless (CCH) is a resident manager there he gave us a tour.  It was a real nice facility that allows individuals in Franklin County with severe and persistent mental health issues live independently.   Unfortunately, the waitlist is closed.  However, I would like to thank the Columbus Foundation for funding it.  Photo attached.

CCH had their monthly board meeting this week.  We discussed the long wait list for individuals to get into the shelter.  Earlier this week the number was close to 100 individuals actively seeking to get into shelter and being denied.  Since part of our mission is to “…advocate on behalf of homeless persons and organizations that serve them” we felt that it is necessary to attend a Columbus City Council meeting and express our concern.  The City is one of the funders to the Community Shelter Board, which funds the shelters in Franklin County.   Therefore, members from the CCH and I will be informing the city council members on Monday evening that more money needs to be allocated to building additional shelters.

David

Working for Local Matters has made me realize the breadth of the organization’s influence. There are so many arms within the organization that I can hardly believe it functions as smoothly as it does. As a result of the different programs that Local Matters orchestrates, there are gardens around the city, classes about cooking and nutrition and smart grocery shopping, grocery distribution programs in underserved neighborhoods, and so much more. Not to mention the Local Matters bumper stickers that I see plastered on cars around the city every day or the inevitable presence of a Local Matters table with volunteers and literature about local foods at any food-centered event.

Hard as it may be to believe, Local Matters’ presence is about to become even more apparent as LOCAL FOODS WEEK approaches! I love Local Foods Week. I mean, I LOVE it. The past two years, I haven’t had any affiliation with Local Matters (other than as an occasional volunteer), but I still attended the Local Foods Week events like it was my job. Local Foods Week is a city-wide celebration of local foods, intended to raise awareness about food issues and cultivate community. From the Eat Local Challenge to the Grilled Cheese Throwdown to burrito rolling contests to cooking classes, there’s guaranteed to be an event to please everyone who cares about food in the slightest.

This year, Local Foods Week is from August 11-19, and it’s going to be bigger than ever. Crave Magazine is having their farm-to-plate week, Whole Foods is focusing on local foods, and Dinin’ Hall is serving dishes made from local foods during the same time period in order to spread the fun city-wide. It’s impossible for me to pick one event that I’m most excited for, but one that stands out as especially creative is the Queen of the Sun screening that will occur at Jorgensen Farm on Thursday, August 16th at 7:00 pm. Here’s the official blurb for the event:

“Spend an evening with the honeybees at Jorgensen Farm, presented by Edible Columbus and Whole Foods Market. Val Jorgensen will start the night with a talk about beekeeping at 7:00pm, Edible Columbus and Whole foods will provide honey and snacks while we screen the documentary “Queen of the Sun,” inside the barn at 8. Suggested donation of $5 will go to The Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation to protect wildlife through the conservation of invertebrates and their habitat. The Society advocates on behalf of bees and other pollinators by publishing research, lobbying lawmakers and educating land stewards to restore the landscape for the benefit of pollinators. Space limited to 50 guests, reserve your space at ediblecolumbus.com see the movie trailer at queenofthesun.com.”

                If that doesn’t sound like an enriching experience, then check out http://local-matters.org/local-foods-week to see what else will be going on. Join in on the local foods fun – the entire city will be there!

Great news… the Homeless Families Foundation has a new website! Check it out to learn more about all of the work that is being done to assist families and children. Warning: You will be inspired to help out!

Tomorrow night will be “One Wild Night” at the Columbus zoo! This is the Homeless Families Foundation’s 25th Anniversary culmination event where generous donors will be recognized for their support of HFF’s important work. I’m excited to help out at the event in appreciation and recognition of everything that has been accomplished here over the past 25 years!

This past week has included a wide variety of tasks and experiences… I partnered with HFF case workers to collect the home schools of our current families. This was not a quick task in that it included talking to case workers, calling clients, and going out to see clients in their homes. I was surprised to learn that some parents are not sure where their children will attend school next month. For some families, this is a time of intense transition and they have more immediate and pressing concerns to address.

After thinking about it more, I realized it should not have been surprising that some parents are uncertain about where their children will go to school. But this does provide an example of the challenges surrounding my transportation study. Homeless and at-risk children can experience frequent changes in their home addresses as well as their schools. So a transportation plan needs to be flexible; frequent changes should be anticipated.

I’ve also continued to: develop online maps and routes, reach out to area non-profits, learn about child transportation regulations, and solidify costs of a variety of transportation options. And I’ve been working to document all of my work and findings in a PowerPoint file. This has been helpful in allowing me to see where my transportation study stands and where I should focus my efforts over the next 4 weeks.

So there are a plethora of little things that have sparked my interests, touched my heart, teased my brain, and comforted my soul since the last time I blogged, and since I can’t think of just one thing, I will ask of thee to pardon my scattered thoughts and hopefully find something that you can relate to or find inspirational as well.

1) I’ve said it before, but I’ll say it again: Every little good thing is worth celebrating. This is the number one thing I’ve learned this Summer and have been reminded of this simple yet so unconventional concept every day of our Summer Learning Academy. These elementary students with Down syndrome may not perform academically like the way most of us did when we were learning to read and perform math, but it seems like I’m the one learning from them. Every time we get an answer right (and I say we, because it feels like it is an accomplishment for both of us and I am rooting so hard for these kids), we do high-fives, say “yayyyy” or put a sticker on our sticker chart. It has never been so fun to learn, these kids are so excited, and it’s a reaction I’ve brought into my own life. Last night, I was putting together a puzzle. I do this a lot, as it is a hobby of mine, but this time was different. Every time I got a piece of the puzzle to fit into place, I caught myself saying (in a dramatically high-pitched voice for a grown man like me) “yayyyyyyy….” It was SO MUCH FUN!!!

2) Don’t take for granted how much people in your life want you to succeed. I can’t say that when I was in grades 1-4 that I recognized my teachers wanted so badly for me to learn the class curriculum, develop social skills, and improve my behavior. In fact, they wanted me to succeed so badly, they put up with a whole classroom of us for 9 months out of the year! Now, we didn’t have Down syndrome students in my class, but I can’t truthfully say I outbehaved these youngsters.

3) I won’t make for a good teacher for the developmentally disabled. No sir. The patience our SLA teachers have is amazing. The creativity needed to maintain the kid’s attention is impressive. To our teachers out there, I salute you. To our parents out there, I salute you, too. But if you want someone to play tag with your kiddo, or go on a bear hunt with him/her (we must have don this 5 of our 7 days, it’s an interactive story with motions and music played on a cd), I’m your man.

4) Columbus is awesome. It is hip. It is fun, innovative, creative. It is sporty (well, thanks to my Buckeyes) and it is smart. It has a great future because of some great businesses, some fantastic leaders, and people who really buy into the heart of the heartland of America. Our population is booming, our business is zooming, and greatness is looming. Thank you Leadership Columbus for your vision and dedication to my favorite city in the world. And thank you Columbus Foundation for everything. I love you. The end.

As a future social worker I have been told how this profession is susceptible to burn out.  This week I was tested with some tough situations.  Firstly I was faced with a homeless woman sleeping at the front entrance of our building.  Even though I told her about the shelter and food resources available she later came back to the office before I left to go home.  Secondly, an intern and I went up to a woman in a nearby park after we noticed she had been sitting there all week.  She explained to us how she was kicked out of Rebecca’s Place, a women’s shelter, and had no where to go.  We called the central point of access to see the shelter availability, but they were all full.  Though it can be easy to be frustrated with the system and the inability to really help someone I need to be able to keep these issues at work.

I have had troubles initially asking people for money to fund my programs.  While the Cramer and Associates presentation taught us how to build donor relationships, I am still finding it hard to ask people to support our programs.  I need to be able to sell our programs to people, who may know nothing about social services and may not even care.  Does anyone have advice or past experience with development?

This week I wrote an article about the effects of family homelessness on children.  I wrote what Columbus is doing and what they still need to do.  I visited the YWCA Family Center and talked with a child advocate and a family receiving services.  The center offered a wide range of services for the children including: a playground, summer camps, trips to COSI, gardening.  I also talked about opening up more family shelters and discussed the new Kinship Program.  This article will be in the new Street Speech edition starting July 20^th.  Buy a copy for a $1 to read it while supporting the homeless individuals who sell them.

David