Human Service Newsbytes: March 16, 2007

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Human Service Newsbytes

March 16, 2007

New Look and Format for Human Service Newsbytes
You will notice some changes to this e-newsletter. We’ve removed most of the graphics and added more news and resources of interest to the nonprofit human services community. We will soon launch a new monthly member update that will include National Assembly news related to our initiatives, business partners, and peer networks. In the meantime, you can access the latest Assembly information on our Web site at www.nassembly.org.

Increase in Boomer Volunteering and Turnover
The surge of Baby Boomers will increase volunteering by older adults by 50 percent by the year 2020, according to a report and projections released by the Corporation for National and Community Service. The report also finds that three out of every ten Boomer volunteers choose not to volunteer in the following year. It outlines key characteristics that lead to greater retention and advised nonprofit organizations to re-imagine roles for older volunteers. For more information, click here.

State-by-State Look at Uninsured Children
New research by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation shows that, since 1997, employer offers of health insurance to parents with lower incomes have fallen three times as fast as offers to parents who earn more money. The report also provides details about uninsured children in every state. Many uninsured children would likely be eligible for free or low-cost insurance coverage through the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP), which Congress is set to reauthorize this year. For more information, click here.

Foundation Support for Most Program Areas Continued to Rise In 2005
Foundation giving for most program areas grew in 2005, and funders increased the number of exceptionally large grants they awarded, according to the 2007 edition of the Foundation Center’s Foundation Giving Trends: Update on Funding Priorities. The share of grant dollars allocated to capital projects rose, following five consecutive years of decline. Children and youth accounted for the largest share of grant dollars and grants in 2005, while funding for the economically disadvantaged declined to $2.6 billion, down from a record $3.1 billion in 2004. For more information, click here.

Supporting Clients’ Civic Participation
A new report from the Alliance for Children and Families describes the experiences of six human service organizations that supported their client-constituents in community problem solving, issue education, legislative training, and dialogues with public officials. The report also provides an analysis of various models used to support civic engagement and lessons learned. For more information, click here.

Financing Mental Health Services for Children Exposed to Trauma
The Finance Project recently produced two publications that provide relevant and up-to-date information on federal funding sources and promising strategies to finance mental health supports and services for children and adolescents exposed to traumatic life events. Thinking Broadly: Financing Strategies for Child Traumatic Stress Initiatives presents a conceptual framework and a set of approaches that initiative leaders can implement to provide comprehensive and coordinated trauma supports and services. For more information, click here. To access the second report, Finding Funding: A Guide to Federal Sources for Child Traumatic Stress and Other Trauma-Focused Initiatives, click here.

Film Premiere for Blind and Visually Impaired Community
On March 6, Jim Stovall, the author of the best-selling novel The Ultimate Gift, partnered with organizations that aid the blind, including the American Foundation for the Blind, to premiere the movie based on his book for an audience of blind and visually impaired persons. This was the first time this audience has been invited to view a movie prior to its release to the general public, according to Stovall, who also co-founded the Narrative Television Network (NTN). NTN makes movies and television programs accessible to blind and visually impaired persons with the addition of a narrative, or descriptive, sound track. For more information about the premiere, click here. The National Collaboration for Youth’s F.I.L.M. (Finding Inspiration in Literature and Movies) Project has developed a program around the movie for youth ages 12-18. For more information, click here.

Resources Highlight Benefits of and Support for Kinship Families
A new fact sheet from the Center for Law and Social Policy (CLASP) addresses whether kinship care is a good thing and how we know this. More than 2.5 million children are being raised by grandparents and other relatives because their parents are unable, for a variety of reasons, to care for them. For more information, click here. The AARP Foundation has launched a new customized version of the National Council on Aging's BenefitsCheckUp to help grandparents raising grandchildren access public benefits that can help cover grandchildren’s health care and other expenses. For more information, click here.

Campaign Launched to Improve Older Americans’ Health and Well-Being
CVS/pharmacy and the National Council on Aging (NCOA) announced the Prescription for Better Health campaign to provide health education, information on prevention, and access to benefits in nearly 6,200 CVS/pharmacy stores nationwide as well as in the community through NCOA's nationwide network of community based organizations. For more information, click here.

Strategies for Communicating Youth Issues
The Forum for Youth Investment, along with Voices for America's Children and Kids Count, recently presented a conference call for youth advocates on communications and messaging. Speakers discussed framing, examples of successful and unsuccessful youth communications campaigns, and a recent study of the attitudes of Minnesota citizens and parents toward youth and youth programs and how to increase their support for positive youth development programs. To read a summary or listen to a recording of the call, click here.

National Collaboration for Youth Appropriations Priorities

The National Collaboration for Youth has distributed to lawmakers requests for Fiscal Year 2008 appropriations funding priorities for the following federal programs: 21st Century Community Learning Centers, Federal Youth Development Council, Learn and Serve America, Mentoring, Runaway and Homeless Youth Act, Safe & Drug Free Schools, Workforce Investment Act Youth Activities, Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act, and Violence Against Women Act Youth Programs. To review the detailed rationale and funding requests, click here.

Senate Budget Committee Sends Resolution to the Floor

The Senate Budget Committee, on a party line vote, passed the Fiscal Year 2008 Budget Resolution on March 15 and it is anticipated that the Senate will take up the measure on the floor the week of March 19. The resolution reinstates pay-as-you-go rules, fully funds the administration’s defense budget and rejects cuts in domestic spending, increasing funds for education, State Children’s Health Insurance and veteran’s health care. These increases amount to a very modest sum over enacted spending for FY 2007. For both Democratic and Republican statements on the Senate Budget Resolution, copy of the Chairman’s Mark, and other information, click here.

How Children Fare in the Federal Budget

The Urban Institute, with support from the Annie E. Casey Foundation and First Focus, has released Kids’ Share 2007, an analysis of federal spending on children and youth from 1960 - 2006. The report examines spending in the areas of income security, nutrition, housing, tax credits and exemptions, health, social services, education and training. This historical assessment of federal funding reveals that programs that help our nation’s young people are a diminishing portion of domestic spending, particularly because they are not indexed to grow with either the economy or inflation. For more information, click here. First Focus has prepared a brief which summarizes the Urban Institute report and includes recommendations for Congress. For more information, click here.

Award for Community Dropout Prevention Efforts
Deadline: March 31, 2007
The 2007 Civic Change Award, sponsored by the Pew Partnership for Civic Change, recognizes an individual or organization utilizing community resources to help keep young people in school. For more information, click here.

Grants for Service-Learning Projects

National Crime Prevention Council (NCPC)
Deadline: April 1, 2007
Grants of up to $500 support youth-led service-learning projects that address crime, violence, or drug abuse in a school or community for National & Global Youth Service Day, April 20-22, 2007. For more information, click here.

Project Learning Tree (PLT)
Deadline: April 30, 2007
GreenWorks! grants up to $5,000 fund “learning-by-doing” environmental neighborhood improvement projects that partner PLT educators and their students with local businesses or community organizations. For more information, click here.

Funding for Early Childhood Services
Deadline: April 13, 2007
The U.S. Department of Education, Office of Safe and Drug-Free Schools’ Foundations for Learning program offers grants for projects that facilitate access by eligible children and
their families to the services available through community resources, including mental health, physical health, substance abuse, educational, domestic violence prevention, child welfare, and social services. For more information, click here.

Award for Programs that Advance Employment of People with Disabilities
Deadline: April 30, 2007
The 2007 Secretary of Labor's New Freedom Initiative Award recognizes public-private partnerships and programs that have had a positive impact on the employment of people with disabilities through access to assistive technologies, the use of innovative training, and hiring and retention techniques. It also recognizes organizations, businesses, or individuals who develop comprehensive strategies to enhance the ability of Americans with disabilities to enter and advance within the workforce of the twenty-first century. For more information, click here.

Awards for Young Social Entrepreneurs
Deadline: May 15, 2007
YouthActionNet Awards are given annually to 20 young people aged 18-29 who are working to bring positive social change to their community. Applicants should be founders of existing projects/organizations, or leading a project within an organization. In addition to $500, recipients participate in a week-long capacity building workshop in Washington, DC. For more information, click here.

Grants for Reading, Arts, and Family Violence Prevention Programs
Deadline: May 31, 2007
Target Local Store Grants fund programs that encourage young children, ages birth through nine, to read together with their families; local art activities such as cultural festivals and free outdoor concerts; and programs such as family counseling and parenting classes that help prevent family violence. For more information, click here.

Funding for Projects to Improve the Health of Vulnerable People
Deadline: July 10, 2007
The Local Initiative Funding Partners Program is a partnership program between the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) and local grantmakers to fund promising, original projects to significantly improve the health of vulnerable people in their communities. Projects must be new, innovative, collaborative and community-based, and must be nominated by a local grantmaker interested in participating as one of the funding partners. Up to 14 matching grants of $200,000 to $500,000 per project will be awarded. For more information, click here.

Funding for Projects Benefiting Women and Girls

Open Meadows Foundation
Deadline: August 15, 2007
The Open Meadows Foundation offers grants of up to $2,000 each for projects that are designed and implemented by women and girls; reflect the diversity of the community served by the project in both its leadership and organization; promote building community power; promote racial, social, economic, and environmental justice; and have limited financial access or have encountered obstacles in their search for funding. Small and start-up organizations with budgets of less than $150,000 are strongly encouraged to apply. For more information, click here.

WHO Foundation: Women Helping Others
Deadline: September 11, 2007
The WHO Foundation supports projects and programs that address the health, education, and social service needs of women and children. Preference will be given to organizations with an operating budget of $3 million or less, those not dependent on government grants, and those with greater program than personnel costs. For more information, click here.

Trainings & Events

National Professional Social Work Month
March 2007

F.I.L.M. Institute Online
National Collaboration for Youth F.I.L.M. Project

Media Literacy Webinars Held Throughout the Week at Various Times
March 26-30, 2007

Meeting the Employment and Parenting Needs of Low-Income Families - Web Conference
Chapin Hall Center for Children

March 27, 2007
1:00 PM - 2:00 PM (Eastern time)

National and Global Youth Service Day
Youth Service America

April 20-22, 2007

Cover the Uninsured Week 2007
Robert Wood Johnson Foundation
April 23-29, 2007

Afterschool for All Challenge
Afterschool Alliance

April 23, 24, 2007

America’s Promise Alliance Regional Forums
June 14-15, 2007, Houston, TX
July 31-Aug. 1, 2007, Nashville, TN

Conferences

National Afterschool Conference
Presented by the National Afterschool Association
March 21-23, 2007
Phoenix, AZ

CORE National Conference
March 25-27
Philadelphia, PA
www.residentialeducation.org

YouthBuild Transformation Institute
April 17-19, 2007
Rodondo Beach, CA

Lutheran Services in America 2007 Annual Conference
Milestones & Stepping Stones – 10th Anniversary
April 18-20, 2007
Baltimore, MD

Child Indicators: Diverse Approaches to a Shared Goal

International Society for Child Indicators and Chapin Hall Center for Children

June 26-28, 2007

Chicago, IL

Alliance for Nonprofit Management Annual Conference
July 18-20, 2007
Atlanta, GA

Generations United 14th International Conference
Intergenerational: IT'S MONUMENTAL
July 24-27, 2007
Washington, DC

National Urban League Annual Conference
July 25-28, 2007
St. Louis, MO

CLICK HERE to post your organization's conference dates on the National Assembly's Web site; click on "Add Your Own Event," and follow the instructions.

Please e-mail david@nassembly.org with your news, events, and suggestions for Human Service Newsbytes.

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