Letter from the President and CEO

New Urban Institute Study of DC OST Programs to Measure Outcomes

Trust Partners Make Science and Math Fun After School

Mark Your Calendars: Grantee Convening to be Held October 26-27

The Trust Created New Categories for DC OST Grants for FY 2011

Ellen London

School has started and that means many Trust grantees are beginning their work with thousands of young people after school.

The Trust is committed  to supporting its grantees not just with funding but also with training and resources. To that end, we are hosting our second all-grantee convening the last week of October. Many of the sessions at this year’s conference, entitled Getting Back to “Why,” will explore the positive youth development approach that the Trust tries to foster in the programs it supports. The two-day conference is open to all providers, including non-grantees. Please join us and register here by October 20.

On October 21, the Trust will participate in “Lights On Afterschool!” to raise awareness among local policymakers about the importance of afterschool programs. Young people from afterschool programs we support will make the case directly to their council members and local policymakers about the importance of after-school programs at the DC City Council chambers. This event is one of 7,500 across the country occurring that day as part of the 11th annual “Lights On Afterschool,” celebrating the importance of afterschool programs and sponsored by the Afterschool Alliance, a national nonprofit advocacy organization.

Thanks to Comcast Newsmakers for airing a recent segment about these events and the work the Trust is doing to offer high-quality afterschool programs in the District to improve outcomes for young people.

The six-month study involved 27 Trust grantees and tracked more than 800 youth in the pilot.  At least five key findings emerged from this six-month pilot program:

• Technical ability varied greatly among participants.

• Providing technical assistance was critical to the success of the pilot.

• Prior experience with outcome measurement led to different needs and expectations about training materials.

The report also made several recommendations about to help nonprofits build their capacity to collect and measure outcomes data.

“The results of this pilot reflect a great beginning,” the report said. “Community-based groups serving the District’s children and youth are clearly receptive and eager to learn. The challenge ahead will be to expand this work to all OST programs in the District and beyond. What is needed is a carefully structured training and technical assistance program to ensure that these skills become infused into the culture of nonprofit organizations so programs can measure their results, adjust their activities if needed, and achieve favorable outcomes for youth.”

To read a brief about the pilot project, click here.

As America’s students lag in math and science when compared to peers around the world, the Trust has made it a priority to turn kids on to those subjects – after school outside of a regular classroom. In September, the Trust partnered with Afterschool KidzScience from the U.C. Berkley’s Lawrence Hall of Science and the Developmental Studies Center to work with DC kids on engaging in the joys of scientific inquiry. The Trust also worked with the National Science and Technology Partnership to offer middle and high school students free, online math homework help from math whizzes from the National Math Honors Society. And connecting with the new National Law Enforcement Museum, the Trust helped it pilot its forensics activity to middle school students from the Trust grantee after-school programs.

It was also a STEM summer for the Trust. Back in June, Trust grantee Beacon House hosted a training session featuring Great Science for Girls, a project of AED’s Educational Equity Center. During the session, Maryann Stimmer, one of the curriculum’s creators, and her colleague, Ben Dworken, demonstrated fun scientific projects. They were training a group of professional youth workers, who will teach the activities they learned to young science-minded students. The experiment can be seen on the Trust’s recent STEM episode of “School’s Out!”
 

Mark Your Calendars: Grantee Covening to be Held October 26-27

The Trust will hold its annual conference for its 150 grantees on October 26 and 27 at the Cloyd Heck Marvin Center at George Washington University. The second day of sessions is also open to non-grantee providers. This year’s conference, Getting Back to “Why,” aims to help nonprofits develop programs that meet the needs of children, youth, and families. A central focus this year will be the need for youth serving programs to tap back into the passion that formed a commitment of serving youth in creative ways. Many sessions will explore the positive youth development approach that the Trust tries to foster in the programs it supports. Positive youth development means equipping young people with the tools to make better decisions to navigate life. It is an approach that has been found to help youth increase their overall health and well-being. Attendees must register by October 20. To register, please click here.

The Trust Created New Categories for OST Grants for FY 2011

The Trust is pleased to announce that it recently created two new grant categories for FY 2011 to "move the needle" and improve quality of out-of-school-time programs in the District and has awarded these grants.

The first, Supporting Proven Success and Sustainability, is a three-year grant given to programs focused on sustained growth and stability. Grantees for this category had to demonstrate a proven track record of success and had to have completed or planned external evaluation showing the program’s effectiveness. Grants ranged from $600 to $1,700 per participant, depending on how many days participants attend and whether the program was held at a community-based organization, school or recreation center.

Also new is the Encouraging Innovation grant category, a one-year grant designed to move programs to the Proven Success and Sustainability grant. Limited to $25,000 per grantee, this category seeks to support innovation and help give programs the opportunity to extend their reach by developing new models of program design, content and delivery.

To learn more about the grantees, please click here.