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Welcome to the July 24 Ready by 21® National Partnership Update Newsletter.
The purpose of this publication is to make all partners aware of upcoming meetings, event, happenings, and news related to Ready by 21. Contact Ian Faigley if you have stories or news you would like to share or if there are additional people on your team you would like added.
We have created a password-protected Ready by 21 Partnership area on our website. You can access this site for full versions of the articles listed below as well as archives of previous updates. For the 'Read More" links below, you will have to enter the following username and password. You will only have to enter the password once if you click the button on your browser to save it.
Username for all- partner
Password for all- readyby21
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A Note From Karen Pittman
The dots are connecting almost faster than we can handle! Our last newsletter was chock full of information on upcoming opportunities in several of the communities we have on our short list (e.g. Chattanooga, Indianapolis) plus opportunities to meet with policy leaders from some of the country's largest and most progressive cities (Ash Institute). This is a more detailed memo to ensure that all Partners have an opportunity to provide intelligence and input and to participate in events as much as possible.
Please pay special attention to the Upcoming Events and Opportunities section as it has a number of events coming up and specific requests related to them. The number of site engagements coming up in the next 45 days really emphasizes the need for your intelligence and your real-time involvement.
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News
Ready by 21 Video and Brochure Now Available Online
A ten-minute video providing an overview of the Ready by 21 Approach and Challenge is now accessible on the Ready by 21 Web site at http://www.forumfyi.org/readyby21. The video presentation features Karen Pittman, Merita Irby, Brian Gallagher, president and CEO of United Way of America, and leaders from Richmond, Va., who have taken on the Ready by 21 Challenge. A brochure on Ready by 21 is available at the bottom of the Rb21 site. The brochure outlines the Approach and lists the Partner. These new information tools are ideal for introducing state and local decision-makers to the Ready by 21 Approach and Partnership.
Ready By 21 Technical Partners In Person Meeting
The Technical Partners had their first in person meeting since March on July 16th. This was an exciting meeting which included all of the partners except for Strive and included new partners who have joined since March. All who attended were able to have some substantive time learning about the scope of the tools and services they each bring to the RB21 Partnership. To facilitate that mutual understanding, Weikart Center, Gallup, Search Institute and nFocus all gave an overview of the tools that they have to help leaders generate new data to be able to answer more complex questions. Community Systems Group provided an overview of the RB21 Workstation and their approach to community coalition evaluation that focuses on the contribution large community-wide efforts make on improving outcomes. Other partners have presented their work in previous meeting or will in the future. A more complete inventory will be developed in the Workstation.
Corporate Voices for Working Families Releases Report on Ill-Prepared Workforce
Corporate Voices for Working Families, a Ready by 21 national partner, along with The American Society for Training and Development, The Conference Board and the Society for Human Resource Management have just released a new report that shows U.S. employers continue to struggle with an ill-prepared workforce, finding new hires lack crucial basic and applied skills. For the most part, employer-sponsored readiness training is not successfully correcting these deficiencies, according to the report, The Ill-Prepared U.S. Workforce: Exploring the Challenges of Employer-Provided Workforce Readiness Training. To view the report, please visit http://corporatevoices.org/node/247. Policy Update
Support is being garnered for the RAISE UP Act which is a bill to be sponsored by Senator Debbie Stebanow to support locally developed systems that will identify young people who have dropped out of high school and challenge them to secure a diploma, a post secondary credential, and a family sustaining career. It will do so through a comprehensive approach that provides young people with opportunities in the areas of education, workforce preparation, and wraparound support services. By bringing together local stakeholders, coordinating resources, and filling gaps in services, the RAISE UP Act offers a systemic approach to one of the nation's most troubling problems. To view the one-pager, please visit attachment.
Karen Pittman and Gallup Presentation at Aspen Institute
The Ready by 21 Partnership was well represented at the Aspen Ideas Festival, thanks to speaking invitations from the Altria and Atlantic magazine hosts. Shane Lopez and Justin Bibb from Gallup joined Karen to deliver a session on Ideas that Work: Changing the Odds for Our Nation's Youth. The main message - better, broader data is one of the most powerful tools we have to inspire leaders to set bigger goals, adopt bolder strategies and build broader partnerships. The Gallup student poll data was presented as the exact type of information about student success that is needed to spark "out of the box" thinking. Review the presentation here.
20th Annual KIDS COUNT Data Book Released Next Week
The Annie E. Casey Foundation will release its 20th annual KIDS COUNT Data Book -- featuring national and state profiles of children's well-being on July 28, with materials available at 11:00 a.m. EDT. The Data Book is distributed to a wide audience of policymakers, practitioners and journalists and is recognized as a leading source of data on the condition of America's kids. The Casey Foundation calls for a "data revolution" to track the progress and improve the lives of vulnerable kids because having timely and easily understood information is critical to shaping policy and programs that can make a difference. For more information, please visit http://www.journalismcenter.org/resource/child-care-and-early-education/20th-annual-kids-count-data-book.
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Partnership Meetings This Month
Below please find the important dates for the Ready by 21 Partnership in July and August
July 30 Ash Institute-Urban Policy Advisory Group Meeting (see below for details)
August 5 Ready by 21 Steering Committee Meeting 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Location TBD
August 10-11 "Ready by 21, Credentialed by 26" - Children's Cabinet Directors and State Policy Directors from 5 States meet to discuss post-secondary education credentialing and disconnected youth
Contact Elizabeth Gaines @ Elizabeth@forumfyi.org for more information
August 10-11 Indianapolis Student Success Summit (see below for details)
August 13-14 Richmond planning visit (see below for details)
August 27-28 Chattanooga Youth Stakeholder convening
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Upcoming Events and Opportunities
City intelligence Needed for July 30th Kennedy School Presentation
Karen Pittman and Jeff Edmundsen from Strive will present a panel discussion to chiefs of staff and senior policy advisors of 25 major US cities at the Harvard Kennedy School. The list of cities that will be represented at the 3-day Urban Policy Advisory Group meeting is on the partner webspace along with a brief summary of the session Jeff Edmundson (Strive) and Karen will be facilitating. The meeting organizers have specifically asked that, in addition to information on Rb21 and the Partnership, the Ready by 21 "Guide to Getting the Most out of Your Summit" (http://www.forumfyi.org/content/dropout-prevention-summit-planning-guide) be distributed given the number of upcoming APA summits in the cities represented. Forum staff have reached out to Ready by 21/Quality Counts liaisons in the cities where there are contacts. If you or your Rb21 advisory group members or champions have contacts in these cities, please drop them a quick note asking them to reach out to their Mayor's offices either before or after the meeting to reinforce the connections.
Stakeholder Side-Meetings Being Set Up in Indianapolis on August 10 - 11th
John Brandon, MCCOY Director and Ready by 21 liaison, is using the upcoming APA-sponsored Summit (http://www.mccoyouth.org/our-impact.aspx?id=110&sid=0&pid=2) to set up meetings with funders and key education, business and community leaders and funders (e.g. Lilly, Lumina) to jump start discussions about how the Ready by 21 Partnership can be helpful, especially given the recent commitment Strive has made to support the development of a University-led P-20 Council. Brandon has specifically requested that a representative from United Way of America join the discussions. Technical Partners Gallup and nFocus are planning to attend the Summit and participate in the discussions (at the last Tech Partner meeting, we learned that every partner is either in Indianapolis/Indiana or is in negotiation to be). AASA is reaching out to the Indianapolis Superintendent to ensure that he is fully briefed about the Partnership. We'll share the finalized side-meeting list as soon as it is available. Please let us know if you have any intelligence or interest in participating. [Note: Pittman will meet with members of the Strive team on Aug 9 to continue discussions of how to coordinate our efforts).
Richmond Visit Scheduled to Piggy-Back on Next Strive Meeting on August 13-14th
Richmond is the second Rb21 priority city to receive funding to establish a University-based P-20 Council. United Way is a critical partner in Bridging Richmond (the newly established P-20 Council), is also a current JCP-Rb21 pilot site, and is leading the planning for the upcoming October 22 Dropout Summit. Forum staff are providing assistance to the local UW team on Summit planning. A call is scheduled with the local UW CEO to discuss UW's role in the integration of Rb21 into the P-20 planning process. Melissa Hough (CVWF) will join Strive in the August meetings, continuing her role as a Richmond "insider." A senior member of the Forum team will also attend. We'll get more information on the Richmond meeting to determine whether it would be beneficial for others to participate in this meeting (in particular, AASA given the prominent role of the school district. Pittman met with the new superintendent at the Aspen Ideas Festival.) There will need to be other visits to Richmond. We will keep you informed.
Chattanooga Planning for August 27-28th Visit Progressing w/ United Way Support
Members of the UWA Rb21 team have joined the weekly prep calls with Chattanooga (the local United Way is playing the leadership role) in preparation for a one-day facilitation of the full range of community stakeholders. The Chattanooga team has been given options for planning a facilitated 10-3 "story-telling" meeting, based on the successful session held last year in Louisville. UWA team members will be joining the Forum team on this visit. Others are welcomed. We will definitely want all outreach calls to be conducted by August 10 in preparation for this meeting.
New Outreach From Priority Sites-Intelligence Needed
- Atlanta United Way called July 20th ready for TA support. UW of Greater Atlanta is one of the strongest local UWs and has been tracking the Rb21 approach for some time. With new leadership in place and a new strategic plan, they have reached out to UW and the Forum to learn more about the supports available through the Partnership so that they can create a TA plan. A call is now being set up to do the initial briefing and begin to map out a timeline for the audit. Intelligence from other partners before the call would be ideal.
- Louisville Mayor's office requested July 23rd visit from Strive. Louisville is a Quality Counts site, but the Forum has not had discussions about additional city leadership-level supports for several months. Strive was invited to speak to a Mayoral convening of the city's leaders on July 23rd to share their strategy for partnership building in Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky. We've communicated with our liaison in the mayor's office (Mary Gwen Wheeler) to ensure that she understands the connections between Strive and the Partnership, knows that we will both be presenting at the Kennedy School meeting, and is aware that we are now ready to engage. Larry Pasti (Forum) will be in Louisville on July 28-29 for a CSG Community Evaluation Strategy training and will do informal follow-up meetings if useful. Any other Partners planning to be in Louisville? Recommendations for other meetings? Please let us know if you would like to review the correspondence between Mary Gwen and the Forum Team.
- Nashville requesting support to implement nFocus Community Solution. Nashville Mayor's Office is quickly ramping up its commitment to expand learning supports for youth. (Nashville is a QC site.) They have investigated participation/program tracking software and would like to implement the nFocus system which is the most comprehensive, but also the most expensive. They are anxious to understand what supports they might get from the Partnership.
Update on the Training on the Ready by 21 Workstation
Training on the RB21 Workstation has begun. This is a reminder that there are still two additional training dates scheduled for Partner staff to learn to use the RB21 Workstation. They are:
July 31 from 10 a.m. to 12 p.m. EST- Online
Phone: 800-274-4142
Passcode: 43054310
Please sign on 10 minutes early so you can be online when this session starts.
August 4 from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m. EST at the Cady Lee (Forum)
Read More
Ready by 21 Webinar: Aligning Policies and Funding
Wednesday, August 12, 2009
1:00-2:00 PM EDT
What is the best way to establish and fund coordinated and aligned youth services? What are the different types of funding available? How can coordinating bodies pool and leverage their resources? It is questions such as these that are leading an increasing number of cities, counties and states to craft creative policy and funding solutions for the coordination of youth services. Hear from states and cities that have crafted innovative solutions to the chronic effects of siloed approaches to improve youth programs and services.
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Jonathan Williams, Ian Faigley and the Ready by 21® National Partnership Team
The Forum for Youth Investment
For more information, contact Jonathan Williams at jonathan@forumfyi.org or Ian Faigley at ian@forumfyi.org.
Ready by 21 is a registered trademark of the Forum for Youth Investment.
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