Last Thursday, CNN was in Washington. Maybe they should have been in Coral Gables.
During the healthcare blahblahthon at Blair House, we watched on national TV how extreme politics poisons Washington's ability to resolve our most pressing problems. The same day, another meeting occurred in Coral Gables.
There, leaders of some of the country's most innovative organizations for social change met to advance their mission: finding more effective solutions to the challenges facing communities throughout the country with less government bureaucracy and fewer taxpayer dollars.
In our era of constrained government spending, sclerotic politics and needs that snake out the door and wrap around the block, it's important to listen to what this community has to say. And they aren't just talking about pie-in-the-sky dreams for world peace. Organized by New Profit, a venture philanthropy fund that supports social entrepreneurs, these people make measurable differences in the lives of Americans facing one of the toughest economic times we've ever seen.
Some of the organizations you might know -- KIPP Schools, Teach For America, CityYear, Jumpstart, Playworks. Others are less well known. No matter: there was no preening for the cameras. No 2,700 page props, or shared talking points. Just focused discussions about how to do better for our country, with less.
One of the speakers who generated the most excitement underscores how radically geeky -- that is to say incredibly focused and accountable -- these folks are: she spoke about how to more effectively measure results.
You see, that's what they do: they worry about how to get more young adults the training they need to successfully enter the work force; how to close the achievement gap between urban students and their affluent suburban counterparts; how to put families on a path to economic independence, breaking the cycle of poverty.
More solutions. Less government bureaucracy. More accountability. Less waste. An understanding, even encouragement, that if a program doesn't measure up, it is shut down. What's not to like? Politics and partisanship seemed dirty in this room.
Consider some of these organizations and the work they do:
LIFT enlists college volunteers to help expand economic opportunity and address underlying causes of poverty for low-income Americans. LIFT provides clients with the basic short-term necessities of housing and employment, allowing them to work towards their own longer-term goals of economic independence and career growth. LIFT's impact is two-fold; clients gain the tools they need to succeed in life while LIFT volunteers become a new generation of advocates for systemic social change. Since its inception, LIFT's volunteer base of more than 5,000 college students has served more than 30,000 individuals and families. Their goal is for 10,000 LIFT volunteers to have served 100,000 clients by 2015.
Tennessee's Youth Villages provides intensive in-home child services to children who are either in state custody or at risk of entering the foster care or juvenile justice system. Recent research shows that among children who completed at least 60 days of services through Youth Villages, 84% were still living successfully at home, 82% reported no trouble with the law and 83% were either in school or had graduated. Over the past 15 years in Tennessee, the number of youth in state custody has been cut in half. Since 2002 the number of children in Tennessee state psychiatric hospitals has decreased by two thirds. At less than half of the cost of out-of-home facilities, Youth Villages shows significantly higher success rates.
Communities In Schools (CIS) has become synonymous with dropout prevention. Utilizing partnerships with corporations like Verizon, Clear Channel and Morgan Stanley, CIS has created unique school-based programs around the country to provide comprehensive solutions to the issues that place young people in jeopardy of dropping out of school. Active in 27 states and the District of Columbia, CIS provides 2.3 million young people with access to services on an annual basis. Among CIS-tracked students, 76% improved attendance, 79% improved academic performance and 83% of eligible seniors graduated. Through business partnerships, a 95% volunteer workforce and financial support from individual donors and private foundations, CIS creates this change at the cost of only $180 per student.
Taken together, the organizations gathered in that room in Florida have helped millions of Americans on their path towards a better future with barely $1 billion in total revenue, almost always with impressive returns on investment. Talk about bang for the buck.
The lines might have crossed last Thursday. A new way to think about serious social policy might have been taking shape a thousand miles south of Washington while the politicians were ... well, you know what they were doing.
As governors, mayors and concerned Americans everywhere search for the most effective solutions to the challenges facing their communities and our country with little or no government dollars available, they'd be smart to look at these people.
The answers weren't on CNN that day, but that doesn't mean we don't already know how to help real people in need. We do. And these folks have some important answers.
