Measurables

Remember the big grant that I mentioned working on last week?

Still working on it.  On the plus side it is due early next week so I will be done with it one way or the other.  Last night I was telling my wife that I felt like I had spent the day on a road trip.  I sat at my computer for several hours not moving much and popping sunflower seeds and drinks in order to stay focused.  Ahhh, the glamor of my job.

One of the pieces that comes up in grant writing all the time is "Measurables."  Grantors (the people who are giving the awards...not a room full of people named Grant) want to know that their money is making a difference in the community and that we are actually accomplishing what we claim to be accomplishing.  The best way to show that would be to bring the grantors to Joel's Place, allow them to meet the kids, have them spend a couple of years with the kids and observe how their home life, school life and social life all mix together while they see the immense benefits that attending Joel's Place offers to our youth.  Then it would be helpful to hop in their Alternate-Dimension machine to see how the same kids' lives would be different if Joel's Place were not around.  Then they could make an incredibly informed decision about whether to support our mission or not.

Due to lack of time, money and Alternate-Dimension machines, usually Grantors are forced to rely on measurable statistics to make their decisions.  For more relationally-oriented and prevention-related organizations that presents a challenge.  It is easy for me to document how many meals we served this past year.  It is more challenging to document how many influential conversations our staff had with kids over those meals.  It is even more challenging to document how many catastrophic choices were averted because of those conversations over those meals.  How many suicides did we prevent this year?  How many dangerous situations did we help kids avoid?  How many F's did not appear on report cards? 1? 10? 1,000?  What we are trying to measure is the internal growth of our young men and women and there's not really a growth chart for that, is there?  Or is there?

During my first year here, Linda introduced me to a small booklet from the Search Institute, down in Minnesota.  They have been trying to turn internal growth into measurables for over a decade now.  They interviewed hundreds of thousands of young people and found that there are 40 Developmental Assets that all youth need in order to have the internal wherewithal to succeed.  The assets range from a certain number of adults who invest in you to hope for your future to family and school environments to personal restraint.  What these surveys showed was that the more Developmental Assets that you possess, the greater chance you will have to succeed academically and professionally as well as a there being a marked decrease in your probability of making destructive choices.  For example how likely are you to have mostly A's in school?

• If you have 0-10 Assets: 8%
• If you have 11-20 Assets: 20%
• If you have 21-30 Assets: 38%
• If you have 31-40 Assets: 59%

How likely are you to enter a Leadership Role?

• If you have 0-10 Assets: 45%
• If you have 11-20 Assets: 63%
• If you have 21-30 Assets: 77%
• If you have 31-40 Assets: 86%

How likely are you to engage in violent behavior?

• If you have 0-10 Assets: 60%
• If you have 11-20 Assets: 34%
• If you have 21-30 Assets: 15%
• If you have 31-40 Assets: 4%

How likely are you to deal with depression and attempt suicide?

• If you have 0-10 Assets: 42%
• If you have 11-20 Assets: 26%
• If you have 21-30 Assets: 11%
• If you have 31-40 Assets: 3%

There are plenty more stats, but you see the picture.  Joel's Place is positioned to help our teens develop 28 of the 40 Assets, meaning that no matter what their background is when they come here, we can help them move up at least one tier, if not two or three, during their time here.  Those are changed lives.  Those are measurables that I can get excited about.