Common Good Ventures (CGV), in partnership with the Maine Community Foundation (MaineCF), seeks applications for the Program for Nonprofit Effectiveness. Through this capacity-building grant program, CGV and MaineCF will provide technical and financial assistance to organizations and collaboratives seeking to increase the effectiveness of program delivery toward achieving greater social impact.
The goal of this program in 2009 is to strengthen the ability of Maine-based nonprofits and collaboratives to lower the barriers and increase the readiness of youth and adults to obtain postsecondary education and training. This goal aligns with MaineCF’s strategic focus on higher education and CGV’s focus on essential services and economic development.
Postsecondary Education and Training: Why It Matters
According to the Compact for Higher Education, nearly 12 percent of Maine's population--and over a quarter of all public schoolchildren in the state--live in poverty. To break the cycle of poverty, a postsecondary education and advanced training are imperative. Obtaining a degree or certificate will provide access to better jobs, elevating future incomes and increasing quality of life.
Additionally, Maine needs a more highly educated, adaptable workforce to increase its competitiveness in the regional and global economy. Maine continues to fall behind the rest of the New England region in terms of the percentage of our workforce with post-secondary degrees and certificates. Approximately 37% of Maine’s workforce currently has postsecondary degrees as compared to the 45% New England average. The Compact for Higher Education is seeking to reach the goal of having 56% of Maine people have college degrees by 2019--which would make us competitive with the projected New England average. Increasing the percentage of Maine’s workforce with postsecondary education and advanced training will drive development of new industries, new jobs, higher wages, and more prosperous communities.
What the Program for Nonprofit Effectiveness Seeks to Accomplish
Too many Maine youth and adults see college and advanced training as beyond their reach. This is especially true of young people who are the first in their family to consider postsecondary education and adults already in the workforce who have a high school degree but face real and perceived challenges when considering postsecondary education and training. In response, effective programs are needed to reduce the barriers, raise aspirations, and assist Maine people in obtaining postsecondary education and advanced training.
Through the Program for Nonprofit Effectiveness, CGV will provide capacity-building services to nonprofits and collaboratives working on:
- Lowering barriers to high school degree attainment for low-income Maine youth
- Raising aspirations of youth and adults to pursue postsecondary education and advanced training
- Increasing readiness of high school students and incumbent workforce to enter into and persist through a postsecondary degree or acquire advanced training program
By focusing their resources on this issue area, Common Good Ventures and the Maine Community Foundation believe the Program for Nonprofit Effectiveness can help the Compact for Higher Education reach its long-term goal for Maine postsecondary attainment.
When identifying organizations and collaboratives to work with, CGV will explore the correlation between the proposed capacity-building work and anticipated gains in program delivery. Will the programs be able to serve more youth and adults? And will more effective programs or services help more youth and adults matriculate into or complete postsecondary degrees or advanced training?
Strategy of the Program
The Program for Nonprofits Effectiveness seeks to identify the right moment when a strategic grant and management assistance will help propel an already strong organization, alliance, or network to a higher level of organizational and programmatic capacity, in this case, to lower the barriers for youth and adults to pursue and attain postsecondary education and advanced training.
The program will establish longer-term relationships with participants, providing on-going management assistance during the term of the grant. Partnerships will span over a range of 1-3 years, depending on the scope of work agreed on by CGV and the partner. A comprehensive understanding of desired work and goals will be defined during the selection process, with a more detailed work plan to be developed when a partnership commences. Technical assistance from CGV will be the primary resource provided. In addition, direct grants will be distributed to partners and will range from $7,500 to $15,000 depending on the scope of the work.
By selecting a cohort of organizations and collaboratives working in the same area, the Program for Nonprofit Effectiveness also seeks to foster and facilitate connections between and among partners. The program will encourage the learning of best practices and ways to measure impact; develop a higher-level understanding of causes and symptoms of social issues targeted by partners so as to best understand their role in the system of support; and explore opportunities to collaborate between nonprofit agencies and network partners to maximize impact.
Focus of the Program
The program seeks to support capacity-building projects that focus on:
I. Strengthening individual organizations’ internal capacity
Capacity-building projects can be focused on almost any aspect of an organization, including management, program delivery, operations, technology, human resources, financial management, board development, and advancement. More specifically, this grant program seeks to support capacity-building projects that:
- Improve governance and leadership
- Improve staff skills
- Improve management systems and practices
- Create and implement strategic and business plans
- Improve, expand or add services and programs
- Reduce or eliminate ineffective programs
- Improve financial management
- Expand strategic assets, including financial and human resources
- Increase collaboration with organizations with complementary models, skills, assets, networks, and service recipients
II. Strengthening the capacity of networks and merging organizations
The grant program also seeks to support existing collaborative initiatives between and among organizations that are intentionally combining resources and assets to achieve greater social outcomes and impact. More specifically, this grant program seeks to support collaborative work related to:
- Networks: intentional collaborations that allow organizations to work together toward reaching common goals and greater social impact through sharing information, combining resources, and exerting collective leadership
- Mergers: combining governance, assets, and operations of two organizations in order to increase impact and/or reduce redundancies.
Technical Assistance
CGV will work closely with partners to develop a work plan that will help them achieve their goals and, through this process, identify outcome measures that help inform progress towards those goals. Technical assistance provided by CGV is intended to guide and facilitate the work, while the partner is responsible for pushing forward on concrete action steps to advance its work.
On average, CGV will spend one day a week in working time with each partner. A similar amount of time is expected to be committed in the aggregate by partner staff. Week to week, this time may vary widely as work ebbs and flows. Technical assistance methods may include:
- One-on-one technical assistance and coaching, as well as skill development with agency staff, board, and volunteers as applicable
- Peer learning with other CGV partners and other organizations doing similar work
- Facilitation of collaborative and network efforts
Focus of technical assistance may cover (but is not limited to):
- Strategic planning and logic model refinement
- Collaborative strategies for increased impact with fewer resources
- Financial tool development
- Organizational development
- Evaluation and measuring outcomes
- Streamlining services
- Technology
- Board leadership
Common Good Ventures recognizes that successful management assistance relationships focused on capacity-building goals require a significant time commitment from senior management. CGV enters into a partnership relationship with each grantee that is characterized by:
- An honest and open working relationship with respect for confidentiality
- A learning climate that recognizes both successes and mistakes as opportunities to learn
- Timely responses by all parties to inquiries, requests, or suggestions
- Efficiency of communication, and effective use of staff time, including being prepared for meetings
- Respect for the organizational cultures of all partners
- Regular feedback about the relationship from perspective of each partner.
Grant Support
Depending on the scope of work, grant funding will range from $7,500 to $15,000 per year for up to three years. As much as possible, funding will be used to support projects and will be specified at the onset of a partnership. Funding will be flexible to revisions as the work progresses. Most often, funding will be used to support specific technical assistance investments (consultants, market research, software, training, etc.). Funding also can be used to replace earned revenue to allow staff time for engagement, specifically staff costs usually paid for by project revenue or billable hours.
Eligibility Requirements
Common Good Ventures seeks to work with organizations or collaboratives that have the following characteristics:
- Maine-based nonprofits that have 501(c)(3) federal tax-exempt status
- Medium to large nonprofits (annual budgets greater than $250,000) or Maine-based networks and alliances that have been in existence for at least one year and have demonstrated success in leveraging resources to achieve common goals
- If applying for assistance with a merger, organizations that have reached a point where the boards of directors of both organizations have taken a formal action to pursue consolidation of governance functions, programs and operations.
Timetable for Selection Process
- January 20: Letter of Intent and related application materials due.
- January 28: Applicants will be notified whether they have been selected to advance to the next round. The Selection Committee may require selected applicants to submit additional materials. These materials may include: diagnostic surveys, financial and/or operational reports and a more in-depth proposal.
- February 6: Additional materials due.
- February 18: Selection Committee will review material and select finalist applicants to visit.
- February 23 through March 6: Selection Committee conducts site visits of finalists.
- By March 20: Final selections made and applicants notified of the outcome.
- First half of April: Work with selected partners begins.
When to Apply
Letters of Intent are due January 20.
How to Apply
- Letter of Intent should be sent via e-mail by January 20 to Chad Sclove, Common Good Ventures Managing Director, at chad@commongoodventures.org. Applicants will receive confirmation of receipt of application within two business days.
- The Letter of Intent should be sent as an attachment in Microsoft Word-compatible format (.rtf or .doc).
- The e-mail should have "MCF Organizational Capacity-Building Program" in the subject line.
- If someone other than the executive director submits the application, please ensure that the executive director also sends an e-mail confirming support of the application.
- We will not accept applications via fax, and we discourage applications being sent by mail.
Documentation
Letter of Intent | Program for Nonprofit Effectiveness 2009 Guidelines & Application Procedure
Contact
Questions should be directed to Chad Sclove, Managing Director at Common Good Ventures at 207-373-9293 or chad@commongoodventures.org.