DC Promise Supporters,
Major gratitude to all at Team DCPNI for putting forth a great effort to apply to the MacArthur Foundation 100&Change competition! We are grateful to have our program model reviewed by a stellar panel of “wise heads.” Out of 800 selected to proceed to the next level of judging, Promise Greenhouse did not advance to the semifinal round. However, based on scoring, we did present a very competitive proposal.
We demonstrated that our work at Promise is the following:
- Meaningful. As stated by 1 of 5 judges, “DCPNI’s proposal addresses as profound an issue as they come: the ill effects on human well-being associated with being born into a situation of poverty. DCPNI proposes to adopt a series of community-based approaches to build on its success to address the issues of systemic racism and poverty in the District of Columbia. This work is exceptionally meaningful. The proposal is also certainly bold. The proposed solution could meaningfully affect the lives of many young people and the society at large, if successfully implemented.” Our proposal was BOLD and offers a solution to an important and urgent problem.
- Feasible. “Providing the supporting services to eradicate DC’s poverty is a hard task, especially when many of those services are not available. The team you’ve brought together seems capable to deliver innovative solutions to improve livelihoods,” says one of the judges.
Moving forward, what we need is more time to establish a reasonable record of effectiveness and we must get the support of local government, foundations, individual donors, and corporations to demonstrate that we can successfully identify and expand to other blighted communities in our nation’s capital.
We will do this!
CONGRATULATIONS to the eight semi-finalists and the 1,906 applicants who were daring to create MUCH NEEDED positive change in this world! We at Promise are proud to be counted in this number.
We have the raw determination and capacity to move ever forward with our plan as presented in our 100&Change proposal to MacArthur, and we are profoundly grateful to MacArthur for hosting such a BOLD and thoughtful competition! 100&Change – and the world – will positively see Promise Greenhouses in 2020!
#PROMISEONWARD
Mary Brown, Executive Director
2016 MacArthur 100&Change Application Highlights
Executive Summary
Nearly one-fifth of the residents of the capital of the richest country (USA) in the world live below poverty (less than $10,000/year). This inequality is exacerbated by the $487,000/year income of its wealthiest residents (DC Fiscal Policy Institute). DCPNI proposes to shrink the opportunity gap that perpetuates this persistent income gap between the rich and the poor in Washington, DC by creating “Promise Greenhouses” in communities of concentrated poverty throughout DC. These hubs will serve as sites for locally-driven innovation and human development where DCPNI will work with indigenous community leaders and organizations together with public and private partners to seed and grow robust pathways to the education, health, housing and employment opportunities families need to thrive. We will leverage the gains made in these communities to open new opportunities for 27,625 residents, one quarter of the 110,500 residents struggling with poverty citywide, and eventually to cities throughout America.
Team Purpose
DCPNI’s mission is to build sustainable, just and prosperous communities where children and parents thrive and healthy and safe places exist. Our ultimate goal is to end multigenerational poverty in DC and beyond by co-creating with indigenous leaders in high-poverty communities a culture of support, multi-organizational partnerships, and rigorous evaluation that continuously improves outcomes and the scaling-up of programs and services. Having established a strong framework for strengthening children and families’ ability to move out of poverty, we are prepared to expand partnerships with local government, private sector and international leaders willing to discuss the adaptability of our networked, place-conscious approach to solving social dilemmas differently. Receiving MacArthur 100&Change would enable DCPNI to expand our “Promise Greenhouse” recipe for transformation to 10 additional DC communities and assist others in considering anti-poverty solutions that are rooted in a genuine grassroot approach that has broader-scale implications for equitable community development.
The Problem Statement
It is widely understood that the conditions into which we are born (e.g., educational opportunities, socioeconomic status, and physical environment) largely determine our future well-being. In Washington, DC, the potential for negative well-being is exacerbated by the enormous gap between the poorest and richest residents—reflecting a global reality that inequality in high-income economies has reached levels unprecedented in the post-World-War-II period, often accompanied by greater polarization in educational and health outcomes, growing exclusion in the labor market, and lower intergenerational social mobility (World Bank Global Monitoring Report 2014/2015). Children growing up in DC’s Wards 5, 7, and 8 start life in an environment of intractably high rates of lack of education, unemployment, poverty, and food insecurity that far exceed the citywide rates and persist over multiple generations. Unemployment and poverty in Ward 8 are double that of the City as a whole. The dearth of full service grocery stores and healthy food in Wards 7 and 8 contribute to obesity rates as high as 44% compared to a 22% rate citywide (DC Department of Health). Unfortunately, interventions by local lawmakers and independent sector agents have been fragmented and devoid of organizational network approaches. Well-meaning organizations are sometimes unfamiliar with the local context, unable to impact positive human development, and therefore ill-prepared to disrupt the lack of access to opportunities faced by residents. When localized efforts have shown successes, they often lack the resources, program performance, data capacity and other supports to scale their efforts for greater impact.
Our Solution
DCPNI proposes to create “Promise Greenhouses” in communities of concentrated poverty throughout DC. These sites for innovation and human development will bring together indigenous leaders and organizations with public and private partners to seed and grow locally-driven solutions to multiple drivers of poverty and increase access to the education, employment, health and housing opportunities families need to thrive. Our philosophy stems partially from the tenet of the highly regarded organizational theorist, Gareth Morgan, that large scale change occurs not by large scale change programs, but unfolds as the result of crucial small scale initiatives that create novel contexts that break the status quo and allow new streams of innovation to occur. Promise Greenhouses will unlock inherent abilities within communities to support the highest good of their children, families and neighborhoods through an intricate and intentional lattice of supports, services and opportunities that mindfully engage parents, respectfully engage community, build the capacity of indigenous leadership and organizations, and use data and evaluation that tell the story of communities leading change that takes root and sustains itself over time. Just as immunizing a certain percent of children in a school prevents many students from getting the flu, we believe transformations originating in a certain percent of DC communities will impact poverty throughout the entire city for multiple generations. Eventually we hope to establish these incubators of locally-driven change in cities throughout America. Our solution’s deep roots in community, and data-supported and synergistic approach, increase our likelihood of sustainability over externally-driven, fragmented alternatives.
