Aspen Forum for Community Solutions Opportunity Youth ... · Part III: Key Elements of the RFP Proposal Process: • Engage partners from key sectors • Reflect clear vision for

Aspen Forum for Community Solutions

Opportunity Youth Incentive Fund

Bidder’s Conference

April 11, 2013

1:00 – 3:00 PM EDT

Part I: Welcome & Introduction

Agenda:

• Part I: Welcome & Introduction

• Part II: Overview of Collective Impact for Opportunity Youth

• Part III: Key Elements of the RFP

• Part IV: Major Components of the OYIF Initiative

• Part V: Questions & Answers

• Part VI: Dates to Remember & Next Steps


Webinar Presenters:

• Steve Patrick - Executive Director, Aspen Forum for Community Solutions

• Monique Miles - Deputy Director, Aspen Forum for Community Solutions

• Lili Allen - Director, Back on Track Designs, Jobs for the Future

• Cheryl Almeida - Research Director, Pathways through Postsecondary, Jobs for the Future


AnyMeeting Overview:

• Webinar is being recorded (available online later)

• Use the “chat” feature to share your question with the audience during the question and answer section

Part II: Overview of Collective Impact for

Opportunity Youth

Defining Opportunity Youth:

• 6.7 million young people in the United States between the ages of 16-24 – one out of every six – who are neither enrolled in school nor participating in the labor market


Opportunity Youth

Defining Opportunity Youth:

• Two segments of opportunity youth: – High School Drop-Outs: About half of all opportunity youth do not

have a secondary credential

– Youth with High School Diploma or GED: The other half of opportunity youth have a secondary credential, but are unable to make successful connections to postsecondary education or employment


Opportunity Youth

Why Collective Impact:

• Opportunity Youth are touched by a number of public systems although none are held responsible for the population as a whole

• Invisible population


Opportunity Youth

Why Collective Impact:

• Collective impact drive systems alignment and cross-sector infrastructure

• It builds increased opportunities for leverage resources and more effective use of public and private funding


Opportunity Youth

Theory of Action:

• Call to action around an equity agenda


Opportunity Youth

Theory of Action:

• The goals of the Opportunity Youth Incentive Fund are to: 1. Build strong evidence of success for building and deepening

pathways into and through postsecondary credentials that achieve better outcomes in education and employment for opportunity youth, and

2. Make the case for increased adoption of collective impact and community collaboration as an effective model for community change.


Opportunity Youth

Theory of Action:

• The OYIF seeks to provide communities with coordinating dollars to stimulate a process that lives beyond the grant and bolsters the following: – cross-sector collaboration and system alignment

– infrastructure and policy changes

– resource leverage and reallocation


Opportunity Youth

Governance Structure:

• Opportunity Youth Incentive Fund Leadership Council

• Role of the Aspen Forum and Jobs for the Future

Part III: Key Elements of the RFP

Two Types of Grants: Development and Implementation:

• Implementation Criteria and Grant Information – Established collaborative with strong backbone org and operations,

high level leadership participation

– Demonstrated success in policy, pathway, and program development

– Success in repurposing and raising funding

– Strong potential to significantly expand portfolio

– Up to $500k over three years, with 1:1 match

– Expect to award a very limited number


• Development Criteria and Grant Information: – Backbone/collaborative in earlier stage of development

– Strategy to build out pathways

– Up to $100k for a year

– May apply for Implementation grants at end of year


Proposal Process:

• Engage partners from key sectors

• Reflect clear vision for work of collaborative in goals/objectives

• Complete tools before writing narrative

• Integrate ideas for each area of work into mutually reinforcing, coherent, aligned strategy/plan


Areas of Work:

• Collaborating for Impact

• Using Data to Guide Decisions and Assess Impact

• Building and Expanding Effective Programs and Pathways

• Leveraging Funding to Support and Sustain Innovation

• Developing Supportive Policies


Key Documents for Completion of RFP:

• Criteria & Evidence Charts (RFP pages 14-18)

• Scoring Guide (Appendix F)


Data Requirements for Proposal:

• Scoping your OY population

• Showing evidence of effectiveness of pathways

• Providing a preliminary plan/strategies for gathering data on Common Indicators


Overview of the Tools:

• Intended to help you complete as thorough a proposal as possible

• Designed to guide planning process prior to completing your proposal narrative


• Commonalities Across Tools: – What’s in place and/or past successes in the area of work

– Opportunities and barriers

– Next steps

• Implementation grants: Four-year goals and one-year objectives

• Development grants: One-year objectives


Tool One: Collaborating for Impact

• Goal: assess current collaborative membership and operations and how to build out for more impact

• Implementation applicants: assess strength of backbone as convener/grant manager

• Development applicants: identify potential entities for backbone


Tool Two: Using Data To Guide Decisions and Assess Impact: Scoping the Population

• Goal: provide best estimates of scope of your OY population including segments (e.g. age, credits, no diploma; diploma) and priority subpopulations (if any)

• Expect gaps in data (especially for Development sites); identify strategies to address gaps

• Previous experience, current capacity and plan for tracking and sharing outcome data including the common indicators especially important for Implementation sites


Tool Three: Building Effective Pathways

• Goal: assess existing pathways for major OY segments: e.g. with a HS credential but disconnected from school and work, and without a HS credential

• Address alignment of pathways with high-demand career fields

• ID building blocks for postsecondary pathways based on current programming and evidence of success


Tool Four: Leveraging Funding to Support and Sustain Innovation

• Goal: assess your experience and capacity to leverage public and raise private funds

• If focusing on a subpopulation (e.g., transition-age youth), address raising/leveraging funds for that population

• Implementation applicants: Show solid plan to raise full match

• Development applicants: Match not required but strengthens proposal


Tool Five: Supportive Policy and Systems Alignment

• Goal: assess successes/challenges advocating for policy and systems change to benefit youth; identify critical next steps

• If focusing on a subpopulation (e.g., transition-age youth), include any advocacy/policy efforts on their behalf

• Implementation applicants: Demonstrate success addressing youth policy issues, understanding of policy conditions impacting OY and clear capacity to move a policy agenda

• Development applicants: Demonstrate experience with policy issues and/or understanding of policy conditions that impact OY; identify potential policy and/or systems changes


Appendix E: Implementation and Development Budgets

• Goal: design a budget that reflects the priorities of the collaborative

• All applicants are required to complete all three functions of the OYIF project budget including: – The overall project budget (the red tab)

– The budget worksheets for each line item in the project budget (the green tabs)

– The budget narrative (included in the budget worksheet)

• Development applicants: 12 month timeline: July 1, 2013 – June 30, 2014

• Implementation applicants: 3 year timeline: July 1, 2013 – June 30, 2016

Part IV: Major Components of the OYIF Initiative

Asset Mapping:

• Conduct on-site assessment of community strengths/opportunities and gaps/challenges

• Produce memos for each site summarizing assets to build on, analysis of gaps and recommended next steps and areas of focus for collaborative

Part IV: Major Components of the OYIF Initiative

Learning Community:

• Cross-site learning institutes of collaboratives and backbone/grantee organizations

• Periodic conference calls with site leads to discuss strategy

• Interactive webinars on topics emerging as common challenges

• Web-based digital forum for peer learning and tool-sharing

Part V: Questions & Answers

Please remember to:

- Use the chat feature to enter your questions (if you haven’t done so already)

- Share your questions with “presenters only”

- We will try our best to answer as many questions as we can

- For the purpose of this webinar, we will focus on answering the most frequently asked questions only

- A compilation of the most FAQs will be posted on our website

Part VI: Next Steps & Dates to Remember

Dates to Remember:

• May 15, 2013: Proposals due to Monique Miles at the Aspen Institute

• July 1, 2013: OYIF communities announced

• July 10th – 11th: Site leader convening in Washington, DC

• July – October, 2013: Community asset mapping

• November 2013: First cross site convening in Aspen, CO

• May 2014: Second cross site convening (place TBD)

• Summer 2014: Development sites apply for implementation funding


Next Steps:

• The Bidder’s Conference webinar will be posted to the Aspen website

• Most common FAQs will be posted to the Aspen website

• For more information and resources please visit the Aspen Forum at: http://www.aspeninstitute.org/policy-work/community-solutions

http://www.aspeninstitute.org/policy-work/community-solutions







Thank you!