On Friday, we’ll be meeting with many of the 100+ funders active in the GLR Campaign and our Communities Network in Washington, DC. Until then we’ll be featuring some of the foundations and donors who are making a difference. Today’s blog post is by Nancy Van Milligen, CEO of the Community Foundation of Dubuque.

When the Community Foundation of Dubuque opened its doors 11 years ago, the Board was committed to a community development/leadership strategy.  Beyond the fundraising and the grant making, an initial effort convened leaders of organizations that support young people aging out of foster care. Soon after, the Foundation led a community visioning initiative that engaged citizens by asking: “What’s next for Dubuque?”  When the 2,332 ideas that were submitted didn’t reflect the needs of young people, especially the underserved in Dubuque, the Community Foundation helped to launch Every Child/Every Promise – a cradle to career promise organization.

Every Child/Every Promise staff worked with local schools and nonprofits that serve youth to improve outcomes for young people in Dubuque by establishing a youth indicator report and supporting the development of improved afterschool programming.

In 2011, when the Annie E. Casey Foundation encouraged the Foundation to join the Campaign for Grade-Level Reading, the groundwork was in place.  We had strong relationships with local schools, nonprofit providers, business leaders and higher education.

The Campaign provided tools, credibility and accountability to our efforts to bring needed attention and support to young people in our community.  Their common sense approach brought meaning to early childhood efforts by connecting them to school readiness. Calling out chronic absence uncovered opportunity hidden by average daily attendance, and the focus on “Summer Slide” helped us garner support to start a Summer Academy.

Technical assistance and supports from Attendance Works, the National Summer Learning Association and GLR’s Results Scorecard accelerated our impact in the community.

This early success caught the interest of regional and statewide education funders at the Iowa Council of Foundations.  Today, a dozen funders have identified grade-level reading as a priority following a year-long process where the group studied education issues in Iowa.

This kind of funder collaboration brings opportunities such as peer learning and shared funding, along with partners who speak the same language and often have similar goals and objectives.  Yet, there are challenges too:  Missions, styles and funding goals don’t always align.  The key to forming the funder collaborative in Iowa has been asking the right questions, with a focus on finding the value-add and making space for a collective approach that allows funders to find value from different areas in the work.