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Innovation Challenge Pilot
Request for Letters of Interest
September 19, 2016
Connecticut Opportunity Project An invitation to work together to engage all Connecticut Youth
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The Opportunity Project Overview Today, 39,000 high school-‐aged youth in Connecticut are disengaged or disconnected from school – equaling more than one in five high school students. The Connecticut Opportunity Project is motivated by the tremendous untapped potential of these young people. The Dalio Foundation aspires to work with all stakeholders to help put all youth on a path to success, and to achieve greater equity and prosperity across the state. As part of this effort, the pilot phase of the Opportunity Project is an innovation challenge, soliciting ideas from individuals, non-‐profit organizations, and partnerships across the state. The goal is to improve the lives and futures of young people in Connecticut who are disengaged or disconnected from school. We invite everyone to join together and collaboratively create innovative solutions to support, challenge, and empower youth of high school-‐age through 24 to lead happy, productive, and fulfilling lives. The most promising proposals may receive grant funding from the Dalio Foundation. Partners must commit to measure results and share findings and strategies openly. Through the innovation challenge pilot, the Opportunity Project aims to reach at least 1,000 young people by launching more than a dozen projects in Year 1 (2017-‐18). We welcome letters of interest representing diverse points of view and multiple points of intervention. We encourage partnerships involving community members, businesses, schools, non-‐profit organizations, and/or civic and public agencies. The pilot is designed to identify partners, raise awareness, democratize innovation, and seed promising projects in urban, rural, and suburban communities across the state. We hope individuals, non-‐profit organizations, and partners will mobilize to take part in this process, sharing their successes and challenges, and building toward even greater impact in the future. The Need in Connecticut Connecticut boasts one of the highest high school graduation rates in the country at 87%, and has many high-‐quality public schools. The experience of so many students, however, is far different from what the headline statewide statistics might suggest. Alarmingly, more than one in five high school-‐aged youth were disengaged or disconnected from school during the 2014-‐15 academic year. The Opportunity Project focuses on disconnected youth, and those who are substantially disengaged from their high school. Aligned with the recently released Parthenon-‐EY report Untapped Potential: Engaging all Connecticut Youth, we define disconnected youth as high school-‐aged youth who are not enrolled in school – oftentimes categorized as high school dropouts. Disengaged youth are students who are at-‐risk of dropping out of high school due to academic failure, behavioral challenges, chronic absenteeism, or any combination of these factors. Please read Untapped Potential to learn more about the needs of Connecticut’s disengaged and disconnected youth, and to consider potential solutions and collaborations. The report is available at www.ctopportunityproject.org. Most often, disengaged and disconnected youth represent many of the same young people at different points in time in their lives. Dropping out of high school is foreseeable and ideally preventable. Disconnection is especially common for
Connecticut Opportunity Project An invitation to work together to engage all Connecticut Youth
Disengaged youth are enrolled in high school, but show signs of academic failure, behavioral challenges, chronic absenteeism, or any combination of these factors. Disconnected youth have not received a high school diploma or equivalent and are not enrolled in high school despite being 21 or younger.
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students who show signs of disengagement when they are in their first or second years of high school. These challenges are widespread across Connecticut, affecting most frequently young people coming from at-‐risk groups. Over three-‐quarters are low-‐income or minority students while one-‐third are students with disabilities or English language learners. Poor attendance, reflecting limited engagement, is a serious indication of future disconnection. Many students also become disengaged when they switch between schools. Both factors suggest students struggle to forge the critical personal relationships with adults and peers that could keep them connected to school. Schools often are unprepared to meet the needs of disengaged students; many young people over time are left by the system to fall through the cracks. Then, as they disconnect, there are few quality alternative educational pathways to help these students complete high school. For a small portion of the highest risk of these youth, a school within a juvenile justice facility is their final touch point with the public education system. Concentrated poverty, inadequate access to quality schools, and unsafe neighborhoods are some of the many challenges that must be addressed in order to better serve Connecticut’s disengaged and disconnected youth. These large-‐scale issues can seem intractable and discourage action by individuals, schools, and communities. However, we believe strongly that significant progress can be made when ideas and commitments from stakeholders across the state combine to generate innovative strategies and solutions. Innovation Challenge Eligibility The pilot phase of the Opportunity Project seeks letters of interest from individuals, non-‐profit organizations, and partnerships. Applicants must have evidence-‐based programs, based on either existing or proposed new work, that aim to support disengaged or disconnected youth in Connecticut towards positive development, educational, and employment outcomes. We hope to receive letters of interest from urban, suburban, and rural communities across the state. Applicants may choose to focus their efforts in one particular neighborhood or community, or a particular region in the state. The three types of applicants are subject to different potential grant awards of up to two years, and a sliding scale of the level of matching funds that would be required before a grant is awarded:
Applicant Tier
Description Range of Annual Grant Award
Expected Match Amount
Individual • A social entrepreneur wishing to create or continue an initiative in response to community demand.
• An individual applicant does not need to be part of a governmental agency or existing non-‐profit organization; applicants may be matched with other applicants or organizations to form strong collaborations for funding consideration.
Up to $1,000 per youth served
No match expected
Organization • An existing governmental agency or non-‐profit organization wishing to create an innovative program or advance an existing one.
Up to $3,000 per youth served
15% match
Partnership • Two or more organizations of any kind that come together to propose an innovative strategy.
Up to $10,000 per youth served
33% match
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• A partnership must identify a lead applicant that is part of a governmental agency or non-‐profit organization.
Innovation Challenge Guidelines Applicants must adhere to the following guidelines:
• Population Served: Each application must focus on improving outcomes for Connecticut’s high school-‐age
youth through age 24 who have not yet graduated from high school, and who are either not enrolled in any school or who are substantially disengaged from the school at which they are enrolled (e.g. low attendance rates, significant behavior challenges, low academic performance). A proposal may focus on the broad population of disconnected youth or disengaged students still in school or a specific subset (e.g. young men of color, recent immigrants, LGBTQ youth, youth in foster care, incarcerated youth, homeless youth, students with disabilities, or others identified in a particular school or community).
• Scale: Applications from organizations or partnerships must demonstrate the capacity to reach at least 75 youth over the first year of their work, anticipating that project implementation will begin by summer/fall 2017. These youth could come from growth of an existing program, or launch of a new initiative. Individual social entrepreneurs must show an ability to effectively engage at least 25 youth in Year 1 (2017-‐18).
• Organizational Background: Applicants in the organizations tier of the Opportunity Project – and lead
applicants of proposals in the partnerships tier – must be part of a governmental unit, as described in Internal Revenue Code Section 170(c)(1), or a 501(c)(3) non-‐profit organization with at least two years of audited financials.
• Guiding Design Principles: Proposals must be informed by guiding principles that research indicate foster positive youth development and resiliency in youth. Along these lines, the Opportunity Project seeks proposals characterized by:
o Caring and trusting relationships between adults and youth; o Engaging activities that enable youth to build academic, career and social-‐emotional skills, and develop
productive persistence; o Opportunities for youth voice and choice, and for youth to make contributions to community; o High expectations for youth, including connections to pathways to achieving educational and
employment outcomes; and o Opportunities for experiences and relationships that help youth expand their understanding of the
potential roles and careers that could be open to them, and educational pathways to achieving these.
The Opportunity Project will elaborate on these guiding design principles in October 2016, with more specific selection criteria to inform applicants’ work.
• Outcomes: Proposals must identify the specific educational, employment, and life outcomes for young people
that applicants believe will result from the project. Proposals must outline specific measures to gauge the effectiveness of the project.
Proposals from individuals (or small informal groups who come together motivated by community needs) are sought to identify and support innovative ways of reaching the hardest-‐to-‐engage youth. These efforts may be smaller in scale and do not need to support an established or ongoing program. Individuals with creative ideas for feasible projects with concrete actions that build community while engaging youth in positive relationships will be considered for the
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Opportunity Project. For example, an individual could propose to organize a basketball league with strong mentorship components for disconnected youth or organize a community outreach program. Individuals may be matched with other applicants or organizations before being invited to develop full proposals for grant funding consideration. Proposals from organizations or partnerships should be more ambitious in scope, engaging more youth and at greater depth. Proposals that reflect collaboration between different types of organizations (e.g. municipal governments, youth development and community-‐based organizations, employers, educational institutions, courts and criminal justice agencies, social service agencies) are strongly encouraged, and will qualify for the partnerships tier of the Opportunity Project. To foster collaboration, the Opportunity Project may seek to match applicants during the evaluation process to form strong designs and collaborations, where ideas seem potentially aligned. Some examples of potential successful partnerships include: a collaboration of business, non-‐profits and schools to help disconnected youth gain relevant workforce, education and life skills, and secure gainful employment; a youth development organization, arts or science organization, municipal department and a high school collaboration to create an outreach and youth leadership program; a collaboration among businesses, a high school and a community agency for mentoring and tutoring of high school students by college students; or a group of rural schools partner together to run a summer program for youth, focusing on skills required to succeed in and out of school. These examples are offered to suggest types of collaborations, but are not meant to limit creativity or innovation. Applicants selected by the Dalio Foundation for grant funding will become partners expected to:
• Maintain Learning Orientation: Design and implement their projects, measure leading indicator data, and
improve their approaches based on youth outcomes, and what they learn over time.
• Share Resources and Data: Collect and share data that demonstrate the outcomes of their projects, as well as best practices and lessons learned. Commit to an open-‐source methodology to share tools and resources with other practitioners.
• Collaborate and Convene: Participate in state-‐wide or regional convenings hosted by the Dalio Foundation, and lead at least one local forum in their community around the needs and promise of Connecticut’s young people who are disengaged or disconnected from high school.
Innovation Challenge Request for Letters of Interest As a first step, interested applicants should submit a letter of interest (up to 4 pages) for consideration, along with a 2-‐3 minute video summarizing the “pitch,” to [email protected] by December 15, 2016. The Opportunity Project will not consider letters of interest or videos that exceed the specified length, are incomplete, or are submitted after the deadline of December 15, 2016. This request for letters of interest is not a commitment to fund any project. At minimum, letters of interest must include:
• Contact Information: Specify whether the applicant is an individual, organization, or partnership. Provide the
applicant’s legal name, mailing address, email address, and phone number. In cases where multiple organizations are collaborating as a partnership, provide the lead applicant’s contact information. If a partnership, include a list of organizations and/or individuals that would partner in implementing the proposed project. We will make a template available at www.ctopportunityproject.org.
• Project Description: Indicate whether the proposal intends to continue or expand an existing program, or
create a new initiative. Specify the target population and geographical area(s) the project aims to benefit.
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Present a clear description of the project, including the number of youth to be served and how they will be identified and recruited. Articulate the theory of change (e.g. who the project targets, what it aims to improve, and how the project will work). Briefly cite any supporting research or evidence of the impact of the project or theory behind it.
• Project Goals: State the measurable goal(s) of the project, and specify the educational, employment, and life outcomes for young people that are expected to result from the project. Propose specific measures to gauge the effectiveness of the project.
• Envisioned Timeline: Incorporate a proposed project programming timeline, beginning in summer/fall 2017 and
lasting for up to two years.
• Proposed Budget: Include an estimate of the overall annual cost to implement the project over two years. For projects requiring matching funds, identify secured and/or likely-‐to-‐be secured funding sources and amounts; it is not necessary, however, to secure matching funds prior to submission.
The “pitch” video is intended to inspire stakeholders to want to support the proposed project, and thus, should articulate a compelling, passionate vision for it. Submitted videos may be shared widely with the general public. Videos may be submitted in any of the following formats: MOV, MPEG4, AVI, MP4, or WMV. We will make specific submission instructions available at www.ctopportunityproject.org. Innovation Challenge Criteria and Selection Process The Dalio Foundation will form a Community Panel of educators, civic leaders, families, young people, and experts in various fields to evaluate letters of interest from applicants, and then invite a select few to develop formal proposals for grant funding consideration. The Community Panel may also function as a matchmaker, helping applicants initially applying as individuals or organizations to form strong collaborations. The Community Panel will make decisions and invite proposals by applying the design principles described above, and a set of specific criteria scheduled for release in October 2016. There will be one set of criteria for individual applicants, and another for organization and partnership applicants. Applicants invited to develop full proposals may receive technical assistance from the Dalio Foundation or its partners in finalizing the full proposal. The Foundation will make final funding decisions. Innovation Challenge Timeline and Process Visit www.ctopportunityproject.org for the most up-‐to-‐date version of the Opportunity Project timeline: September 19, 2016 Innovation challenge pilot launched.
October 2016 Selection criteria released.
November 2016 Convening of potentially interested applicants to share promising ideas, build meaningful relationships, learn from disengaged and disconnected youth and other experts, and answer any questions around the Opportunity Project.
December 15, 2016 Applicants submit letters of interest (up to 4 pages), along with a short video of no more than 3 minutes.
January 2017 Community Panel – comprised of educators, civic leaders, families, young people, and experts in various fields – evaluates letters of interest, and selects a few to develop formal proposals for grant funding consideration by the Dalio Foundation.
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February 2017 Selected finalists are notified and invited to develop full proposals. Finalists will be asked to refine their proposals with specific budgets, implementation plans, and evaluation metrics. Technical assistance may be provided by the Dalio Foundation or its partners.
April 2017 Finalists submit full proposals.
May 2017 Dalio Foundation selects grantees and announces funding decisions.
Summer/Fall 2017 Grantees receive initial grant funding and launch projects.