Annual Report 2004 - Charles Stewart Mott Foundation

PATHWAYS OUT OF POVERTY: OVERVIEW
The Independent Media Institute’s
Strategic Press Information Network (SPIN)
Project nurtures such outcomes by providing
nonprofit, public interest groups with
accessible, affordable communications
consulting, training and networking.
A two-year, $80,000 grant expanded
the San Francisco-based institute’s reach via
the SPIN Academy. The academy offers
community organizing groups individually
tailored communication tools and
strategies, emphasizing clarity, transparency
and effectiveness in message development
and delivery.
Supporting the efforts of local
communities to identify concerns,
formulate solutions and create meaningful,
sustainable progress is also the focus of the
Center for Community Change (CCC).
The Washington, D.C., organization
provides grassroots-driven initiatives around
the country with technical assistance on
issues of community and organizational
development, community organizing and
public policy.
A three-year, $650,000 general purposes
grant to CCC helps ensure that the voices of
low-income families and communities
continue to be heard.
SPECIAL INITIATIVES
Nurturing the capacity of youth to avoid
pregnancy and explore life options was the
purpose of a one-year, $873,782 grant to the
New York-based Children’s Aid Society (CAS)
for the CAS-Carrera Program Strategic
Growth and Expansion Initiative. The
initiative, with $3.6 million in Mott support
since its launch in 2001, has created five
regional training centers to help communities
establish local teen pregnancy prevention
programs based on the CAS-Carrera model.
That model’s holistic approach has proven to
reduce pregnancy rates among high-risk
adolescent females, particularly those living in
low-income communities.
This is the final grant planned by Mott
in the field of teen pregnancy prevention,
which has received funding since 1970.
Helping low-income individuals and
families work toward a life outside the
boundaries of poverty is an important
outcome of the field of micro-enterprise.
A micro-enterprise is a small business that
has fewer than five employees, is started with
less than $35,000 in capital, and generally
lacks access to commercial financing.
A one-year, $325,000 grant to the
Corporation for Enterprise Development in
Washington, D.C., for the Allowing
Enterprise: Federal Micro-Enterprise Policy
Project, supported ongoing fundraising,
public policy development and partnership
building activities by state-level microenterprise
organizations. Such activities are
essential to helping create and sustain
business opportunities for low-income
entrepreneurs.
2004 ANNUAL REPORT
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