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How is Communities In Schools different from other
programs that help kids prepare for life?
Communities In Schools is the nation's leading
community-based organization helping kids prepare for life. CISP
is distinguished by our results, our philosophy, our
model and our advocacy.
Our Results: When it comes to helping
kids, CISP has a track record with a focus on results. We provide
access to services for over 1,000 young people on an annual basis:
- We celebrate student success: increased graduation and stay-in-school
rates; increased attendance; better academic performance
- We are part of the largest stay-in-school network in America
- We form effective partnerships, and create unique programs
with companies including CS Floors, Costco, Geneva Foundation,
Greater Pierce County Community Network, Milgard Manufacturing,
Pierce County Department of Community Services, Rotary Club
of Gig Harbor, The Threshold Group, LLC, and many more
- We have over six years of experience with programs and activities
in the greater Gig Harbor/Key Peninsula area
Our Philosophy: CISP believes that every
child needs and deserves:
- A personal, one-on-one relationship with a caring adult
- A safe place to learn and grow
- A healthy start and a healthy future
- A marketable skill to use upon graduation, and
- A chance to give back to peers and community
Our Process: CISP is a community-builder
delivering resources to kids.
- We partner with families, schools, and community leaders
to create a support system for students
- We utilize a committed field staff to customize, develop
and facilitate effective local programs
- We successfully garner support from businesses, organizations
and government, social service providers and volunteer groups
- We work in partnership with public schools - principals,
superintendents, teachers and administrators
Our Advocacy: Founder Bill Milliken
and the CIS network are influential advocates for children in need.
We support:
- Bridging the digital divide
- Obtaining a high school education as a necessary part of
preparing for life
- Providing marketable skills for youth
- Kids are the "solution" not the "problem"
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How is CISP different from other school-community
partnerships? Do we really need CISP if we already have community
involvement in schools (with a coordinator of services, community
voice in school planning, local education fund, etc.)?
Viewing student success as everybody's responsibility,
CISP is not a school initiative but a community-school collaboration.
As a community-wide organization, CISP has a greater capacity to
leverage community resources into schools and to serve as a neutral
coordinator of the relationship between service providers and schools
than a school-based organization may have.
While many communities have formed local partnerships
with the public schools, often their mission may be quite different
(e.g., to promote public schools or advocate for school reform),
and their work may include little or no service connection. In other
communities, a school-community partnership may be considering "best
practices" on how to work together for the benefit of youth. In
either case, the CISP process may be a valuable complement to or
outgrowth of the community's efforts.
Where a local collaborative already exists
with a mission and operation similar to CISP, affiliation with the
CISP network may be appropriate.
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Would CISP-brokered services be available to the
entire student body, regardless of income? And how can CISP work
with an agency that only targets consumers in lower-income brackets?
Yes, if the community has adopted a comprehensive
CIS approach. With a comprehensive or whole-school strategy, appropriate
services are made available to any and all students, based on need
for those services. Some communities have CIS "academies" or "case
management" strategies that generally affect smaller populations
of at-risk students. Agencies which must restrict services based
on income can still be utilized to provide programs for eligible
youth; other providers are sought for non-eligible students.
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Exactly what sorts of services do CISP programs broker?
CISP publishes a report that contains programs
and services, along with many other facts about CISP. In our 2005-2006
report, 17 categories of services were cited, with mentoring/tutoring,
academic support, prevention of risky behaviors, and special events
being the most widely brokered by CISP local programs.
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Are there start-up costs involved in developing CISP
in local schools?
Under a comprehensive approach, there need
be no out-of-pocket cost to individual schools to implement CIS.
The school assigns CISP site-coordination duties to an existing
school employee (e.g., assistant principal or school counselor).
This individual works with and is trained by the CISP staff to prioritize
students' needs, schedule services and maintain appropriate records;
that staff person assumes these tasks in addition to their other
duties.
A community's short-term investment in establishing
a local CISP initiative consists of primarily a local liaison, who
may be paid or a volunteer, who might be temporarily released from
othe duties by a local collaborator or is perhaps a retiree. Assuming
donated office space and administrative support, other costs of
development are regular meetings of the local steering committee
and travel to CISP training.
The cost to our community of sustaining the
CISP collaboration is minimal to non-existant. CISP operations began
and are maintained with a single executive director and an administrative
assistant. Salaries and benefits fit our community standards; office
rent and supplies are largely in-kind contributions; our budget
includes travel, insurance and other miscellaneous costs. CISP operations
may require more staff, at a ratio of about one additional agency/school
coordinator for every 8-10 schools added. In this case, the CISP
process leverages services worth many times the CISP budget into
our local schools.
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How is CISP funded?
Communities In Schools Of Peninsula, a 501(c)(3),
is privately and publicly funded through a variety of corporate,
foundation and government grants.
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How does the CISP process overcome political divisions
and "turf" issues?
Collaboration must be "win-win". The process
of developing CISP engages community leaders to work in new ways
toward a shared vision. It works because all key players feel ownership
in our successes and deficiencies. The process allows our collaborators
to carry out their various programs and missions in response to
that vision with the CISP collaboration acting as a neutral facilitator
and broker of whatever resources participants bring to the table.
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How is the exchange of confidential information between
agencies, schools and CISP handled?
Schools and agencies involved make these decisions
and have them written out in the school-agency Collaborative Agreement.
Generally, schools refer students to services based on their own
records without releasing those records to CISP. Likewise, CISP
maintains its policy on confidentiality when working with individual
students while sharing aggregate information on services rendered
and outcomes achieved. In the comprehensive approach, CISP asks
for both schools and CISP personnel and volunteers to furnish aggregate
statistics on numbers of students served, services provided, and
any general evaluation and outcome data.
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Is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit like CISP necessary to develop
CISP-like programs? Could CISP-like services be developed within
the framework of an existing nonprofit?
Based on experiences of the national CIS network,
CISP strongly discourages a separate nonprofit devoting itself to
a CISP-like mission. Choosing to "umbrella" the Communities In Schools
initiative under a programmatic organization distorts the perception
of CISP as a neutral brokering agency and limits program effectiveness.
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What is the involvement of CIS National at CISP's
site? Is final "approval" needed from CIS National for each program?
One of the benefits of joining CISP is access
to training and technical assistance of CIS Inc. CISP staff are
available to assist our community in the development of local programs.
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What are the benefits of belonging to the CIS network?
Encompassing a network of over 150 local CIS
operations and affiliates, CIS provides local partnerships and the
opportunity to connect with school-community efforts nationwide,
learning from best practices.
CIS offers national and regional training and
conferences, plus on-site training tailored to local needs. Technical
assistance is available through ongoing relationships with state
offices and regional Field Support Centers along with online resources.
Among the possible enhancements to local efforts
are regular news updates and information about the opportunities
(such as effective programs or federal grants) the CIS Global Networked
Campus and information management tools, relationships with prominent
national CIS partners (including America's Promise, Cisco Systems,
and HUD), and whenever possible, access to pass-through funds and
participation in special projects and research.
The process of CIS Quality and Standards review
is helpful for our community in both refining our programs and communicating
our successes.
Finally, the increasing recognition of CIS
by funders and federal agencies is valuable to our community by
virtue of the CISP partnership with a known leader in the stay-in-school
movement.
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What data does CISP have to show the effectiveness
of the CISP process?
As the nation's oldest and largest stay-in-school
network, CIS has an impressive track record. CISP programs increase
attendance, increase graduation rates, improve GPA's and reduced
incidences of discipline and dropout for our students served. Moreover,
new studies to evaluate the complicated issue of CISP program outcomes
are under way.
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Can I volunteer with CISP?
Absolutely! Dedicated community volunteers
are the bedrock of CISP programs. Potential volunteers please e-mail
or telephone our local office with your interests, abilities and
time constraints, and we will coordinate an appropriate activity
for you.
Change a Life...Be a Mentor...read with
a child - or - help a young person do math one hour, once a week,
at a local school Click Here or Call
(253) 884-5733
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