Connection
OPPORTUNITIES | |
We're happy to share these items of interest from around our local network. Please e-mail us any opportunities you would like to be featured in future editions! (The Nonprofit Connection usually goes out during the first ten days of the month; we typically don't include fundraisers.)
Training
OPPORTUNITIES
+ "Transform 'Fundraising' Into 'Philanthropy'," Offered by Capital Development Services, April 18th, 9 am to 4:30 pm, Community Foundation of Greater Greensboro, $120. Join the experts at Capital Development Services, a HandsOn Consulting Partner, for a 1-day workshop exploring how your organization can make the transformation from "fundraising" to "philanthropy." Topics covered include trends and tools, prospect research, leadership giving, the art of the ask, and a lead/donor panel discussion. They recommend one staff person and one board member attend from each organization that wants to participate. More details and registration are online.
+ "Eating Well: For Ourselves, For Our Neighbors, For Our Planet," 2012 Critical Issues Seminar hosted by the NC Council of Churches; Thursday, April 19th, 8:30 am-3:30 pm, St. Paul's Episcopal Church; $25. Everyone eats. How and from where we get that food, how much is available to us, how it is grown, and what happens when there's not enough all have implications for our world and its inhabitants. This seminar will explore topics like the economics of hunger in the midst of plenty, the connection between food and water insecurity and peace, buying local, food and spirituality, issues of climate change and personal health, and more. Rev. Michael Curry, Bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of North Carolina will be the featured speaker. For more information, and to register, click here.
+ One Week Left to Register for the Blue Cross Blue Shield Foundation's Healthy Community Institute! The Spring 2012 Healthy Community Institute for Nonprofit Excellence (HCI) will be held April 4-5 at the New Bern Convention Center in New Bern. By all reports, the Institute can have an significant impact on your organization's learning and development. Registering organizations must be committed to making a change in how they are currently operating in order to improve organizational effectiveness. A pre- and post assessment are also required to inform the BCBSNC Foundation of the growth and organizational changes that have been made since participating. This is a year-long commitment. The Institute is FREE! However, a $250 deposit check must be sent to reserve your space. The deposit will be
returned on the 2nd day after the minimum requirements of Institute participation have been met (see website for additional details). Travel expenses and overnight stay are the responsibility of the nonprofit organization. For more information and registration, go to the Foundation's website. Deadline for applications is March 16th! The Fall HCI will be held October 18-19 in Concord.
+ NC Center for Nonprofits' 2012 Public Policy Forum and Nonprofits Day, May 29th-30th, Raleigh. Learn and network with leaders at the Public Policy Forum on Tuesday, May 29th then use what you learn to connect with your legislators on Wednesday, May 30 at NC Nonprofits Day! The Public Policy Forum will be held at the McKimmon Center in Raleigh and features an entire day of workshops and discussions about public policy, civic engagement, and advocacy, along with a networking lunch. The cost is $50 for Center Members. NC Nonprofits Day is your chance to advocate with your elected officials at the Legislative Building in Raleigh. They'll hold a quick briefing at the NC Museum of History at 8:30 a.m. in case you can't attend the Public Policy Forum. NC Nonprofits Day is free but please register so they can keep you in the loop on everything you need to know to prepare. These two days will be a great follow-up to the local discussions and events that will be happening in March and May. More information and registration is online.
+ FREE Communication Effectiveness Webinars Offered for Nonprofits! Blackbaud, Constant Contact, and TechSoup have teamed up to offer live webinars that will share tips on how to better engage your supporters online, build a communication plan, and have a successful multi-channel engagement strategy. Topics that will be covered include: A Communication Plan and Tactics to Engage Supporters Online; The Anatomy of Engaging Email Campaigns; Effective Marketing Tips and Tricks for Clicks; and The Right Message, The Right People, The Right Time. These are being offered as four, one-hour webinars, held between March 28 - June 14. For more information and to register, go online.
Funding
OPPORTUNITIES
+ Application Deadline Rapidly Approaching for the Women's Fund of Winston-Salem's Teen Pregnancy Micro-Grants! As you may know, the Women's Fund of Winston-Salem has made a special commitment to preventing teen pregnancy. Last month, they released an issue brief entitled Teen Pregnancy and Parenting: Community Concern, Community Solutions, which looks at the impact of teen pregnancy and early parenting on the larger community and examines how our entire community can take shared responsibility in addressing this issue. You can download a copy of the brief here. In their last full funding cycle, the Fund's members approved a $20,000 set aside to support a teen-pregnancy prevention mini-grant program targeted to community-based organizations as a first step to tackling this critical community issue. You can find the grant guidelines here; applications are due March 15th! This is a great opportunity for any community-based or faith-based organization that works with youth and/or parents.
+ Applications Now Being Accepted by United Way of Forsyth County for the 2012 Joel A. Weston, Jr. Memorial Award! The winner of the Joel A. Weston, Jr. Memorial Award for Excellence in Nonprofit Management will receive a $10,000 stipend from the Joel A. Weston, Jr. Memorial Award Endowment Fund. Agencies are judged on the quality of financial and personnel management, services to clients, marketing and other significant achievements related to organizational excellence. For more information, please plan to attend an information session on Wednesday, March 28th, 10 am to 11 am at Senior Services. To RSVP, or to learn
more about the application requirements, please contact Noelle Stevenson at 721-9336. Deadline for applications is 5 pm on April 25th!
+ GlaxoSmithKline's $40,000 IMPACT Awards Now Available to Forsyth Nonprofits! With North Carolina continuing to face deep cuts in healthcare programs, three new counties are joining the list of those eligible for a GlaxoSmithKline IMPACT Award. For the fourth year, GlaxoSmithKline and the Triangle Community Foundation will award
$40,000 each to up to ten groups that set an outstanding example in providing access
to healthcare. The fourth annual GlaxoSmithKline IMPACT Awards will honor community nonprofit
organizations that excel in
providing access to healthcare. To qualify for a GlaxoSmithKline IMPACT Award, applicants must: be physically located in an eligible county; provide access to healthcare services (primary mission and resource allocation); have annual total operating expenses between $160,000 and $3 million, as documented in the organization's most recent fiscal year financial statement; and have been in existence as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization for at least five years as of 2012. For more details and to apply, please visit the
Partnerships at 919-483-2669. Deadline for applications is March 28th!
+ Enter the 4th Annual Clifford BE BIG! in Your Community Contest! BE BIG™
is a multiyear campaign that invites everyone, big and small, to take action and raise awareness for how Clifford's BIG Ideas (Share, Be Kind, Help Others, Be a Good Friend, Play Fair, Have Respect, Be Truthful, Believe in Yourself, Work Together and Be Responsible) can make the world a better place. As part of the BE BIG campaign, the contest will award one $5,000 community grant to bring their BIG Idea to life. In addition, $5,000 in community grants of $1,000 each will be awarded to five (5) first place winning ideas. Last year's Grand Prize Winning BIG Idea was to transform an empty school rooftop into an eco-friendly garden
playground. Your BIG Idea might just be next! Scholastic and HandsOn Network will work with the winners to bring their Big Ideas to life! Everyone is invited--parents, kids, teachers or community leaders-- to submit your ideas now through June 22nd! You'll find contest forms and entry rules on Scholastic's website.
+ State Farm Youth Advisory Board Grants Fund Service-Learning Projects! The State Farm Youth Advisory Board is currently accepting applications for service-learning projects between $25,000 and $100,000 that are designed to create sustainable change in local communities across the United States and Canada. Applying organizations must be a public K-12, charter, or higher education institution; non-profit organizations are also eligible if they are able to demonstrate how they plan to impact student achievement within the public K-12 curriculum. Projects must address the root cause of the following issue areas: Access to Higher Education / Closing the Achievement Gap; Financial Literacy; Community Safety and Natural Disaster Preparedness; Social Health & Wellness Issues; and Environmental Responsibility. More information can be found online; deadline for applications is May 4th!
+ KaBoom Offers Funding for New Playgrounds! The mission of KaBOOM! is to create great playspaces throughout the United States through the participation and leadership of communities. They are now offering Let's Play Community Construction Grants of $15,000 to be used toward the purchase of playground equipment that will be built using the KaBOOM! community-build model. Eligible applicants include municipalities, neighborhood associations, schools, day care centers, and nonprofit organizations without a playground or with existing equipment that is unsafe for children to use. Applicants can start the process by going online and registering their project. Application deadline is March 16th!
+ The Kate B. Reynolds Charitable Trust Seeks Part-Time Communications Director! The Trust is excited to add a Communications Director to their team in the next few months. They are interested in applicants who can support their daily communications tasks, in addition to developing communications strategies with their divisions and Trust-wide. Specifically, the Communications Director will be responsible for producing routine collateral items (both print and online); managing the Trust's website and online presence; creating and executing public relations strategies; and providing communications support to staff, leadership, and grantees. Qualified applicants will have a minimum of five years experience, and strong written and oral communications skills. An advanced degree (MA, MPH, MSPH) is preferred. You can find a full position description on their website. Applicants should email an attached cover letter, resumé, and one or two representative samples of their work (up to 20MB) to Shirley Womack by close of business on March 30th! The letter should describe the applicant's experience and skills relevant to the position description. No calls, please. Interviews will begin in April with an estimated start date in June.
+ "Celebrating People in Action," National Volunteer Week Materials Now Available!
|
HandsOn
JOIN / GIVE NOW
|
HandsOn NWNC invites nonprofits to financially support our mission to build the capacity of local nonprofits and increase volunteerism. In exchange for a minimum $50 donation, our Supporting Partners receive a variety of discounts on our program offerings and other special opportunities, that can lead to savings as great as $800 per year! Vendors and consultants who work with nonprofits are also encouraged to become Supporting Partners. Join HandsOn and Become a Supporter
|
|
|
|
March 2012- Vol 5, Issue 3
|
Greetings!
| |
Yay! March is here, and spring is finally in the air! March also means that after many, many months of planning and training, we have finally launched HandsOn Connect!
 This powerful, new online volunteer tool will make getting connected easier for volunteers, while helping nonprofits track, communicate with and manage their volunteers and volunteer opportunities more effectively. We held two training sessions about HandsOn Connect last month, but because the tool is so powerful (and, therefore, a little harder to wrap your hands around,) we'll be offering ongoing learning labs on the last Friday of every month for the rest of 2012. This way, we'll get a chance to all learn from each other in an informal atmosphere to best harness the fantastic power that this tool brings to our community. Our first lab will be on March 30th; you'll find more details and registration information below. You can access the HandsOn Connect portion of our site two ways--either by clicking the "Volunteer Now" link on our homepage or by going directly to hoc.handsonnwnc.org.
March also means that we're deep into the Spring semester of Nonprofit Essentials classes. As we are finishing up this 2011-2012 year, we're beginning to plan the 2012-2013 year. That will be the third year of the series (how did that happen?) and not only are we hoping to strengthen the current series, but also explore ways to possibly offer a "201" version of some of these classes. This second series may be directed to graduates of Nonprofit Essentials or to those who already have more experience in the field. We're working closely with our partner, the Institute for Public Engagement at Wake Forest University, to explore the possibilities. If you're interested in such a series, or have an idea for a 201 topic, we'd love to hear from you!
Finally, we hope to see many of you at our Best Practice Breakfast later this month. This quarterly breakfasts are a great time to connect with your peers, all while learning more about a best practice in our field. This month, we'll be talking about succession planning, a hot topic that we know is on the minds of many of our local, long-time Executive Directors. Please join us for what will certainly be a thought-provoking and invigorating discussion. Best of all, the breakfast is FREE for Supporting Partners, and we're charging just $5 to everybody else. How can you afford *not* to come?!?
Take time to smell the flowers blooming this month, 
 Executive Director
|
|
Nonprofit Essentials 2011-2012:
Collaboration
|
Thursday, March 15th, Noon to 4:30 pm
Location: WFU campus, Reynolda Hall, Room 301. Parking is available on Davis Field. For directions to the Reynolda Hall and to Davis Field, see map.
Saving time, money and resources through collaborations with other organizations sounds like a good idea, but what are the key principles that should be considered? Learn best practices  for nonprofit collaborations and how to make these partnerships legally sound and successful. The class will be taught by Steve Virgil, Director of Wake Forest University's Institute for Public Engagement. Steve is an Associate Clinical Professor of Law and Director of the School of Law's Community Law and Business Clinic, where Wake Forest clinical students offer legal services to non-profit organizations and entrepreneurs who create new businesses in low-wealth areas in Forsyth County. Before joining the faculty in 2008, Steve directed a similar law clinic at Creighton University School of Law; practiced law with the Urban Development Office of Cleveland Legal Aid in Ohio and the Kutak Rock law firm in Omaha; and clerked for the Honorable George W. White, Chief Judge, U.S. District Court, Northern District of Ohio. He is the founder and General Counsel of the Great Plains Environmental Law Center and a former National Association for Public Interest Law Equal Justice Fellow with the Nebraska Appleseed Center. Cost: $35 per person for Supporting Partners/ $45 all others. $300 for all nine classes! (This is the sixth class of the series; you may begin at any point. Signing up for the full series is a great option for organizations that have several employees who could benefit from taking different courses. Learn more about our Nonprofit Essentials series here.) The cost includes take-home materials and a networking lunch with your peers.
|
|
Winter 2012 Best Practice Breakfast:
Succession Planning for a Sustainable Future
| |
Wednesday, March 28th, 8:00 am to 9:30 am
Location: Winston-Salem First, (formerly First Assembly,) 3730 University Parkway (see map)
We're very excited to host our next Best Practice Breakfast on a topic that we've heard a lot about from our partners over the past year! Change - sometimes surprisingly fast change - remains the one constant we can count on. Despite this, many organizations fail to prepare for the most predictable change of all - the departure of their executive or other key leaders. While succession planning may sound like a daunting task, there's good news: you can complete the basics - an emergency backup plan and a board-adopted succession policy - in one to three months.
This workshop, delivered in partnership with TransitionGuides, will help provide participants with a blueprint to get started and give an overview of systems and strategy to create a more "leaderful" culture in your organization - one focused on developing and maximizing your most valuable asset, your human capital.
Raven Consulting Group President, Jeanie Duncan, will be the presenter for the breakfast. Jeanie is recognized as a guiding presence in transforming the way organizations think and operate to improve performance
and achieve goals. Through a seasoned blend of strategic consultation, assessment, facilitation, and professional coaching, Jeanie guides organizational transformation and increases people's capacity to lead it. Before launching Raven Consulting Group in 2011, she served the nonprofit sector for 20 years in various executive leadership roles - most recently as President and CEO of the United Arts Council of Greater Greensboro. Jeanie holds her BA in Communication Studies from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, the CFRE designation from CFRE International, and a Certificate in Non-Profit Management from Duke University. Her board service includes the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, Arts North Carolina, and Americans for the Arts.
Cost: FREE! to Supporting Partners/ $5 all others. Cost includes a light breakfast and take home materials.
(Not sure if you're a Supporting Partner? You can view the list on our website.)
|
|
HandsOn Connect Learning Lab
| |
Friday, March 30th, Noon to 1:30 pm
Location: Winston-Salem First, (formerly First Assembly,) 3730 University Parkway (see map)
To help us all get the most out of our new HandsOn Connect technology, we've decided to offer monthly learning labs that will provide in-depth, "hands on" training that will benefit all of us. These sessions will be held at lunch on the last Friday of each month, and will provide an informal avenue to share best practices between peers. We welcome participation from both those who already have a HandsOn Connect account, as well as those of you who might be interested in creating one.
In each session, we'll be using the Partner Staff Training Portal as a guide, plus they'll be time for specific troubleshooting and Q&A. If you have a laptop, feel free to bring it with you to take advantage of Winston-Salem First's wi-fi capability. Otherwise, you'll be able to follow along on the big screen.
Cost: FREE! Bring your own lunch, and we'll provide drinks and dessert. Helpful hint: WSFirst has an excellent lunch counter right inside their lobby where you can pick up something yummy to bring into the lab.
Registration will be online by Monday, March 12th.
|
|
Nonprofit Essentials 2011-2012:
Evaluation
|
Tuesday, April 26th, Noon to 4:30 pm
Location: WFU campus, Reynolda Hall, Room 301. Parking is available on Davis Field. For directions to the Reynolda Hall and to Davis Field, see map.
The nonprofit sector is increasingly under pressure to show meaningful results. This class will examine different evaluation models and lead you through the process of designing an approach to measure programs, creating meaningful measures, collecting and analyzing data, generating a report and communicating results to document impact, improve services, and support fundraising efforts.
The class will be taught by Doug Easterling, Ph.D., currently Associate Professor with the Department of Social Sciences & Health Policy Division of Public Health Sciences, Wake Forest University Health Sciences.Dr. Easterling previously served as the Director of Research and Evaluation at The Colorado Trust (1992-1999), where he managed the process through which the foundation's community-based initiatives were evaluated. The outcomes and lessons from those initiatives are described in Promoting Health at the Community Level (Sage Publications, 2003), which he co-edited. Since returning to academia in 1999, he has evaluated foundation-sponsored initiatives designed to promote community-based problem solving, social capital, and improved race relations. Through workshops, presentations, papers and consultation, he has helped a number of foundations develop their strategies for evaluation, environmental scanning, and organizational learning. Along with Ross Conner, he co-teaches the evaluation module for the Health Forum's Fellowship programs.
Cost: $35 per person for Supporting Partners/ $45 all others. $300 for all nine classes! (This is the seventh class of the series; you may begin at any point. Signing up for the full series is a great option for organizations that have several employees who could benefit from taking different courses. Learn more about our Nonprofit Essentials series here.) The cost includes take-home materials and a networking lunch with your peers.
|
|
NEWS YOU CAN USE
Share Your Volunteer Story and Get a Chance to Win a Alaskan Cruise!
| |
|
|
NEWS YOU CAN USE
TechSoup Wants to Hear From You!
|
For those of you who don't know, TechSoup is an online resource for nonprofits looking for technology advice, hardware and software at minimal cost. A nonprofit themselves, they provide other nonprofits with technology that empowers them to fulfill their missions and serve their communities.
In order to serve all of us better, TechSoup wants to learn more about how your nonprofits currently uses traditional and cloud-based technology, and about your plans for the future. The survey is short, and should take you only 15 minutes to complete. It is intended for anyone who has responsibility for recommending, purchasing or managing IT products or services at a nonprofit. All ranges of IT experience is welcome: from accidental techies to IT directors.
By better understanding the tools you currently use and your future plans, TechSoup will be able to work with their corporate donor partners to provide all of us with the technology resources we need to operate at our full potential. The survey closes March 23rd! They'll be sharing the results in a white paper later in the spring.
|
|
FEATURED CONSULTING PARTNER
Raven Consulting Group
|
On a rotating basis, we feature one of our Consulting/Vendor Partners in our newsletter, to share with you some of the resources that our network of experienced consultants and vendors can bring to your organization. To learn more about becoming a Consulting/Vendor Partner, please check out our website.
Raven Consulting Group specializes in working with individuals, teams, and organizations in the areas of navigating change and leadership development. More specifically, this includes:
- Strategy | Sustainability Planning
- Executive Transition | Succession Planning
- Interim Leadership
- Board & Staff Development
- Leadership Coaching
- Workshops
Raven Consulting Group President, Jeanie Duncan, founded the firm after 20 years of executive roles in the nonprofit sector, most recently as President & CEO of the United Arts Council of Greater Greensboro.
"I enjoy having the opportunity to help organizations move through significant transitions and realize their full potential," says Duncan. "Balancing and assessing complex organization dynamics while moving through change is how I can best serve my clients."
|
|
We Make it Easy to Make a Difference!
|
|
