2010 Capacity Building Award Announcement

National Fatherhood Initiative (NFI) is pleased to announce 25 capacity-building awards, one award in the amount of $25,000 for each of the organizations below. The purpose of these awards is to develop these organizations' capacity to effectively serve families and fathers in their communities. On February 1-5, 2010, two staff leaders from each of these awarded organizations will participate in a comprehensive, 40 hour "Certification College," where National Fatherhood Initiative senior staff and other expert consultants will provide technical assistance and training in the areas of leadership development, program development, organizational development, and community engagement. The organizations will use the awards for targeted work in these same areas.

2010 Capacity-Building Awardees:

Becoming Parents Program, Inc. (Seattle, WA)
Child & Family Services of the Upper Peninsula (Marquette, MI)
Clinical Outcomes Group (Pottsville, PA)
Community Action, Inc. (Janesville, WI)
Creciendo Unidos/Growing Together (Phoenix, AZ )
Cuyahoga County Fatherhood Initiative (Cleveland, OH)
Family Central (North Lauderdale, FL)
Fatherhood Initiative of Polk County (Des Moines, IA)
Fresno County Healthy Marriage Coalition, Inc. (Fresno, CA)
House of Pride (Dover, DE)
Human Resources Agency of New Britain, Inc. (New Britain, CT)
Kansas City Community Center (Kansas City, MO)
Las Cumbres Community Services, Inc. (Espanola, NM )
Marriage Resource Center of Carroll County (Westminster, MD)
Masjid Bilal, Inc. (Richmond, VA)
Metropolitan Area Group for Igniting Civilization (Chicago, IL)
Millennial Mentoring Youth Academy, LLC (Suffolk, VA)
New Jersey Physicians Advisory Group (Fanwood, NJ)
Refined By Fire Ministries, Inc. (Jackson, LA)
Sandusky Valley Domestic Violence Shelter, Inc. (Fostoria, OH)
South Carolina State Head Start Association (Hartsville, SC)
Spirit of Peace Community Development Corp. (Dayton, OH)
UIH Family Partners (Trenton, NJ)
United American Indian Involvement, Inc. (Los Angeles, CA)
Wiregrass Hope Group (Dothan, AL)

GRANT SUMMARY

Since 1994, National Fatherhood Initiative (NFI) has worked to improve the well being of children by increasing the proportion of children growing up with involved, responsible, and committed fathers. It has done so by:

Educating and inspiring all Americans—especially fathers—through public awareness campaigns, careful research, and providing other resources;
Equipping and developing leaders of national, state, and community fatherhood initiatives through curricula, training, and technical assistance; and
Engaging every sector of society through strategic alliances and partnerships.

The Opportunity

To this end, with support from the US Department of Health and Human Services' Office of Family Assistance, NFI announces availability of 25 awards, each in the amount of $25,000, for local community-based organizations, faith-based organizations, and other grassroots fatherhood agencies. Through a competitive bidding process, top applicants will receive funds for the specific purpose of increasing capacity to develop their fatherhood programming, and to improve their financial sustainability by becoming more familiar with—and better qualified to receive—federal or private philanthropic support.

Some examples of fatherhood programs could include, but are not limited to, the following:

Parenting education programs for new and expecting fathers, teen fathers, fathers in need of general parenting skills, or fathers with special needs children
Programs providing marriage counseling, relationship counseling and/or divorce counseling
Support groups for stay-at-home and/or single fathers
Programs for incarcerated fathers
Programs providing court-mandated fathering skills training
Job skills training and/or job placement programs that include a fatherhood component

Awardees must agree by signing a Memorandum of Agreement to use their funds to send two staff members to participate in an intensive, weeklong "Certification College," led by fatherhood experts from NFI and private consultants who have past government experience. Awardees will also receive follow-up technical assistance from NFI, including phone consultations, e-mail follow-up, occasional web-based seminars and other resources. Finally, selected organizations will participate in a two-day mini-conference, including assessment and evaluation that measures their improvement.

Funds may not be used for direct programming costs, but will instead be granted on a reimbursement basis* for each awardee's leadership development, program development, organizational development, and connections with the community (including outreach to local media, public officials, and Board Development). In other words, these grants are designed to help build the capacity of grassroots organizations-including both community-based and faith-based organizations-enabling awardees to build their organizational capacity, to more effectively deliver existing or future services promoting responsible fatherhood in local communities.

*Funds will be reimbursed on a monthly basis via a required reimbursement submission process.

Staff members from selected organizations will receive technical assistance from NFI, to improve their programs and cultivate "promising practices" in their leadership development, organizational structure, programming trends and community connections.

Eligibility

Eligible applicants must not be receiving any other funds from current Promoting Responsible Fatherhood programming, sponsored by the Office of Family Assistance at the Department of Health and Human Services.

Grant Benefits

To support the future delivery of responsible fatherhood services at the local level, awardees will receive:

Formal training and technical assistance to strengthen site capacity, in:

program development
leadership development
organizational development, and
community engagement

Participation by two staff leaders in a national Certification College for Responsible Fatherhood, to assess program strengths, develop a working budget and to begin working toward targeted capacity improvement in two of the four key areas of fatherhood capacity-building noted above.
Up to 40 total hours of follow-up technical assistance, over a period of ten months (December - September 2010).
$25,000 in reimbursable financial support for each organization, including technical assistance, conferences and other resources.