# Presentation: 686301

## Safe and Drug-Free Schools

**Safe and Drug-Free Schools**
**Mentoring Programs**
**CFDA # 84.184**

**U.S. Department of Education**
**Center for Faith-Based and Community Initiatives**
- www.ed.gov/faithandcommunity

## Program Purpose

-  Assist children in receiving support and
-    guidance from a mentor
-  Improve students’ academic performance
-  Improve students’ interpersonal relationships
-  Reduce dropout rate
-  Reduce juvenile delinquency and gang
-     involvement

## Competition Overview

-  Application deadline:  May 23, 2007
-  Submission format:  Paper or electronic
-  Grants.gov is optional not mandatory
-  Estimated number of awards:  198
-  Estimated award range:  $100,000—200,000
-  No matching requirement
-  Grant period:  3 years

## Eligible Applicants

-  Local Education Agencies (LEAs)
-  Nonprofit organizations
-  Partnerships between LEAs and nonprofits

- 			  _Note_:
- This competition is open to only organizations
- that meet the above criteria and do not have a
- currently active mentoring grant.

## Absolute Priority

**Address the academic and social needs of**
**at-risk youth by providing funds to **
**increase the number of **_**school-based**_** **
**mentoring programs that target  **
**middle school students (grades 4****th****-8****th****)**
**and provide them with mentors**

- Only applicants that address the absolute
- priority will be considered for funding

## Competitive Priority

-  Consortium of applicants includes at least
-      one Local Education Agency (LEA) and one
-      Community Based Organization (CBO) other
-      than a school or
-  At least one private school that qualifies as a
-      CBO & at least one other CBO not a school that
-      provides services to youth and families

- Applicants meeting this priority will
- receive additional 5 points to their total score

## Target Population

-  Living in rural or high-crime areas
-  Troubled home environments
-  Attend schools with violence problems
-  Most at risk of
-  Educational failure
-  Dropping out of school
-  Involvement in criminal or delinquent activity
-  Lacking strong role models

- Must serve same cohort of students for life
- of project and onto high school when possible

## Applicant Eligibility

- (Requirements)

-  Identify all agencies in the consortium
-  Outline roles, responsibilities, activities of each
-  Be specific and include budget details
-  CBOs applying must provide this as well as
-      a signed letter of agreement by the authorized
-      reps of the CBO and a private school or LEA
-  Include a signed assurance that it will establish
-     clear goals and collect data/report data to
-     program’s performance indicators

## GPRA

-  *Government Performance & Results Act*
-  *Requires specific performance measures*
-      *for all programs*
-  *Applicants must align their project*
-      *goals and objectives to program’s *
*     **performance measures/indicators*

## Performance Indicator

- #1

-   % of student/mentor matches that are
-        sustained for a period of twelve months
-        will increase

## Performance Indicator

- #2

-   % of  mentored students who demonstrate
-        improvement in core academic subjects
-        as measured by GPA after 12 months will
-        increase

## Performance Indicators

- #3

-   % of mentored students whose number
-        of unexcused absences will decrease

## Application Outline

-  ED 424 “face page”
-  ED 524 budget form/narrative
-  One Page Abstract
-  Table of Contents
-  Application Narrative
-  Certifications and Assurances
-  Appendix
-  Survey

## Grant Writing 

- Grant Writing
- Suggestions

** ****Clear, concise, and detailed**
** ****Your own PROFESSIONAL STYLE**
** ****Utilizes up to date research and stats**
** ****Persuades and informs the reviewers**
**Aligned with statute/purpose**
** ****Plots out life of the grant **

## Budgeting the Proposal

-  Complete 524 Parts A & B for life of project
-  A for all federal dollars; B for all non-federal
-      in-kind support including cash.
-  Narrative is to clarify all costs—quick and to
-      the point.  Not part of the narrative
- All items must be **allowable, allocable,** and
-     **reasonable**

- The more you understand the costs of the grant,
- the stronger proposal you will have

## Cost Concerns

-  Mentors can not be paid
-  Only purchase items necessary for the project
-      and not the grantee’s day to day operations
-  Support for litigation is unallowable
-  Construction is a no no
-  Mentoring Grant—8% indirect cost rate or
-      applicant’s actual which ever is less

## Writing the Abstract

-  One page synopsis of your proposed project
-  ID applicant and partners
-  Briefly highlight past experience
-  Length of organization’s existence
-  ID target population & community
-  Convey the need—share a couple of key stats
-  Explain what you want to do & accomplish
-  Note dollar amount
-  Community buy-in/support

## Selection Criteria

-  Need for Project				10 pts
-  Quality of Project	Design		30 pts
-  Quality of Management		35 pts
-     Plan
-  Quality of Project Personnel		10 pts
-  Quality of the Project 			15 pts
-     Evaluation

## Need for the Project

-  Outline magnitude and severity of problems
-     addressed by project
-  Note the number of students to be served
-  Emphasize the problems the students face
-   Know your target population
-  Single parent families
-  Unemployment rate/job opportunities
-  Area crime rate/gang activity/% of youth
-  Academic levels of proficiency

- Gather specific data about target community

## Gathering Data

-  Work with partner locally
-  Utilize Census Data
-  American fact finder is primary tool
-      for accessing statistics on:
-  Population
-  Income
-  Education
-  Unemployment
-  Track patterns by decade

- www.census.gov/

## Practical Questions

-  What are the biggest obstacles facing
-     children in your community?  Prioritize
-     them if more than three listed.
-  What is your organization or consortium
-     best suited to address?

## Project Design

-  Quality of the plan to support and sustain
-      mentoring relationships (10 pts)
-  Ratio of mentors to students
-  Length of mentoring relationship
-  Frequency of contacts
-  Quality of mentoring services provided (10 pts)
-  Academic enrichment
-  Positive commitment/attachment to school
-  Promotion of pro-social norms and behaviors
-  Post-secondary educational/career opportunities

**1:1 ?**

## Project Design

- (Continued)

-  Applicant’s capability of effectively
-       implementing  its program (10 pts)
-  Degree that parents, teachers, CBOs, and
-      the local community have or will participate
-      in the _**design**_ and _**implementation**_** **of project

- Review indicators; Ensure goals and objectives
- and activities address  the need statement

## Practical Questions

-  How many students need to be served?
-  How many students can you serve?
-  How many people do you have ready to be
-     mentors once you receive the grant?
-  If not a 1 to 1 ratio of mentors to students
-    what is your ratio?  Can you demonstrate
-    it is not too high?
- List at least three activities to implement
-     in your mentoring project.

## Management Plan

-  Quality of system to monitor mentor reference
-      and criminal background checks (10 pts)
-  Quality of mentor training (10 pts)
-  Orientation, follow up and support
-      of each mentor/student match to ensure
-      long-standing relationships
-  Quality of Mentor recruitment (5 pts)
-  Outreach, criteria for selection, termination,
-      and replacement

## Management Plan

-  Comprehensiveness of plan to match
-      mentors with students based on need (5 pts)
-  Criteria for matches
-  Extent of school staff input
-  Demonstrates ability to monitor and support
-      mentoring matches (5 pts)
-  Including terminating matches
-  Reassigning students
-  Serving students from 9th –12th grade as needed

## Practical Questions

-  How will you divide up responsibilities
-    between the partners in the grant?
-  Who or what organization do you know
-     has experience with backgrounds checks?
-  When should you begin training the mentors?

## Quality of Personnel

-  Provide qualifications and relevant (10 pts)
-      training of key staff
- Time and effort
-  Experience in mentoring services case mgmt
-  Education
-  Provide strong job description/responsibilities

**Mentoring is about human relationships!**
**Vital to project success to have strong staff**
**in place administering grant**

## Practical Questions

-  List the job positions you think you will
-     need?  How many positions?
-  Are they all full time positions?  Do they
-     need to be?
-  Do you know the average salary for the
-     positions listed in your area?
-  Where should resumes go in the application?

## Quality of Evaluation

-  Provide performance feedback & periodic
-      assessment of progress (5pts)
-  Include use of objective performance
-     measures connected to intended outcomes
-      (ie meeting need) and  that produce
-      qualitative and quantitative data (10 pts)

- Project goals, objectives, and evaluation tools must
- address both the stated need and GPRA indicators

## Practical Questions

-  Who should evaluate the mentoring
-     relationships?  How often?
-  When would a grantee need to begin
-     thinking about the evaluation?

## Program Contacts

- Bryan Williams and Earl Myers
- U.S. Department of Education
- 400 Maryland Avenue, SW
- Room 3E259
- Washington, DC 20202-6450
- Email:  bryan.williams@ed.gov
- 	    earl.myers@ed.gov

## Winning Reminders

-  Find partner; ID target area; Know the need
-  Mentoring.org
-  National Dropout Prevention Center
- 	www.dropoutprevention.org/default.htm
-  School Improvement Knowledge Base
- 	www.helpforschools.com/sikb/what_new.shtml

- Ask questions and apply, apply, apply

## No Child Is 

**Thank you for **
**ensuring that**
**No Child Is **
**Left Behind**

- 1-800-USA LEARN
- www.ed.gov/programs/21stcclc/index.html