Author: Lisa Kays

Servathon 2007: Planting more than grass seeds.

Posted on by Lisa Kays

I’ll admit, I had an unusual level of anxiety about participating in this year’s D.C. Cares Servathon. 

In fact, it wasn’t even remotely normal.

When I had gotten the invitation from WIN to join a group that would be cleaning up and painting one of the House of Ruth‘s Washington, D.C. women’s shelters, it had sounded like a good idea at the time.

And then I started thinking about skills.

And how few I had to offer.

I began having flashbacks to a work-camp trip I’d taken with a friend’s church when I was young, and how we’d gotten into trouble for not really helping do anything.

We’d had some difficulty making it clear, I guess, that it wasn’t that we didn’t want to do anything, but that largely, we had no idea how to do anything.

We’d wandered around lost, trying to make ourselves look busy, while not actually being sure what we could or could not touch, or should or should not do to avoid messing anything up or cutting off someone’s finger.

Sort of like what I do now, in the kitchen at other people’s dinner parties or when visiting my mom, before she finally hands me a spoon and says, "It’s okay dear, just stir. Or perhaps you’d like to go balance the checkbook?"

We all have our strengths and skills, and for me, painting and yard work are not generally among them.

Largely because I’ve never painted, or done much in a yard besides rake or pick up a hedgeapple or two.  Or be called out by my mother to admire her petunias, wherein I would say, "Cool.  What’s a petunia?" 

I imagined myself standing alone, sort of wandering around touching tools while everyone else worked and said, "See that girl?  She’s not doing anything."

But, astoundingly, I found that I was actually useful, and had a great time. 

Not only did I meet a lot of fun, new people, but I learned how to turn soil, plant grass seed, weed and lay out mulch (after, of course, finding out what mulch is),

Not to mention serving as a self-instated project director for the drawing and painting of the four-square court for the kids.

I do, after all, have a particular flair and passion for four-square, having served as one of the longest fifth-grade champions of the "sport" ever known to the history of my graduating elementary school class.

So, as our work dried, and we stood back to admire the new four-square and hop-scotch courts we’d painted, and the cleaned up green space and freshly laid grass seed that had been–just a few hours before–a muddled array of weeds, trash and cigarette butts, I couldn’t help but thinking that this had proven to be a most productive day.

Because not only were there kids watching from the deck, nearly coming out of their shoes hopping around in anticipation of playing on the courts once they dried, but I’d learned another powerful lesson about the power of giving together.

Because it means that you don’t have to know it all to give.

Just that you have to be open to having something to contribute. 

And that through the giving, what you just might get is an expanded sense of who you are, and what you have to give. 

News and Views of Note: Week of April 30, 2007

Posted on by Lisa Kays

See below for a round-up of what was news this week in the world of philanthropy, social change and women and girls in the Washington metropolitan region and beyond:

A New York Times article explores how CARE, an international development organization, has leveraged the philanthropic interests of wealthy women over 35 into international efforts to improve the lives of women and girls through education, micro-enterprise and small development programming efforts. 

Salary.com released their annual figures on how much the labor of a working mom is worth, putting this year’s tab at $138,095 annually–3 percent higher than last year’s results.  Brings whole new perspective to the wage-gap discussions that have been taking place, when one also considers domestic and international "unwaged" labor, largely provided by women.  To further this discussion, last week Riane Eisler wrote in Alternet about "The Feminine Face of Poverty" and how she thinks it’s high time for leaders to consider addressing poverty through a lens that redefines "productivity" in economic indicators in a way that accounts for the unpaid labor provided by the world’s women. 

Susan V. Berresford, president of the Ford Foundation, offers an op-ed in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer challenging perceptions of a new intergenerational philanthropic divide that claims that new foundations are "entrepreneurial, innovative, ambititous and strategic" while long-standing ones are not.  "I am here to say this dichotomy does not fit reality. It does not capture the breadth of philanthropy’s scope and history, and it has the potential to damage our field," she writes.  Debate and discussion over this topic has since ensued among a number of philanthropic leaders, which is nicely summarized in a Tactical Philanthropy post, "Old vs. New Philanthropy."

Melinda Gates shared the lessons she’s learned from 10 years in philanthropy, which was preceeded a few weeks ago by her comments on the important role women and girls play in changing the world.

We learned that fewer employers are offering health benefits and a new report, From Poverty to Prosperity: A National Strategy to Cut Poverty in Half by the Center for American Progress advocated 12 recommendations–many of which are directly tied to the issues impacting low-income women and their families.   John Podesta, CEO of the Center for American Progress, testified to the House Ways and Means Subcommittee on Income Security and Family Support on poverty and the goals of the Poverty Task Force.  

And that’s the news for this week!  Now, onto your views–post a comment to let us know your thoughts on any of the above, or about any news of note that we’ve missed. 

And, above all, happy Friday!   

What beliefs have to do with building wealth.

Posted on by Lisa Kays

At Monday’s official launch of the DC Saves campaign, Colleen Daily, the executive director of Capital Area Asset Builders–a lead partner in the DC Saves campaign and a Grantee Partner–explained that a great deal of the work in helping people, particularly low-income people to build wealth, is not financial.

It’s about beliefs about money, far more than it is about money itself.

Getting people who haven’t grown up with money to believe the message that they can build wealth, she explained, is what it’s all about. 

And is often the hardest part. 

When she said this,  I couldn’t help but think back to last week’s Philanthropy Forum on Families, Money and Philanthropy: Building a Legacy Across the Generations, where donors and potential donors of The Women’s Foundation gathered to talk and think through–with speakers like Carrie Schwab Pomerantz, Loribeth Weinstein and A’Lelia Bundles–the legacy that money can have through philanthropy.

I must say, I didn’t expect the event to be terribly applicable to me, being without a family foundation or huge philanthropic legacy and all.

But what astounded me was that it was actually about everyone, and how much our families have to do with how we view money, giving and the everyday financial habits that build wealth or hold it at arm’s length.

Over lunch, sitting around my table, we discussed not strategy or programming, but rather our personal stories and lessons of money, wealth and planning for the future.

By the end of lunch, I was referred to as the Junior CPA, after sharing that balancing my mom’s checkbook and writing all the checks for her to sign, which I did along with my sister as of the age of 10 largely because we loved it, trained me to be the fiscal hawk I am today, making sure my accounts are in balance, that I’m not charging more than I can pay off and that my credit history is clean.

My engagement with my finances today came directly from my mom’s teachings that managing money wasn’t scary or overwhelming.  That even a kid could do it. 

Over and over, the stories came and reverberated, tales of single moms teaching their kids how to conserve on things from electricity to water, to role modeling good habits and how those translated into their daily lives today.  Some learned to stretch a dollar when their mom showed them how she stretched a casserole, and others learned that even when financial hardship comes suddenly and unexpectedly–due to divorce or death–that families can recover and rebuild.   

How in the lives of every woman at the table, their financial habits were almost an exact mirror of their parents’–and often, a single mother’s. 

Bringing home in a very real way what Colleen said on Monday, and what Pomerantz said at the forum.  That , “Money isn’t just about ‘the talk.  It’s about lots of little moments and exposures throughout life.”

Which begs the question of what happens when there are no lessons about money, or money isn’t talked about in a home, or it’s seen as something foreign and scary and uncontrollable.  A matter left to the fates, not financial planning.

That what we believe about ourselves and, in essence, our worth, has as much to do with what our bank accounts become, as who we become.

That teaching financial literacy goes well beyond building skills, to building new beliefs.   

Stepping Stones Research Update: April 2007

Posted on by Lisa Kays

As part of our ongoing commitment–in partnership with The Urban Institute–to providing information and resources related to the goals of Stepping Stones, please find below summary of recent research on issues of economic security and financial independence for women and their families.

This research is summarized and compiled for The Women’s Foundation by Kerstin Gentsch of The Urban Institute, NeighborhoodInfo DC.

Financial Education and Wealth Creation News

Subprime and High Interest Rate Mortgage Lending in the Washington, D.C., Region
By Peter A. Tatian
Urban Institute
March 27, 2007

Looks at the latest data on subprime mortgage lending and high interest rate loans from the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act (HMDA) for the 25 jurisdictions that make up the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area.

Subprime loans are those that have higher costs (such as higher interest rates) than prime loans. Subprime loans are designed for applicants with poor credit histories, high loan-to-home-value ratios, or other credit risk characteristics that would disqualify them from lower cost, prime-rate loans.

There is increasing concern around the country with the amount of subprime and high cost mortgages issued in recent years. Subprime lending has made credit available to households with low incomes or credit scores that would not allow them to qualify for prime-rate loans. Nevertheless, as is now becoming all too clear, subprime lending can be detrimental if borrowers who take out higher-cost loans later have difficulty repaying them and risk defaulting on those loans.

Click here for the abstract and introduction, or here for the full report.  

Jobs and Business Ownership News

Behind the Pay Gap
American Association of University Women
April 23, 2007

Shows that women earn less even when working in the same career field, likely due to sex discrimination.

  • One year after college graduation, women earn only 80 percent of what their male counterparts earn. Ten years after graduation, women fall further behind, earning only 69 percent of what men earn. Even after controlling for hours, occupation, parenthood, and other factors known to affect earnings, the research indicates that one-quarter of the pay gap remains unexplained and is likely due to sex discrimination. Over time, the unexplained portion of the pay gap grows.
  • The research also shows that ten years after graduation, college-educated men working full time have more authority in the workplace than do their female counterparts. Men are more likely to be involved in hiring and firing, supervising others, and setting pay.
  • This pay gap exists despite the fact that women outperform men in school – earning slightly higher GPAs than men in every college major, including science and mathematics.

Minorities in Business: A Demographic Review of Minority Business Ownership
By Ying Lowrey
Office of Economic Research, Office of Advocacy U.S. Small Business Administration
April 2007

Provides information on minorities in the work force and minority-owned businesses, including statistics about the minority population, their labor force participation, age, education, occupation, work schedules, average personal and household income, business ownership, and business dynamics.

  • In 2002, minorities owned approximately 18 percent of the 23 million U.S. firms.
  • Black-owned firms had the highest growth rate for several measures between 1997 and 2002: 45.4 percent for the number of firms; 24.5 percent of total receipts for the group; and 16.7 percent for employer firm receipts. Asians also experienced growth in the number of employer firms, at 12.6 percent, and in annual payroll, 25.3 percent. The number of American Indian and Native Alaskan businesses grew 2.1 percent.
  • Hispanics or Latinos constituted the largest minority business community and owned 6.6 percent of all U.S. firms, 3.7 percent of employer firms, and 7.4 percent of nonemployer firms.
  • Percentages of minority women owning businesses rose from 1997 to 2002: 29 percent of Black employer firms and 47 percent of Black nonemployer firms were women-owned in 2002. In contrast, women owned 17 percent of White employer firms and 31 percent of White nonemployer firms.
  • Owners use a variety of sources of capital to start or acquire businesses. Nonemployer firm owners generally use a less varied array of financing sources than owners of firms with employees. Higher percentages of male/female equally owned, male-owned, and White-owned employer firms than of other firm groups financed their startups or acquisitions through business loans from banks. Higher percentages of Black- and Native American-owned employer businesses, as well as equally men- and women-owned employer firms used business loans from the government or government-guaranteed bank loans. More than all other groups, Islander employers used personal and business credit cards to finance their startups and acquisitions.

For full report, click here. 

Social Security Spouse and Survivor Benefits for the Modern Family
By Melissa Favreault and C. Eugene Steuerle
Urban Institute
March 27, 2007

Examines the effect of earnings sharing—through which husbands’ and wives’ earnings records are combined and averaged throughout their marriage when computing benefits—as well as other changes to spouse/survivor benefits.

Social Security spouse and survivor benefits advantage single-earner families relative to dual-earner families paying the same total taxes. Our paper considers earnings sharing—through which husbands’ and wives’ earnings records are combined and averaged throughout their marriage when computing benefits—as well as other changes to spouse/survivor benefits, including caregiver credits and minimum benefits. All the roughly cost-equivalent packages examined improve adequacy and horizontal equity compared to current law. The earnings-sharing proposal, however, only reduced poverty with significant adjustments to the treatment of surviving spouses. The packages reveal tradeoffs among beneficiary groups, with particular tensions around work and marital status.

The abstract and executive summary are available on-line, as is the complete paper. 

Child Care and Early Education News

KidBits: Using data to drive better outcomes for children and youth
DC Action for Children
March 28, 2007

A report meant to fuel efforts to improve conditions of children, youth and their families across the District of Columbia.

  • Offers a snapshot of data in six key areas: school readiness, school success, healthy children and youth, youth opportunity, children and youth in stable families and youth transitioning to adulthood.
  • Shows that poverty is growing, and becoming more concentrated in the areas of the city where there are the most kids.
  • Offers several key recommendations to local policy makers:
    o End child poverty in the District of Columbia.
    o Create a citywide public awareness campaign to help parents understand the importance of routine,  preventive care and kept appointments.
    o Aggressively address the growing truancy issue by expanding the current court initiative to more schools and institute real time and immediate notification of parents and other caregivers.
    o Add HPV and herpes to the list of reportable sexually transmittable diseases (STD) and provide treatment at the city’s STD clinics.
    o Direct additional resources to young people not in school and not connected to other services and supports with a specific emphasis on Wards 7 and 8.
    o Create and implement comprehensive plan to end child abuse and neglect.
    o Direct resources for prevention efforts.
    o Recommit to implementing the city’s Effective Youth Development Strategy.

For full report, click here. 

Health and Safety News

How Well Do Health Coverage Tax Credits Help Displaced Workers Obtain Health Care?
By Stan Dorn
Urban Institute
March 26, 2007

This testimony addresses three topics: health coverage challenges facing displaced workers; the strengths and weaknesses of the HCTC program in helping these workers retain health coverage; and policy options to improve the HCTC program so it can be more effective in meeting the health coverage needs of workers who lose their jobs because of international trade.

Health Coverage Tax Credits (HCTCs) have been generally ineffective in providing health care to displaced workers for several reasons:

  • The credits are used by only 11 percent of eligible workers.
  • The coverage for which credits may be used often leaves out the health care that workers need. When job loss is followed by a gap in coverage of 63 days or longer, plans can deny treatment of the worker’s known health problems. Moreover, many states offer only plans with high deductibles that make care unaffordable for workers with limited incomes. Also, such plans often exclude or severely limit such basic services as prescription drugs, maternity care, and treatment of mental illness.
  • In some states, HCTC plans increase their premiums substantially for enrollees who are older, female, or have health problems.
  • When a displaced worker turns 65 and qualifies for Medicare, the worker’s spouse loses HCTC, even if that spouse is too young for Medicare and has no other coverage.
    HCTC’s shortcomings can be addressed successfully through program changes like the following:
  • Increase the size of HCTCs to pay at least 75 percent of premiums.
  • When beneficiaries have low household income, provide supplemental credits that lower worker costs to no more than 10 percent of premiums.
  • Eliminate the requirement that workers must enroll in qualified coverage and pay full monthly premiums before the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) will rule on their eligibility for HCTC.

The summary of testimony and the complete testimony are available online. 

Other News and Research

Kids’ Share 2007
By Adam Carasson, C. Eugene Steuerle, Gillian Reynolds
Urban Institute
March 15, 2007

Reports on trends in federal spending on children from 1960 to 2017, looking across over 100 major federal programs, including tax credits and exemptions.

This study reports on trends in federal spending on children from 1960 to 2017, looking across over 100 major federal programs, including tax credits and exemptions. Children’s spending increasingly shifted from broad-based programs to programs targeting low-income or special needs children over the 1960 to 2006 period. Thirteen major programs enacted between 1960 and 2006, which include Medicaid, the earned income tax credit, and Food Stamps, comprised 65 percent of federal spending on children in 2006. Overall, federal children’s spending increased in real terms from $53 billion in 1960 to $333 billion in 2006, or from 1.9 to 2.6 percent of GDP. Yet as a share of federal domestic spending, children’s spending declined from 20.1 to 15.4 percent. Meanwhile, spending on the automatically growing, non-child portions of Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid, nearly quadrupled from 2.0 to 7.6 percent of GDP ($58 billion to $993 billion) over the same time period. Over the next ten years, children’s programs are scheduled to decline both as a share of GDP and domestic spending, because they do not compete on a level playing field with these rapidly growing entitlement programs.

Click here for the executive summary or here for the complete report.

The dollars and sense of financial literacy II: women and retirement.

Posted on by Lisa Kays

As financial literacy month marches forward and we continue to talk about the dollars and sense of financial literacy, particularly for women, today we turn our attention to the procrastination-inducing topic of retirement planning.

Yes, I know, you’re already thinking about reading this blog tomorrow.  But don’t. 

For it seems that while financial advisors are out there educating potential clients and encouraging them to sign up for retirement plans, a key group is missing out on this information, and, as a result, the savings plans that could determine their health, wealth and happiness in retirement, reports an article in today’s Women’s eNews called Money Advice Runs Low for Minority Women.

The article documents the work of the Women’s Institute for a Secure Retirement (WISER), Mother’s Voices of Georgia, The Older Women’s League (OWL) and Women Work! The National Network for Women’s Employment–a few of the organizations working on addressing the information gap regarding financial planning, investment and retirement for women, and particularly low-income minority women.

Their work is of great importance, considering that 12 percent of all elderly women 65 and older live in poverty, according to the Employee Benefit Research Institute.  Futher, they revealed in a March report that men age 50 and older are considerably more likely than women of the same age to receive pension and annuity income, and to receive higher yearly amounts of such income.  In 2005, 44 percent of men age 65 and older received annuity and-or pension income, with a mean amount of $16,933 a year.  Only 29 percent of women age 65 and older received annuity and-or pension income that year, with a mean pension income of $10,086.

Vicki Elisa, current board chair of Mother’s Voices of Georgia–which helps low-income women become financially empowered–explains in the article that, "Half of minority women older than 65 in the United States are living in poverty.  Those are my aunts, who at age 75 had to go to work at Wal-Mart because they didn’t have enough money in retirement to live in dignity."

Some of the particular barriers to retirement savings for women–and particularly low-income or minority women–according to the article, are: 

  • Lack of information and knowledge regarding finances, debt and retirement options related to divorce or death of a spouse. 
  • Banks and financial-planning firms have little interest in helping low-income women because they focus their marketing on those who can immediately buy a financial retirement product, such as an individual retirement account.
  • Lack of financial literacy materials that take into account the needs and realities of low-income women.
  • Women typically earn less than men, take time out of the work force to care for children and aging parents and live longer than men, making them more likely to require health insurance and larger savings–issues that are often compounded for low-income women.
  • Low-income women, particularly single mothers, often cannot afford to take money from their paychecks to apply to their savings or retirement plans.
  • Many nonprofits and advocacy organizations tend to focus on jobs training, pay equity or other more current issues–few are dedicated to working with women on financial planning and retirement-related education and support.

There is good news–a number of committed organizations have developed effective strategies for informing women about retirement options and the importance of planning, and are creating the tools to educate, inform and change behavior. 

  • WISER conducts workshops about retirement and economic issues for low-income women.  Attendees learn about retirement savings, money management, debt and divorce, and the impact on minority women.  WISER also conducts extensive trainings on the basics of money management, investment, Social Security, pension, divorce and widowhood, and reducing credit card debt. 
  • While taking the WISER training, Elisa of Mother’s Voices made the curriculum culturally relevant for women of color.  Mother’s Voices’ own educational program would later go on to win a 2006 Freddie Mac grassroots award for its economic literacy program aimed at low-income women.
  • WISER publishes a quarterly newsletter and booklets to help women better understand their situation.
  • The Older Women’s League sponsors a a project called The Color of Money that educates women of color about preparing for a secure retirement.

Much like retirement, which requires investment today for payoff later, investing in similar programs, initiatives and practices today could yield a much more productive, brighter, dignified future for women tomorrow. 

Melinda Gates: Empower your daughter to change the world.

Posted on by Lisa Kays

As part of Huffington Post and iVillage’s new Mothers-Daughters Campaign, Melinda Gates spoke out yesterday about the important role women play in changing the world–and that she believes this is largely done these days by improving the lives of women. 

And how it’s crucial that women pass that spirit of giving in the interest of women on to their daughters. 

"It’s so important for women to encourage their daughters to become more engaged in the problems of people in need," Melinda says.  "We know that improving women’s health, by ensuring access to reproductive health services and developing tools to address the unique needs of women, is crucial for improving family health and the health of communities…Our global development work, which is focused on agriculture and financial services, has at its heart the goal of empowering the world’s poorest people – most of them women with young children.  Our daughters will play a crucial role in creating a world where everyone has the opportunity to live a healthy, productive life.  We should be encouraging and nurturing them to do that work well."

And we certainly know that to be true here at The Women’s Foundation, where the return on investment that Melinda speaks about when philanthropists invest in women is ever-present in our work, and in the work of our Grantee Partners. 

flyshirt.jpgWhere we know that the investments we’re making today are impacting, changing and improving the lives of the daughters who will follow us.      

While going through some of our photos yesterday, I came across this one, featuring the statement, "We are the leaders we have been waiting for."

This, and Melinda’s statement, got me thinking about the legacy of giving and engagement we will leave today’s girls and young women, and I can’t help but wonder what that will look like. 

I think had you asked my mother when she was growing up what she would have wished different for me, she would have said that she would want me to finish school with more than two career options (those presented to her had been teacher and nurse).

Mission accomplished.  When I graduated, I felt that the world was wide open, and stepped right in.

But I’m sure there were also disappointments.  I think she would have certainly changed many of the challenges she faced economically and in terms of legal and social supports as a single mother–many of which still exist today for women throughout the country (and world).  As a nurse (50-50 odds), I think she would have wanted a world where all women of my generation had access to health insurance, information and care–which is far from reality.  She would probably have hoped that the world would be safer for women of my generation than it is in terms of violence and domestic abuse.  And I think as a nurse and mother of two daughters in the nonprofit sector that she’d have a lot to say about that wage-gap that still afflicts us.   

With every passing generation it seems that women experience victories, while also maintaining many of the same challenges, and often, accepting new ones.

My peers and I see HIV/AIDS as a daily reality and concern–particularly given the many economic, social and power inequities that contribute to its increasing spread among women in minority populations and developing countries–which my mother couldn’t even have concieved as a threat for her daughters’ generation. 

I also worry about the increasing pressure on young women to grow up too fast in terms of their dress, behavior and lifestyle, while my mother probably celebrated how much more freedom her daughters and their girlfriends had in dress, lifestyle and everyday choices than she did.   

And so I ask, what would you wish to be different for your daughters, or the girls who will follow behind us to lead tomorrow?  What fights do you hope they won’t have to fight?  What challenges do you most hope they will view as a mere passing piece of history? 

What issues do you expect them to take on…as activists, as philanthropists, as advocates? 

What will it mean, to them, to serve their communities, countries, the world and women?

And how can we, as the women leading the way, best support them, best inform them, best educate them and best carve for them a pathway to their own leadership and vision? 

Stepping Stones Research Update: March 2007

Posted on by Lisa Kays

As part of our ongoing commitment–in partnership with The Urban Institute–to providing information and resources related to the goals of Stepping Stones, please find below summary of recent research on issues of economic security and financial independence for women and their families.

This research is summarized and compiled for The Women’s Foundation by Kerstin Gentsch of The Urban Institute, NeighborhoodInfo DC.

Financial Education and Wealth Creation News

Have Middle-Income Parents Improved Their Economic Status?
By Robert I. Lerman
Urban Institute
February 23, 2007

Looks at middle-income married versus unmarried parents’ net worth between 1989 and 2004.
 
Between 1989 and 2004, middle-income parents experienced moderate income growth, but only married parents have gained net worth—a significant fact given that the share of households headed by an unmarried parent increased from 26 to 33 percent over the same period. Using data from the Federal Reserve Board’s Surveys of Consumer Finances, income measures alone show that middle-income unmarried parents gained some ground relative to married parents. However, trends in net worth—the value of what households own minus the value of what they owe—diverged by marital status, demonstrating the importance of looking beyond income data.
 
For fact sheet, click here! 
 
Jobs and Business Ownership News
 
Capital Access for Women: Profile and Analysis of U.S. Best Practice Programs
By Salzman, Harold, S. McKernan, N.M. Pindus, and R.M. Castaneda
Urban Institute
February 26, 2007
 
Analyses key success factors, barriers, and constraints faced by women entrepreneurs, and provides policy recommendations.
 
Capital access programs and funds for women starting and expanding their businesses have grown dramatically over the past decade. These programs cover the spectrum from microenterprise to venture capital funds and serve highly diverse populations. Thirteen "best practice" programs and three "promising practices" (new programs that appear innovative but do not yet have a track record) are profiled in this report and are the basis for our analysis of key success factors, barriers, and constraints faced by women entrepreneurs, and our policy recommendations. We profile and analyze the programs to share best practices and lessons learned so that successful programs can be replicated. Our analysis of these best practice programs identifies six areas that can improve the strength of all capital access programs and expand their reach.
 
For abstract and executive summary, click here!
 
For full report, click here!   
 
Understanding Low-Wage Work in the United States
By Heather Boushey, Shawn Fremstad, Rachel Gragg, and Margy Waller
March 2007
Center for Economic Policy and Research
 
Analyzes labor market data to provide a picture of the low-wage labor market.
 
Over 40 million jobs in the United States — about 1 in 3 — pay low wages ($11.11 per hour or less) and often do not offer employment benefits like health insurance, retirement savings accounts, paid sick days or family leave. These low-wage jobs are replacing jobs that have historically supported a broad middle class.  This report provides a clear and sobering picture of the low-wage labor market through analysis of labor market data, including: downward wage trends over time, poor work conditions, largest occupations, and declining mobility. The authors used a social inclusion definition of low-wage work that allows for comparison among jobs in the United States.
 
An abstract and full report are available. 
 
Child Care and Early Education News 

Gender Gaps in Math and Reading Gains During Elementary and High School by Race and Ethnicity

By Laura LoGerfo, Austin Nichols, and Duncan Chaplin
Urban Institute
March 2, 2007
 
Analyzes gender differences in math and reading tests for four racial and ethnic groups over six time periods.
 
Gender differences in academic achievement have long fascinated researchers and policy-makers alike. In this paper we analyze differences in math and reading test score growth rates by gender for four different race and ethnic groups—white, black, Hispanic, and Asian students—for six different time periods. Our data cover both the earliest years of education and the crucial years of adolescence. In addition, we have data bracketing one non-schooling period. Together these data enable us to get a very complete picture of how gender gaps evolve over the course of early elementary and high school years and how these trajectories differ by race and ethnicity. While the gender gaps are not always statistically significant, they are for 15 of 48 comparisons made, all during school. In addition, all of the statistically significant results suggest that males learn more math and females more reading during early elementary school and again during high school.
 
An abstract and introduction and the full report are available.

Early Head Start and Teen Parent Families: Partnerships for Success

Center for Law and Social Policy
February 26, 2007
 
Focuses on how the services available through Early Head Start can support the special needs of families with teenage parents.
 
This issue brief focuses on the special needs of teenage parents and their children ("teen parent families") and on how the unique set of services available through Early Head Start (EHS) programs can support them. Teen parent families face multiple risks, risks that may be substantially different from those faced by families with older parents and that may be further complicated by issues involving disability, abuse, or neglect. These issues are interrelated and must be integrated and addressed as programs design services to meet the needs of this population.
 
For full brief, click here!
 
Early Child Care Linked to Increases in Vocabulary, Some Problem Behaviors in Fifth and Sixth Grades
National Institute of Child Health and Human Development
March 26, 2007
 
Looks at the link between quality of child care before entering kindergarten and increase in vocabulary and problem behaviors in fifth and sixth grade.
 
The most recent analysis of a long-term NIH-funded study found that children who received higher quality child care before entering kindergarten had better vocabulary scores in the fifth grade than did children who received lower quality care.
 
The study authors also found that the more time children spent in center-based care before kindergarten, the more likely their sixth grade teachers were to report such problem behaviors as "gets in many fights," "disobedient at school," and "argues a lot."
 
However, the researchers cautioned that the increase in vocabulary and problem behaviors was small, and that parenting quality was a much more important predictor of child development than was type, quantity, or quality, of child care.
 
The study appears in the March/April 2007, issue of Child Development.
 
For full article, click here! 
 
Other News and Research 

Kids’ Share 2007: How Children Fare in the Federal Budget

By Adam Carasso, C. Eugene Steuerle, and Gillian Reynolds
March 15, 2007
Urban Institute
 
Reports on trends in federal spending on children from 1960 to 2017, looking across over 100 major federal programs, including tax credits and exemptions.
 
This study reports on trends in federal spending on children from 1960 to 2017, looking across over 100 major federal programs, including tax credits and exemptions. Children’s spending increasingly shifted from broad-based programs to programs targeting low-income or special needs children over the 1960 to 2006 period. Thirteen major programs enacted between 1960 and 2006, which include Medicaid, the earned income tax credit, and Food Stamps, comprised 65 percent of federal spending on children in 2006. Overall, federal children’s spending increased in real terms from $53 billion in 1960 to $333 billion in 2006, or from 1.9 to 2.6 percent of GDP. Yet as a share of federal domestic spending, children’s spending declined from 20.1 to 15.4 percent. Meanwhile, spending on the automatically growing, non-child portions of Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid, nearly quadrupled from 2.0 to 7.6 percent of GDP ($58 billion to $993 billion) over the same time period. Over the next ten years, children’s programs are scheduled to decline both as a share of GDP and domestic spending, because they do not compete on a level playing field with these rapidly growing entitlement programs.
 
An abstract and a full report are available. 

Hear all about it! Stepping Stones live with Jackie Guerra!

Posted on by Lisa Kays

On April 7, Program Officer Nisha Patel discussed Stepping Stones with Jackie Guerra on The Jackie Guerra Show.  To tune in to hear the show, click here! 

Nisha shared the opportunities Stepping Stones provides to low-income women and families throughout our region, with a particular highlight on the YWCA’s Washington Area Women in the Trades (WAWIT) program focusing on access to nontraditional jobs for low-income women.

"Non-traditional occupations, or those that employ fewer than 25 percent women, pay wages that are 20 to 30 percent higher than jobs in the service sector and they are more likely to offer work supports, such as health benefits," explains the YWCA.  

Such work, which the YWCA does in collaboration with the Community Services Agency of the Metropolitan Washington Council, AFL-CIO and Wider Opportunities for Women (WOW), fits perfectly into the strategy of Stepping Stones, a multi-year initiative to build the economic security and financial independence of low-income women and their families throughout our region. 

By funding Grantee Partners and programs (such as WAWIT) that contribute to the economic security of low-income women, Stepping Stones is generating a large return on the philanthropic investment behind it. 

The WAWIT program is a powerful demonstration of that return.  Through its work: 

  • The greater Washington metropolitan area will have fewer families living in poverty and more families paying higher income and sales taxes. 
  • Within four to six months these newly employed women will have earned income equal to the dollars expended on their training and within as little as five years will have contributed to the tax base a sum equal to the cost of the training. 
  • Contractors will have a ready resource of skilled women to meet the demands of their workforce and ensure that their workforce reflects the diversity of the community.
  • Area residents will have a compelling reason to support construction and revitalization projects that include a training program that directly benefits the area’s most needy families.
  • In five years, over 3,000 women will be provided assistance and over 400 graduates will be prepared for high-skill/ high-wage jobs in the greater Washington metropolitan area.

Goodwill of Greater Washington, also a Grantee Partner, has boasted similar success with nontraditional training programs such as its female construction employment class. 

Yet more stories to think about as we continue to challenge and re-think the reasons behind the ever-present wage-gap and what we, as women working together, can do about it.

Helen Hunt on philanthropy by women, for women.

Posted on by Lisa Kays

Helen LaKelly Hunt says women’s philanthropy rocks. 

Only she says it in more eloquent terms in a commentary this week in Women’s e-News called "Sharing the Wealth: Female Philanthropists Open Up." 

Helen is no stranger to philanthropy, feminism or women’s funds.  She is the founder of The Sister Fund and has been active with her sister, Swanee Hunt, founder of the Hunt Alternatives Fund, in starting and fostering women’s funds throughout the country.  Helen is also the author of Faith and Feminism: A Holy Alliance. 

Her story is very much one of how giving transforms not only those who receive, but the giver as well, much as Claudia Thorne has shared in her op-ed and on this blog and as has been discussed by Siobhan in our philanthropic education workshops. 

Helen explains in her commentary, "My imagination was set ablaze by the possibilities offered by women’s funds.  My sister Swanee and I both saw these emerging institutions as powerful vehicles for social change as they invited cross-race, cross-class alliances. Not only did grassroots women receive needed financial support and thus became stronger, but donors were transformed as well…While our goal was to empower other women, in the end, it is we who truly have been transformed." 

It is a refrain not at all uncommon in the halls of The Women’s Foundation, or in the other forums where I’ve had the priviledge of participating in women acting and giving on behalf of other women. 

And I have to ask, why does this refrain seem to be so much louder when women give on behalf of other women than it does when giving occurs in general?  Is this a real phenomenon or just a perceived one?  And if it is real, why does it occur? 

It reminds me faintly of the resounding chorus of the returned Peace Corps volunteer told, "I really admire what you did…that was so giving and altruistic," and will invariably dissmissively reply, "Not really, I got far more from it than I gave."

In the case of the volunteer, "what I got" speaks very much to the sense of self-worth, empowerment and confidence that comes from spending time in an environment where every assumption, every idea, every thought about who you think you (and your country, culture and society) are is called into question at least 50 times a day.

Instead of breaking you down, this experience allows you to really get at the heart of your core beliefs about yourself and to own, or disown, those you may have been charged with that no longer fit. 

The person who emerges is therefore stronger, with a sense of self that no longer relies on external assumptions for validation.

What were once accepted as universal truths are tested a social, cultural, economic or emotional assumptions that may or may not hold up under the illumination of a brighter sun in a strange land. 

And I have to wonder if this is perhaps at the heart of the empowerment of women’s funding and philanthropy–and its mutually transformative nature. 

Helen begins her article by expressing her disappointment at having learned that the women’s movement was largely funded by men in the beginning. 

But the movement has come a long way, and women are now holding more than 51 percent of all assets in the country–and are starting to seriously give in the interest of women and girls. 

And perhaps in so doing–in creating a space in which we are able to question and challenge assumptions about ourselves and our society–we have been able to challenge and, where appropriate, discard the biases that have been thrust upon us–and to emerge with a greater sense of our own confidence, empowerment and worth.

As individuals and as a collective. 

For on a large and small scale, women’s philanthropy challenges prior (and current) assumptions held about women:  That we couldn’t, or shouldn’t, manage (or make) money.  Or that investing in the education and training of women wouldn’t yield a significant return.  Or that our realm is the private confines of the home, rather than the public squares of community.

Whatever the assumption, perhaps our philanthropy is its antidote. 

Our way of asserting, through ever dollar granted and every policy changed, that we, as women standing together, are now realizing, acknowledging and investing in our own worth. 

It's Wednesday…how much money did you save today?

Posted on by Lisa Kays

And you thought it was just another Wednesday, when in actuality today was the kick-off of the DC Saves campaign with the first "Money Saving Wednesdays" seminar! 

First reports indicate that 30 people attended–primarily Department of Insurance, Securities and Banking (DISB) and D.C. government employees–and that as of the end of the day, there were already 10 completed enrollment forms signed and several people promising to make monthly deposits to accounts opened as a result of DC Saves.

These folks are now officially DC Savers, a proud title earned, according to the Mayor and DC Saves, by "anyone who agrees to save regularly for a specific goal such as a rainy day fund, car or home purchase, college tuition, retirement or debt repayment and reduction.  DC Savers set monthly saving goals of as little as $10, and then develop a strategy to deposit this amount to a savings account each month.  District banks have signed on by offering savings accounts to DC Savers at no cost for 12 months."

For more information on DC Saves, National Financial Literacy Month and the importance of financial literacy for our communities (and pocket books), check out our earlier post this week and the new DC Saves Web site, which will be live soon. 

In the meantime, turn your Wednesdays from blah to bank with this informational series sponsored by a partnership of Mayor Fenty, DISB, Capital Area Asset Builders (a Grantee Partner!) and DC Saves!

According to the Mayor’s press release on the seminars, “Encouraging District residents to check up on their personal finances during tax season in April will help individuals and families reduce debt, save money and build wealth.  Financial literacy and education are critical to enabling people of all income levels to achieve their personal financial goals, and maintain and improve their quality of life.”

Money-Saving seminars are a key part of the strategy.  Straight from the Mayor himself (or, well, his very official press release): 

Throughout the month of April, DISB will take its Money-Saving seminars into the community starting with District government employees. During the weekly noontime seminars, attendees will be able to sign up for the DC Saves program. To RSVP, please e-mail Michelle Phipps-Evans.  Feel free to bring your lunch.

WHAT: Money-Saving Wednesdays financial-education seminars
WHEN: Every Wednesday in the month of April, from noon to 1 p.m.
WHERE: 810 First St., NE, Suite 701. Call (202) 727-8000 for information

TOPICS:

April 4 – Making Saving a Habit
April 11 – Five Keys to Investing Success
April 18 – ABCs of Saving for Education
April 25 – Planning a Worry-Free Retirement

Why not?  Make Wednesdays worry free with the end of (or at least an improvement on) your financial woes. 

Knowledge, as they say, is power! 

(And don’t forget to bring your lunch from home…that’s $6-10 in the bank!)