Stepping Stones

Stepping Stones Research Update: August 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

District of Columbia Housing Monitor: Spring 2007
By Peter A. Tatian
Urban Institute
June 28, 2007

Looks at the Washington, D.C., housing market, tracking home prices, real estate listings, new construction, and affordable housing; examines mortgage lending trends through 2005; and highlights the declining share of low income home buyers in neighborhoods throughout the city.

Key findings:

  • Housing demand continues to slow; median third quarter sales prices for single-family homes and condominiums are down from one year earlier.
  • Real estate listings of single-family homes and condominiums decreased between the third and fourth quarters of 2006, but the time houses spend on the market continued to increase.
  • Prices show definite signs of declining or flattening in all wards except Wards 7 and 8.
  • Home building slowed in the fourth quarter of 2006, and housing permits for the entire year were down for the first time since 2003.
  • Denial rates for home purchase loan applications rose again in 2005; almost one quarter of all loan applications in Wards 7 and 8 were denied.
  • Home buyers in Wards 5, 7, and 8 were more than 12 times more likely to take out a high interest rate loan than were buyers in Ward 3.
  • The share of home purchase loans for second home and investment properties continues to increase.
  • As housing prices have increased, the share of home purchasers who are very low income has dropped dramatically.

Abstract, introduction and key findings. 
Full issue.
 
How Have Asset Policies for Cash Welfare and Food Stamps Changed since the 1990s?
By Signe-Mary McKernan and William Margrabe
Urban Institute
July 2007

Examines allowance changes for restricted and unrestricted accounts at the federal and state level and tracks the different allowances for IDAs, food stamps, and welfare programs from 1992 to 2003.

Cash welfare and food stamps are means tested: assets and income must fall below set limits for families to qualify. While this ensures that benefits go to the neediest families, asset limits may also discourage asset building. States can exempt all assets (unrestricted assets), or they can exempt assets held for a specific purpose, such as education, a home, or a business (restricted assets); a car; or an individual development account (IDA).

Since 1992, states have increasingly supported IDAs and have allowed specific classes of assets. States allowing IDAs went from none in 1992 to 26 in 2003. Similarly, states exempting restricted assets in their welfare programs went from none in 1992 to 30 in 2003.

Prior to 2002, the Food Stamp Program provided no exemptions for restricted accounts. But the 2002 Farm Bill provides states the option of exempting restricted assets, if doing so aligns their food stamp policy with their welfare or Medicaid policies.

In 1992, federal policy for cash welfare allowed families to exempt $1,500 in vehicle value from the asset limit. By 2003, 29 states allowed exemption for at least one vehicle. Only 3 states exempted the entire value of a vehicle from Food Stamp eligibility during the late 1990s, but by 2003, 34 did.

The growth in allowances for restricted assets contrasts with the erosion in limits on assets not set aside for a particular purpose. Average TANF unrestricted asset limits rose in real terms from $1,138 in 1993 to $2,779 in 1998 but have since been eroded by inflation, falling to $2,592 in 2003. The Food Stamp asset limit has eroded in real terms from $2,398 in 1991 to $1,895 in 2003.

It remains unclear how much disregarding certain assets from eligibility determinations will affect decisions to save.

Text-only version.
Full paper.

Jobs and Business Ownership News

Economic Mobility: Is the American Dream Alive and Well?
By John Morton and Isabel Sawhill
The Brookings Institution
May 2007

Intends to provoke rigorous discussion about the role and strength of economic mobility in American society.

For more than two centuries, economic opportunity and the prospect of upward mobility have formed the bedrock upon which the American story has been anchored — inspiring people in distant lands to seek our shores and sustaining the unwavering optimism of Americans at home. From the hopes of the earliest settlers to the aspirations of today’s diverse population, the American Dream unites us in a common quest for individual and national success. But new data suggest that this once solid ground may well be shifting. This raises provocative questions about the continuing ability of all Americans to move up the economic ladder and calls into question whether the American economic meritocracy is still alive and well.

Summary.
Full report. 

Child Care and Early Education News

Early Care and Education for Children in Low-Income Families: Patterns of Use, Quality, and Potential Policy Implications
By Gina Adams, Kathryn Tout, and Martha Zaslow
Urban Institute
May 2007

Assesses the patterns of early care and education (ECE) utilization by low-income families, the implications for children’s development of the extent and quality of ECE participation, the evidence on the quality of ECE that low-income children receive, and the policy context that shapes ECE.

Key findings include:

  • Patterns of early care and education differ for families with higher and lower incomes. Participation in early care and education settings is common for children from low income families.
  • The use of particular early care and education arrangements reflects access to different arrangements as well as family preferences and constraints. 
  • There is consistent evidence of a link between the quality of early care and education and children’s development. Recent studies find that the type of care and extent of care also are important for children’s development even after controlling for quality. 
  • While we lack nationally representative data on child care quality, large-scale studies in differing geographical regions suggest that overall (setting aside the issue of family income), much of the care in the United States falls below a rating of “good” on widely used observational measures.
  • We also lack a national picture of the quality of the market-based child care that children from low-income families receive.
  • Studies indicate that the quality of program-based early care and education settings such as Head Start and state pre kindergarten differs by program type.
  • Children from low-income families may be more likely to experience changes in early care and education arrangements.
  • Public policies that affect the quality of early care and education tend to focus primarily on one of three goals—supporting parental work, supporting children’s development through access to early care and education programs with specific quality standards, or supporting the quality or supply of market-based settings.

Abstract, summary, and key findings.
For full report. 

Health and Safety News

Food Insecurity and Overweight among Infants and Toddlers: New Insights into a Troubling Linkage
By Jacinta Bronte-Tinkew, Martha Zaslow, Randolph Capps, and Allison Horowitz
Child Trends
July 2007

Examines data on food insecurity, defined as limited or uncertain availability of nutritionally adequate and safe foods, and links food insecurity with maternal depression, poor parenting, and—paradoxically—overweight toddlers.

  • One in eight U.S. households with infants (12.5 percent) reports being “food insecure”.
  • Among households with low-birthweight infants—infants born weighing less than 5.5 pounds—about one in seven (14.4 percent) is food insecure.
  • Among poor households with infants, nearly three in 10 (28.9 percent) report food insecurity.
  • Young children living in households with very low food security are 61 percent more likely to be overweight than are young children living in food-secure households.
  • Mothers living in food-insecure households are significantly more likely to report symptoms of depression than are mothers living in food-secure households.
  • Parents in food-insecure households have less positive interactions with their infant children, such as less responsiveness to infant distress and less behavior directed at fostering their babies’ social and emotional growth.

Press release.
Full brief. 

Survey Spotlight on Uninsured Parents: How a Lack of Coverage Affects Parents and Their Families
By Karyn Schwartz
Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation
June 2007

Spotlights how being uninsured affects not just a parent’s health, but also the well-being of the entire family.

Health insurance for low-income parents influences both their own health and access to care, as well as the well-being of their families. Without health insurance for parents, families are more likely to incur debt and cut back on other basic needs to pay for care. Uninsured parents face real health consequences when they delay care, and the entire family is affected when those delays cause a parent to remain ill or be unable to participate in daily activities.

Medicaid coverage for parents is limited, and many low-income parents are not eligible. Uninsured low-income parents who are working have very limited access to employer coverage, with about half working for firms with less than 25 employees and over 40% working in industries with the lowest rates of employer coverage. About 60% of uninsured low-income parents say that they are very concerned that they do not have enough savings to cover financial obligations. Without savings, they are unlikely to be able to pay for medical treatments out-of-pocket.

As documented earlier, when parents have insurance, children are more likely to be covered and have access to health care. Some states have taken steps to improve access to public coverage for parents recognizing the importance of making coverage available for the whole family.11 Children in homes where everyone has coverage also gain financial stability and other positive benefits when their parents are able to access care. As policy makers look to decrease the number of uninsured children, children’s health coverage may be more broadly and effectively addressed if their parents’ access to coverage and care is also improved.

Full brief.  

Other News and Research

Nonprofit Governance in the United States: Findings on Performance and Accountability from the First National Representative Study
By Francie Ostrower
June 25, 2007
Urban Institute

Presents survey findings from the first ever national representative survey of nonprofit governance.

  • Discusses relationships between public policy and governance, factors that promote or impede boards’ performance of basic stewardship responsibilities, board composition and factors associated with board diversity, and recruitment processes, including the difficulty experienced by many nonprofits in finding members.
  • Includes some data on the representation of women on nonprofit boards.
  • Our representative sample of organizations results in a radically different picture of representation by women.
  • Almost all nonprofit boards include women (94 percent) and as a whole they are almost equally balanced with respect to gender. On average, boards are composed of 46 percent women (the median is a close 44 percent).
  • The percentage of women on boards, however, is inversely related to organizational size. The average percentage of women is 50 percent among nonprofits with expenses under $100,000, but drops to a low of 29 percent among the largest nonprofits (over $40 million in expenses).
  • Conclusions about gender composition based on larger nonprofits will be quite different than those that include smaller ones. These findings are consistent with the contention that women are less likely to serve on boards of large and prestigious nonprofits.

Abstract and introduction. 
Full paper. 

In Marshall Heights, "biggest losers" shave debt, not fat.

Posted on by Coach Tate

The coaches on The Biggest Loser might help people burn fat and shed pounds.  I do something similar, only I help them shave off unnecessary, unhealthy debt.

This year, I’ve coached 234 women through the rough work of shaving off a total of $115,050 in debt through my work at the Marshall Heights Community Development Organization, Inc. (MHCDO), which is a Grantee Partner of The Women’s Foundation’s Stepping Stones initiative. 

Stepping Stones brings together nonprofits–like MHCDO–with other organizations throughout our region to work collaboratively to build the economic security and financial independence of low-income, single mothers.

While providing job training is a huge part of this work, this has to be coupled with financial literacy to really be effective, so that women can learn how to manage the basics of bank accounts, budgeting, saving and all the pitfalls and benefits of credit.

A big part of that journey is often getting rid of debt and the limits it places on your life, opportunities and goals. 

This isn’t easy work.  Just like losing weight, it requires sacrifice, changing habits and a lot of hard work.  I help by providing the tools our clients need.   I provide the playbook and call the plays, but in the end, our clients are truly awesome, and they’re the ones who get the job done.

One client who did an amazing job with this work is Tracey Turner.  Her story of going from falling behind in rent to becoming a workforce development specialist working out of MCHDO’s office is on page 13 of The Women’s Foundation’s annual report.  As she tells her clients now, "I know what it’s like to be in the other chair.  I know about the sleepless nights. I know about the emotional breakdowns. I know what it’s like to go without a meal so your children have something to eat.”

She knows about the burden of carrying around excess debt. 

Now a coach in her own right, she works with me at MHCDO and knows the struggles, challenges and the power of transformation that emerge when women like her do the hard work of changing the game in their own lives! 

One client who embodies this change is a single parent divorcee that had accumulated excessive debt with her was-band (my slang term for former husband).  They had agreed as part of the divorce settlement that he would be responsible for a car repossession repayment of $8,250.

Needless to say, that repayment never occurred.

Through the credit and financial education offered by MHCDO through Stepping Stones, she found this debt showing up on her credit report.  She couldn’t locate the copy of the courthouse document confirming the agreement so I advised her to obtain another copy.

That certified copy was then forwarded to the Equifax, Experian and TransUnion credit bureaus to update her credit report to show that the ex was totally responsible for the debt. Their responses in writing permanently removed the $8,250 delinquency from her credit file, thus allowing her to continue with her mortgage pre-qualification.  I asked her to keep me informed with the process so we can celebrate.

Another example is a Stepping Stones participant–a single parent divorcee–whose credit report showed a $6,800 car repossession because she had co-signed a loan for her brother who didn’t hold up his end of the bargain.  This debt just recently appeared. Had her brother been honest with her, she would have known sooner and she could have made a more conscious decision that would not have become a detriment to her credit. 

She lives at Mayfair Mansions, a joint partnership with MHCDO and other investors to help preserve affordable housing east of the Anacostia River in Wards 7 and 8 by converting targeted apartment buildings in this historic development into affordable condos and giving first rights of refusal to current qualified residents.

She felt it was hard enough having to juggle bills before becoming a Stepping Stones participant, and now she had to deal with this new burden of debt.  Under our advice, she got her brother to sign a notarized statement that he was solely responsible for the car payment, forwarded a payoff letter from the collection agency showing this and sent copies of it to all three credit bureaus.  This cleared the debt from her credit, and enabled her to successfully secure a credit union loan for the full amount to buy into her condo–a tremendous leap in financial security! 

These were just samplings of the 234 Stepping Stones participants that have been able to successfully reduce debt and improve their financial situation.  Most of them are still working on reducing their household debt and continuing to effectively manage their budgets to be able to make intelligent financial decisions in the future, thus developing self-sufficiency and goals towards wealth-building.

To become part of the power of giving together and to support the hard work of nonprofits like MHCDO and low-income, single mothers working to gain financial literacy, shed debt and become homeowners, join us!  We’re changing women’s lives, and our community, together.

Coach Geoffrey Tate is a certified credit counselor with Marshall Heights Community Development Organization, Inc., a Grantee Partner of The Women’s Foundation.

Stepping Stones Research Update: July 2007

Posted on by Kerstin Gentsch

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

Some Thoughts About New and Old Asset-Promotion Policies
By Robert I. Lerman
Urban Institute
June 2007

Provides methodological guidance about how to best view and evaluate policies on helping people build assets.

Despite a plethora of proposals for helping people build assets, policy researchers have provided little methodological guidance about how best to view and evaluate these policies. This paper is an initial attempt to move in this direction, drawing on methods for assessing income-tested and social insurance programs and on analyses of public policies dealing with savings, investments, and risks. It examines whether and in what ways the traditional criteria of incentives, progressivity, and equity apply to an assessment of asset-building policies. Further, it discusses how to design an asset policy to deal with the potential social dislocations arising from gentrification.

For abstract and introduction.  
For full report. 

Eligibility for Child Tax Credit by Age of Child
By Leonard E. Burman and Laura Wheaton
Urban Institute
May 22, 2007

Examines child tax credit eligibility by age of child.

The child tax credit (CTC) is a $1,000 partially refundable federal income tax credit for each qualifying child under age 17. In 2007, tax filers may claim a refundable credit (over and above any tax liability) equal to 15 percent of the excess of earnings over $11,750, up to the $1,000 maximum per child. The earnings threshold means that families with very low incomes get no benefit from the credit, and others will receive only a partial credit. This brief analysis shows that many families with young children tend have lower incomes and are thus left out. In 2007, 30 percent of qualifying children under age 2 in working families had family incomes too low to benefit from the full credit, compared with 27 percent of children overall and 24 percent of children 10 and older.

For abstract and excerpt.  
For full report.   

Jobs and Business Ownership News

Reducing Poverty in Washington, D.C. and Rebuilding the Middle Class from Within
By Martha Ross and Brooke DeRenzis
The Brookings Institution
March 2007

Makes a set of recommendations for a workforce development strategy that will increase the skills, earnings, and employment of at least 10,500 low-income, low-skilled residents over the next seven years.

Washington D.C. has experienced job growth, increases in city revenues, and a development boom over the past several years, but too many residents are excluded from local and regional prosperity. Ensuring the District’s future as a vibrant, inclusive city depends on a commitment to increase the middle class from within. This paper from Brookings Greater Washington makes a set of focused recommendations for a workforce development strategy that will increase the skills, earnings, and employment of at least 10,500 low-income, low-skilled residents over the next seven years.

Workforce development, however, should be seen as part of a broader strategy to move the working poor into the middle class. Even with enhanced education and job placement services, many residents will continue to work in low-wage jobs. Polices and programs that support employment and create financial incentives to work can help residents in low-wage jobs make ends meet.

Additionally, an unstable housing situation can make it difficult to find and keep a job or participate in workforce programs. This paper proposes increasing assistance to alleviate the severe housing shortage experienced by the lowest-wage workers. To help working households stay in the city as their incomes increase, this paper also recommends developing workforce rental housing for middle-income families.

By helping more residents enter and advance in the workforce, the city can begin to steady its fiscal base while blurring economic, racial, and geographic divides.

For summary.  
For full report.  

An Economy that puts families first: Expanding the social contract to include family care
By Heidi Hartmann, Aariane Hegewisch, and Vicky Llovell
Economic Policy Institute
May 24, 2007

Focuses on the policy gaps that must be filled to make U.S. workplaces more family friendly.

A comprehensive family policy program is needed to make the U.S. economy more family friendly and to enable workers to combine work and family responsibilities more easily. Such a program is part of a new social contract that should spread the costs of family care beyond the immediate family and help redistribute the burden of care more equitably between men and women within the family. The comprehensive program laid out throughout this briefing paper is ambitious and complex. Here we offer our priorities for policy making in the United States during the next five to 10 years. We present these priorities using our framework of three types of policies: those that subsidize the cost of care; those that provide income replacement while workers are providing care; and those that lead employers to change their behavior and make the jobs they offer more family friendly. We select these priorities based on need and practicality. In virtually all cases workable models exist. Most are not especially expensive, costing less, for example, than the deductibility of mortgage interest costs on owner-occupied housing in the federal personal income tax system.

For full report.

Framework for a New Safety Net for Low-Income Working Families
By Olivia Golden, Pamela Winston, Gregory Acs, Ajay Chaudry
Urban Institute
June 2007

Conceptualizes a framework for a new safety net for low-income working families that is rooted in their most essential needs.

The report is organized around five key goals:

1. Enabling parents to meet their family’s needs while working in lower-wage jobs.
2. Helping families weather gaps in parental employment.
3. Supporting parents’ job advancement.
4. Helping parents combine work and child-rearing.
5. Improving children’s well-being and development.

The paper describes these families’ circumstances, discusses gaps in current safety-net programs, and explores possible alternative approaches to meeting families’ most pressing needs.

For abstract and introduction.  
For full report. 

Child Care and Early Education News

Making Pre-kindergarten Work for Low-income Working Families
By Rachel Schumacher, Katie Hamm, and Danielle Ewen
Center for Law and Social Policy
June 2007

Based on a review of the first in-depth national research on the 29 states that, as of 2004, allowed mixed delivery in their pre- kindergarten programs. The review focused on promising practices and ideas for improvement.

  • Provides evidence that policymakers need to review their pre-kindergarten initiatives to ensure maximum access for children in working families, especially low income children.
  • Describes some models states and localities are using to be responsive to low-income working families’ needs by delivering pre-kindergarten in community-based settings.
  • Highlights key strategies to address the needs of low income working families and examines the extent to which state pre-kindergarten policies currently do so.

For full report.

Reforming the Child and Dependent Care Tax Credit
By Jeff Rohaly
Urban Institute
June 11, 2007

Examines the revenue and distributional implications of making the CDCTC fully refundable.

The child and dependent care tax credit (CDCTC) is a nonrefundable tax credit designed to help offset the expenses of providing care for children under the age of 13 or disabled dependents as long as a parent or caretaker is working or searching for work. In theory, a low-income family can qualify for a maximum $2,100 credit. The credit is not refundable, however, and families with low incomes generally owe little or no income tax. Thus, the theoretical maximum rarely applies in practice. This paper examines the revenue and distributional implications of making the CDCTC fully refundable.

For abstract and introduction. 
For full report.   

Early Head Start and Teen Parent Families: Partnerships for Success
Center for Law and Social Policy
June 2007

Examines the special needs of eligible low-income pregnant women and mothers with infants and toddlers, many of whom are teen parent families, and highlights promising Early Head Start programs.

Teen parent families may face increased risks for child abuse and neglect and for disabilities and developmental delays in children. Studies have shown that teen parent participation in EHS programs helps improve child development and parenting behavior and increases economic self-sufficiency and the family’s ability to access support services.

The report highlights the importance of increased collaboration between EHS programs and other systems serving teen parent families, especially child protective services and early intervention programs. EHS can collaborate with the child welfare system to prevent child abuse and neglect by teaching teenage parents appropriate parenting techniques, improving their knowledge of child development, and connecting them to support services. EHS programs can also identify children who may have disabilities and facilitate access to appropriate services.

The full report is based on discussion and findings from a 2-day meeting of EHS providers

For Department of Health & Human Services summary.
For full report.   

Men’s Pregnancy Intentions and Prenatal Behaviors: What They Mean for Fathers’ Involvement With Their Children
By Jacinta Bronte-Tinkew, Allison Horowitz, Elena Kennedy, and Kate Perper
Child Trends
June 2007

Presents information on what men report about their pregnancy intentions and their prenatal involvement, and examines the effects of these intentions and behaviors on men’s involvement with very young children following birth.

We found that although most resident fathers report that they wanted the pregnancy at the time or sooner, one in four reported that he did not want the pregnancy at all.

We also found that both fathers’ pregnancy intentions and their prenatal involvement differ by age and race/ethnicity. For example, teen fathers were the least likely to report that the pregnancy occurred at the right time and were the most likely to report that they had not wanted the pregnancy. Non-Hispanic black fathers and fathers of other ethnicities were more likely to report not wanting the pregnancy than were Hispanic or non-Hispanic white fathers. In addition, teen fathers and Hispanic fathers were less likely to demonstrate specific prenatal behaviors, compared with other fathers.

We also found that an unwanted pregnancy was associated with less warmth towards the infant but that a pregnancy that occurred later than the father wanted it to occur was associated with more nurturing behaviors.

Another important finding was that fathers who were more involved during pregnancy were also more likely to be involved in helping to rear the child in the first year of life. These fathers engaged in a higher level of cognitively stimulating activities with their very young children, showed more warmth and nurturing in their interactions with them, and provided more hands-on physical care.

For full report. 

Other News and Research

What is Evidence-Based Practice?
By Allison J. R. Metz, Rachele Espiritu, and Kristin A. Moore
Child Trends
June 2007

Part 1 in a Series on Fostering the Adoption of Evidence-Based Practices in
Out-Of-School Time Programs.

The lag between discovering effective practices and using them “on the ground” can be unnecessarily long, sometimes taking 15 to 20 years! The purpose of this brief is to provide practitioners with a better understanding of evidence-based practice, and to share resources that can help bridge the research-to practice gap and reduce the lag time between the identification and application of evidence-based practice. Forthcoming briefs in this series will provide additional information on key aspects of adopting evidence-based practices including replication, program fidelity, and specific implementation strategies.

For full brief.    

Women hammering their way to social change, not just another job.

Posted on by Sherell

Last Friday, I attended Goodwill of Greater Washington’s Female Construction Employment Training Program‘s graduation ceremony, because Goodwill is a Grantee Partner of The Women’s Foundation. 

Since 2005, Goodwill has received funds from the Stepping Stones Jobs Fund that allow them to continue helping women in the Stepping Stones target population–women-headed families with annual incomes of $15,000 to $35,000, a working population still struggling to make ends meet because of the high cost of living in the region–strive towards success via attaining jobs that pay a living wage.

I’m so glad I had the opportunity to see the women graduate.  Their proud faces mirrored those of their families and the Goodwill employees and supporters who helped them through the program. There’s nothing as satisfying as seeing the tangible results coming from The Women’s Foundation’s grantmaking process.

The first few words that came to my mind during the ceremony: hope, pride, struggling, overcoming, nontraditional, and daring.

Many graduates gave brief stories when rising for their certificates, and reflected on how they came to the program with low confidence and doubt about how the program would work for them, but upon completion, were more confident, happy and armed with the hard and soft skills necessary for work (such as time management), and some even heartily exclaimed that they had landed jobs!

A big theme was confidence. 

Entering the construction program was more than just a way to land another job and paycheck for these women.  It started with a desire to be something.

One of the Goodwill employees gave a great rendition of Linda Rabbitt’s story.  Linda Rabbitt is the founder and CEO of Rand, the third largest female owned construction company in the world.  When Linda reentered the workforce as a secretary, her boss noticed her strong entrepreneurial spirit and urged her to start her own business.  And just look at Rand now. 

The women sitting in that room on Friday now have the potential to be a motivation like Rabbit.

I especially enjoyed one story by a Latina graduate, because it was also reflective of the gender stereotypes and sexism women challenge.  Her story set the light-hearted and down-to-earth vibe of the room with a comical (but serious) story about her adventure with Goodwill.  She had learned about the program when she spotted the word "free" while looking at advertisements in an unemployment office.  Upon calling, she was encouraged to come in.  With the the language barrier, she had a hard time finding Goodwill, but she made it there. 

But, when she found out it was for construction, she had some doubts. 

Even though over 1.1 million women in the U.S. work in construction at a steadily rising rate, it’s still more the exception than the rule to spot women toiling away in hardhats. 

Nevertheless, she joined the program despite her and her family’s skepticism. In her family (as in many others), the natural thought was that females belonged in the kitchen.  But, she persevered and showed her family that she did know a thing or two about construction, and is on her way to finding a construction job!

These women illustrated how women in construction isn’t just another job. 

It represents a challenge we are making to the status quo.  It is representative of our resilience, smarts and true abilities.

It’s also a marker of the economic improvement in women’s lives.

I wish these women the best of luck, and I think they will do great things even outside of construction. They are now armed with the powerful knowledge that they are capable of pursuing a lifestyle that will provide economic security and stability.

And just think that all of the smiling faces of the graduates are products of a wave of philanthropy, a cycle of people who just want to help other people.

I can see the great places those women are now capable of getting to.

To learn more about similar training programs for women, visit our blog to and read more stories about the impact of Goodwill of Greater Washington’s female construction and environmental services programs, and YWCA National Capital Area’s Washington Area Women in the Trades program.

Then, join us by getting involved in the growing wave of philanthropy that’s leading women throughout our region to break barriers and build bright futures.  Become a part of the power of giving together.

WAWIT: Welding a new world for women.

Posted on by Lisa Kays

A friend and I have a running list of people you need in your life, particularly as you edge towards "grown-up" living. 

Topping the list are a good mechanic and a good plumber, among a number of other skills we seem to be desperately lacking in. 

carpentry class.WAWITAt last week’s graduation ceremony of the first class of the YWCA National Capital Area’s Washington Area Women in the Trades (WAWIT) program, it struck me how our natural tendency to assume that these roles would be filled by men are long, long outdated.

Because the 10 women who graduated–with aspirations including careers in plumbing, carpentry, painting, landscaping and sheet metal work–not only intend to shatter stereotypes of the types of work women can do, and are doing, but to change the very structures in which they do it.

They intend not only to weld metal, but to weld the very world that produces it.

After only 12 weeks, which, like with previous classes graduating women ready to take on nontraditional careers, hardly seems like enough to contain it all–or to produce this level of confidence, strength and, even a twinge of well-placed rebellion–the ceremony was marked with graduate’s indications that their intentions went well beyond their own economic security, to that of changing the world of work for all women.

"We have come a long way from just wanting to get a job, to wanting to make a difference in the industry," said one of the graduates before stating proudly that they planned to establish a union among women in the trades throughout our region. 

One can only imagine that this sense of confidence and comaraderie only comes from the same holistic approach to support that was evident throughout the First Female Construction Employment Class of Goodwill of Greater Washington and what I can only imagine was present in their Environmental Services Training Course. 

As evidence of this, the women discussed taking each lesson bit by bit–and refusing to move on until everyone got it.  They talked about keeping each other motivated–sometimes with a phone call harrassment plan–when getting up at the crack of dawn (sometimes as early as 3:30 a.m. to bike in from Virginia) and being on job sites in the dead of winter was almost too much to bear.  They talked of struggling through–and then gaining strength from–the mandatory kick-boxing and weight training courses that would be necessary to ensure that they could manage the heavy lifting of their new professions.

Including the mental heavy lifting that would be required.

Because, as one of the commencement speakers, Sarah Reynolds–a bus mechanic with Metro for more than 20 years–noted–even in 2007, "There are too few of us."  With part of her current responsibilities being to recruit young women into careers at WMATA, she said, "I’m not leaving Metro until I have more women behind me."

This is crucial, she explains, to handle some of the difficulties of being one of a few women in a very male-dominated world.  And the key, she says, is the support of other women.  "The negative things I dealt with, you will not have to deal with by yourselves anymore.  You will have other women with you," she promised, as she outlined a mentoring plan underway for the graduates with experienced professional women in the trades,

Joan Kuriansky, executive director of Wider Opportunities for Women, a partner of WAWIT, explained that this is precisely the point.  Construction is a billion dollar industry in this region, she said, and there is no reason that women–and their families–shouldn’t benefit from it. 

"This program," she said, "represents a breakthrough for many women not here today, because it is changing perceptions of what is women’s work.  One by one, the stereotypes about women, and what we can do, will be debunked!" 

And as these programs continue to demonstrate, changing these perceptions is always the beginning–from changing the women’s perceptions of what they can do personally, to changing their children’s perceptions of what women can do through their example, to changing society’s perceptions of women’s work. 

The graduates confirmed that, while a professional journey, it can’t be approached without taking into account the personal obstacles.  "If I can do it," said one graduate, "all these women can do it.  And we come from all different walks of life.  Not a Paris Hilton life.  A hard-knock life."

From hard knocks to laying hard wood, a path that started with learning skills has turned into a unified desire to transform the scope and scale of women’s work.   

"That’s the kind of stepping stone you represent," Kuriansky told the graduates. 

Words that couldn’t have been better selected, since this program is a perfect realization of one of the goals of our Stepping Stones initative–an early partner to WAWIT–to increase the economic security of low-income women in our region by providing access to high-growth, well-paying, nontraditional careers. 

With training programs like this throughout our region–many of them supported by The Women’s Foundation–it’s difficult not to get the sense that this is far more than shop talk, but rapidly evolving system change, which is what The Women’s Foundation, and our partners, are all about. 

About investing in women as a means of building stronger communities. 

With bright futures–and job opportunities already waiting for many–it’s easy to imagine this transformation unfolding.  In fact, with the graduates sometimes spontaneously bursting into Ain’t No Stoppin’ Us Now, it’s harder to imagine that it won’t. 

From victories from the personal to the professional, from skills to scaffolds of an unlimited height.

As Kuriansky said, "The elevator, I don’t think it’s ever coming down."

If it does, it will only be on occasion, but only for these women to head back down to pick up those they’ll carry up to the top, just as they have been, and will be, supported by those women, like Reynolds, who came before. 

As one of the graduates said, "We are the blueprint and the foundation of it all.  It began with us, and we have the responsibility to keep this legacy going, even after today."

Echoed by another graduate, who said, "It started with us, and it won’t finish with us." 

Indeed it won’t.  The next class starts on Monday.  

For more information on The Women’s Foundation’s Stepping Stones, which supports programs like this throughout the Washington metropolitan region, click here. 

To learn more about WAWIT, and how to get involved, visit YWCANCA.org.  WAWIT is a collaboration among the YWCA National Capital Area, Wider Opportunities for Women (also a Stepping Stones Grantee Partner) and the Community Services Agency of the Metropolitan Council of the AFL-CIO.

To learn more about similar training programs for women breaking barriers, visit our blog to learn more about Goodwill of Greater Washington’s female construction and environmental services programs.

Then, join us in building a better Washington region by investing in and expanding strategies and programs like these.  Join in the power of giving together. 

Stepping Stones Research Update: June 2007

Posted on by Kerstin Gentsch

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

Borrowing to Get Ahead, and Behind: The Credit Boom and Bust in Lower-Income Markets
By Matt Fellowes and Mia Mabanta
The Brookings Institution
May 11, 2007

Examines the nation’s lower-income credit and lending markets.

  • Over 55 percent of lower-income households held debt in 2004, a 10 percent increase since 1989.
  • Usage of credit in lower-income markets varies widely across the country, from a high in Boston (where 75 percent of borrowers in lower-income markets owed money in 2005) to a low in Las Vegas (where less than 40 percent did).
  • Management of credit in lower-income markets also varies widely across the country, from a low in San Jose, where less than 5 percent of borrowers in lower-income markets were behind on debt payments in 2005, to a high in Memphis, where over 18 percent were delinquent on at least one bill.
  • Based on an evaluation of credit scores, potential growth in the supply of credit in lower-income markets is also widely variable across the country, from a low in Memphis and Milwaukee, where the average credit score in lower-income markets was 556 in 2005, to a high in Portland and San Jose, where the average score was over 635.
  • With the expansion of lending in lower-income markets, an entirely new generation of policy implications has emerged, transcending the traditional focus on the supply of credit.

For main findings. 
For full report. 

A Local Ladder for Low-Income Workers: Recent Trends in the Earned Income Tax Credit
By Elizabeth Kneebone
The Brookings Institution
April 2007

Analyzes IRS data on low-income working families who received the federal Earned Income Tax Credit in tax years 2000 and 2004.

  • In tax year 2004, more than one in six taxpayers nationwide received the EITC. Cities in the South, such as Jackson, MS (41 percent) and El Paso, TX (37 percent), had among the highest rates of EITC receipt in the country.
  • By 2004, large metropolitan suburbs were home to 2.4 million more EITC recipients than their cities. While a higher share of central-city taxpayers (22 percent) than suburban taxpayers (13 percent) received the EITC in 2004, the number of suburban EITC recipients expanded by nearly 1.4 million from 2000 to 2004, versus less than half a million in cities.
  • More than 46 percent of EITC filers claimed the Additional Child Tax Credit (ACTC) in tax year 2004, and together the EITC and ACTC accounted for more than 70 percent of refunds paid to these low-income working families. The average EITC credit was $1,834 in 2004, while the average ACTC amount was $895. In total, EITC filers claimed $48.9 billion through the EITC and ACTC in 2004.
  • The proportion of EITC recipients who filed their returns through volunteer tax preparers increased steadily in recent years, but by 2004 remained far lower (under 2 percent) than the share using paid preparers (over 70 percent).

For main findings. 
For full report.  

Jobs and Business Ownership News

The Gender Wage Ratio: Women’s and Men’s Earnings
Institute for Women’s Policy Research
April 2007

Shows that the wage ratio between women and men failed to narrow in 2006 and that an earlier trend toward equal pay has stalled.

  • According to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, in 2006 the ratio of the annual averages of women’s and men’s median weekly earnings was 80.8 for full-time wage and salary workers, down slightly from 2005, when it was 81.0, compared with a 1993 level of 77.1. Women’s usual weekly earnings were $600 in 2006, compared with $743 for men.
  • Another series of earnings data, median annual earnings, shows the same trend of a stalled gender wage ratio. The annual earnings ratio for full-time year-round workers in 2005 (the latest year for which data are available)—77.0—was very similar to that observed in 2001—76.3. Women earned an average of $31,858 in 2005, compared with men’s $41,386. Real annual earnings have not increased for either women or men in recent years.

For press release.  
For full fact sheet. 

Innovative Employment Approaches and Programs for Low-Income Families
By Karin Martinson and Pamela A. Holcomb
Urban Institute
May 17, 2007

Designed to assist states and localities in identifying innovative strategies to promote stable employment and wage growth among low-income populations.

The paper distills key lessons from the body of research undertaken to date and identifies innovative approaches and programs for improving the employment prospects of low-income families. The paper presents a typology of four relatively broad employment strategies, and within each, a number of “innovative” approaches and several programs that exemplify each approach. Overall, the paper identifies and profiles 12 innovative approaches and 51 programs for improving the economic success of low-income parents. The paper discusses why the approach is innovative and provides a description of the key components of each.

For executive summary.  
For full report.  

Child Care and Early Education News

Improving After-School Program Quality
By Robert C. Granger, J. Durlak, N. Yohalem, and E. Reisner
William T. Grant Foundation
April 2007

Argues that the primary issue facing the after-school field is learning how to intervene effectively to improve programs and provides new information on the features of effective programs.

Summarizes findings from two recent reports:

  • After-school programs attempting to enhance youth’s personal and social skills can improve outcomes that are important to both school and non-school audiences programs focusing on specific social or personal skills are most successful when they employ sequential, focused, explicit learning activities and active youth involvement. They also find that these programs tend to improve a range of outcomes at the same time. They refer to such programs as SAFE (Sequenced, Active, Focused, Explicit).
  • The second report describes instruments that measure the quality of youth program practices at the point of service. Although various teams of researchers and practitioners created the instruments, the report shows that these instruments share a common core and that practitioners believe the instruments capture the practices that define program quality. This convergence suggests that an important consensus is emerging in the field about effective practices.

The aim here is to help the field consider the implications of these two reports for policy and practice. The reports support the case that after-school programs are capable of improving important youth outcomes. They also support the need to stay focused on improving program quality.

For full report.