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  The Kennedy Foundation We are committed to serving the Transgender community We would like to take this opportunity to thank The Kennedy Foundation for their generous support this year to The STHN Group, Seattle Transgender, and the LGBT community.
The Kennedy Foundation opens a new office in southern California for a national outreach.
The Executive Tower
11400 West Olympic Boulevard Suite 200
Los Angeles, California 90064 (310) 312-9500
The Kennedy Foundation helping Disadvantaged Communities Thrive: Poverty cuts across all our areas of giving. Our home state of Washington has among the nation's highest rates of poverty, unemployment, and hunger. The foundation supports nonprofit organizations and tribal organizations in Washington state, that provide human services to children and families with great needs and few resources.
Through Community Grants: We invest in nonprofit organizations that help disadvantaged communities access the resources they need to survive and thrive. Priority populations include at-risk youth, low-income women and families, communities of color, immigrants, and refugees.
Everyone deserves an equal chance to get the skills, tools, and knowledge needed to participate more fully in life. The foundation’s Program seeks to work with many public and private partners to reduce inequities by expanding opportunities for those with great need. Improving Family Economics:
Among the world’s people who survive on less than $2 a day, only one person in 10 has access to formal financial services, such as loans, insurance, wire transfers, and savings accounts. The goal of the foundation's Financial Services for the Poor initiative is to to make these services far more available so families can survive economic setbacks, build savings, and improve the health and education of their children. The Challenge:
A strong, stable family is the foundation of a thriving society and a bright future. Yet even though we live in one of the wealthiest regions in the world, Washington state has more hunger, childhood poverty, and unemployment than the national average. More than one in four children live in families in which no parent has full-time, year-round work. We know that during unsupervised after-school hours, kids are at increased risk of juvenile crime, drug and alcohol abuse, youth violence, and teen pregnancy. In Washington state, the percentage of teens not attending school or working continues to rise, and the state’s juvenile arrest rate is more than 50 percent higher than the national average.
Washington is also one of the largest refugee resettlement states in the country, and our immigrant population continues to grow. Immigrants and refugees—and especially their children—often face multiple challenges, which are compounded by language and cultural barriers. Support services for these newcomers to the United States can be helpful in advancing their efforts to become productive, contributing members of society.
The Hope:
The solutions to these problems are not easy, but the foundation focuses on creating cycles of opportunity that can change lives. Supported youth become successful adults. Successful adults lead to strong families, and strong families comprise healthy, strong communities.
We know adolescence is a pivotal time of development and can shape a young person’s success as an adult. Promising models exist. Programs that provide a safe place to go and pair youth with caring adults can dramatically improve a child’s academic achievement and self-confidence. Youth who lack these resources are nearly twice as likely to have trouble in school and later in life.
There also are effective approaches for helping vulnerable families and individuals living tenuously on the edge. Organizations that provide services like food banks, domestic violence counseling, financial literacy, or legal assistance for immigrants are creating opportunities that can make the difference between someone moving toward self-sufficiency or dropping out of society.
We also support organizations that are helping build community by creating places for cultural groups to gather, such as an intergenerational tribal longhouse or a community center that serves as the main touchstone for a rural isolated town.
We are fortunate to live in a region rich with organizations that bring creativity and passion to strengthening families and children. We see success every day in the work of our grantees, which serves as a testament to what can happen when this region focuses on giving at-risk families and children access to the resources they need to flourish. But much remains to be done, and the current level of funding does not meet the challenges at hand. It will require the long-term commitment of government, business, community groups and others to reduce these inequities and help shape a better tomorrow for all of Washington.
The Foundation Invites Letters of Inquiry:
The foundation invites letters of inquiry (LOI) for a new program dedicated to reducing avoidable death and disability associated with undernutrition among infants and young children. For Grant Seekers:
The foundation awards the majority of its grants to U.S. 501 (c)(3) organizations and other tax-exempt organizations identified by our staff. We do not award grants to individuals.
Copyright © 2006-2008 The STHN Group
Last modified: March 21, 2008 |
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