free services mission san francisco Archives - Mission Promise Neighborhood

16

Determination Equals a Family Being Formed, Then Strengthened via Collective Impact

Immigrating together can definitely form a strong bond. Such was the case for Yeimy Moreno and Orlin Salazar, who separately decided to leave their native Honduras in search of a better life to the north. The bond formed put these émigrés on the path to becoming a family, but that did not happen overnight.

Yeimy wound up in the Northern California farming town of Watsonville, which offers a strong Latino immigrant community, while Orlin and his 8-year-old son, Dannis, headed to San Francisco’s Mission for the same reason.

Despite being 100 miles apart, Orlin could not forget Yeimy, so he started an online search — a search that eventually proved successful. A reunion turned into a permanent relationship.

The now close-knit Moreno-Salazar family rented a small bedroom in a three-room apartment on Cesar Chavez Street in San Francisco’s Mission District, with the relatively low rent supported by Orlin’s work cleaning restaurants at night, while Yeimy took care of Dannis. All was moving along until the family learned that the building was going to be demolished, effectively being taken off the rental market. The challenge of finding new affordable housing began with this no-fault eviction. Further complicating the situation was that Yeimy had given birth just two months prior to daughter Brittani, which meant this was now a family of four in search of affordable housing in the Bay Area. No easy task.

Yeimy had always been proactive in seeking assistance, which is why she came to Family Success Coach Yadira Diaz, based at Dannis’ school, Cesar Chavez Elementary, one of a quartet of Mission Promise Neighborhood schools. (MEDA is the lead agency of the Mission Promise Neighborhood.) Diaz acts as a connector to services in the Mission.

Yeimy feared her family would wind up on the street.

Knowing the difficulty of locating a permanent residence the family could afford — especially when trying to find a landlord open to accepting a housing subsidy — Diaz helped them secure a temporary spot at a Hamilton Families shelter. The search continued, a diligent Yeimy daily scouring Craigslist ads, enlisting the counsel of Diaz on which apartments seemed appropriate for the family. Diaz then passed on the best options to Hamilton Families caseworker Miguel, who ascertained how the housing subsidy could be put to best use.

While this process was taking place, Diaz was busily connecting Yeimy to other services to strengthen her family. When Dannis starting exhibiting behavioral issues, possibly attributed to leaving his homeland, Instituto Familiar de la Raza’s services made sense. The youngster was also awarded a special slot in Jamestown Community Center’s after-school program because of the family being in the extreme situation of being in a shelter; that organization offers age-specific support groups as a means to bettered academic achievement.

Another problem was that Diaz determined the Moreno-Salazar’s were unbanked, an especially egregious issue because they were carrying around money they had received from the landlord when they were evicted. Being unbanked is often an issue with newcomers, who often have an inherent mistrust of their new country’s financial institutions. That’s where MEDA’s Financial Asset Program Manager Jackie Marcelo’s came into play, getting the family set up with an account at Self-Help Federal Credit Union, located in the heart of the Mission and with an ongoing offer of just $5 to open a savings account.

The good news is that the determined family finally found a new home — a rental located in Oakland. This was an exhaustive, eight-month search from the time of the initial eviction notice.

Diaz then connected Yeimy to the Families & Youth in Transition (FYIT) program via SFUSD. FYIT is providing the Moreno-Salazar’s with assistance procuring BART passes, now needed so Dannis can get to school in San Francisco’s Mission, plus uniforms and much more.

Always looking to learn and better her family’s life, Yeimy is also looking to better her English-language skills by taking classes at Good Samaritan Family Resource Center. Additionally, Diaz has connected her to Mission Neighborhood Centers to eventually put her infant daughter in quality child care so that Yeimy can start working outside the home.

“Yeimy is resilient. She’s a doer. I am proud to be part of a Family Success Coach team for the Mission Promise Neighborhood, connecting families to free, culturally relevant services that will better their lives so their children can succeed in school,” concludes a zealous Diaz.

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About Mission Promise Neighborhood

The Mission Promise Neighborhood is a citywide community partnership that was created to support kids and families living, working and attending school in the Mission District. It brings together schools, colleges, community organizations and community leaders to help kids graduate and families achieve financial stability.

2

August

Mission Promise Neighborhood Education Forum Prepares Families for 2016-17 School Year

August 2, 2016 Backpack Giveaway, Partners free services mission san francisco , mission promise neighborhood education forum , san francisco backpack giveaway mission

Last weekend, politicians, community partners, parent advocates and a bevy of dedicated volunteers came together to offer support to the habitually underresourced families of the Mission District. With 450 attendees — and 300 of them kids — the impact was huge. From educational workshops to partners offering free resources to supply-laden backpacks being distributed, the Mission Promise Neighborhood Education Forum 2016 was a definite success.

“The community came out on a Saturday to help you get your children ready for the next school year. The Mission Promise Neighborhood is excited to head into our fourth school year. We are seeing impact and know we will see even greater successes in 2016-17,” stated MEDA Executive Director Luis Granados in his welcoming statements. MEDA is the lead agency of this education initiative.

Granados was followed by Assemblymember David Chiu of the 17th District, who took to the podium toting baby Lucas, who turned 5 months old that day. Chiu explained how his parents were immigrants, as is his wife, so he understands the importance of a community making their voice be heard. He then implored the crowd to vote for this November’s Immigrant Parent Right to Vote proposition, which would allow undocumented parents to vote in School Board elections. “One-third of school parents in San Francisco currently have no say in their children’s education. When you are engaged in schools, my son, Lucas, will benefit,” Chiu explained to loud applause.

Following Chiu was Dean Jorge Bell of City College-Mission Campus, which generously offered its Mission campus on Valencia Street as the venue for the day’s event. This was the first time City College and the Mission Promise Neighborhood had teamed up. Bell extolled the need for parents to take college classes to better their lives by saying, “We have so much talent in the neighborhood, but that talent is a diploma away from translating to true success.”

Next up was Trustee Brigitte Davila of City College of San Francisco, who echoed Bell’s advice on the life-changing effect of obtaining an education. Davila was the first in her family to go to college, and she is now a professor at San Francisco State University, where she teaches government and policy classes.

The final speaker was Mission Promise Neighborhood’s Lucia Obregon, who took to the podium and showed an in-depth data presentation of issues needing to be addressed in the community.

As families then headed to take 60-minute workshops over the next couple of hours, some parents brought their young ones to the child care room, replete with activities to foster early learning. There was a large poster stating “Yo Soy la Mission,” with little ones drawing an outline of their handprints in crayons of various hues and then writing their names inside. There was even a “Design Your Neighborhood” interactive exhibit, with kids building community landmarks out of shoeboxes and placing them on the Mission map laid out on the floor. Finally, with reading to children ages 0-5 a major goal of the Mission Promise Neighborhood, Tandem, Partners in Learning was brought in to do what they do best. Said Program Supervisor Kaitlin Pearce of Tandem, “We had many meaningful interactions with families and child care providers, and we really appreciate you providing us access to share our information with the participants. I’m impressed at how the Education Forum continues to grow each year.”

Members of La Colectiva served as caregivers. One of their tasks were to feed the always-hungry children, finding a way to satisfy even those with the most finicky of palates.

Univision was also in attendance, setting up a booth in the City College courtyard and handing out “Vota” bags, as the Latino station backed today’s message of the community letting its voice be heard. Univision even provided a number of keepsakes to fill the bags.

Heading back to the auditorium, it was time to learn of parent advocacy. That occurred by Marco Ponce, Lourdes Dobarganes and Luz Rodríguez of the Mission Promise Neighborhood Parent Advisory Council (Concilio de Padres) taking turns at the podium — a powerful moment, as this was the first time any of them had addressed such a large crowd. Each spoke profoundly about how becoming a parent-advocate had bettered their lives, and the lives of those in the Mission community. The advocates made a call to action to those in the crowd to join the next cohort of the Parent Advisory Council, which starts this fall.

The excitement then grew as ScholarShare drew names for a raffle of five Chromebooks that the nonprofit had donated. Attendees clung to their raffle tickets as numbers were called out, with audible shouts of glee from winners. Being connected to a computing device at home is important for Mission Promise Neighborhood families, so these devices were definitely appreciated … and will be well used.

It was then time for distribution of supplies and backpacks. The Mission Promise Neighborhood team staffed a table of donated books, with exuberant children finding their favorites. All courtesy of the San Francisco Public Library.

There were even 750 tickets doled out for free admission to the Asian Art Museum, the Exploratorium and Yerba Buena Center for the Arts.

Backpacks came from combined donations: 300 from Mission Lodge 169, with Factory 2-U’s donated supplies for these backpacks running the gamut from notebooks and pens to calculators and folders; 250 from the Mayor’s Office of Neighborhood Services (MONS), 46 from DoubleDutch; and 25 from LinkedIn’s HOLA group, with these brought to Mission Promise Neighborhood offices during a recent scavenger hunt held by the tech giant’s Latino group.

Senior Advisor/Director of Neighborhood Services Derick Brown of MONS spoke of the importance of this event as follows: “For the past 10 years, MONS, together with several City agencies, corporations such as Target and community-based organizations like Mission Promise Neighborhood, has worked to improve the educational experiences of children in the Bay Area by providing them with the resources necessary for academic success. San Francisco is home to thousands of elementary and middle school age youth in need of support inside and outside the classroom. The Mayor’s Annual Backpack Giveaway represents our unyielding commitment to the City’s youth, and helps to ensure thousands of young students are prepared for the upcoming school year. We really appreciate Mission Promise Neighborhood’s commitment to youth and leading by example. The Education Forum 2016 was a wonderful event and a much-needed resource for our community. Great job!”

The stuffing of so many backpacks was made possible courtesy of the formidable efforts of Mission Promise Neighborhood staff and partner volunteers. Executive Director Edward Kaufman of Mission Graduates could be seen filling backpacks for hours. Kaufman later donned City College’s ram mascot outfit for the backpack giveaway, much to the delight of the kids — and their parents.

Stated Kaufman of why his organization took part in today’s event: “Mission Graduates was proud to be a partner once again of the Mission Promise Neighborhood Educational Forum. I was impressed at the array of services available to the parents attending by the partnering agencies, ranging from health care to housing to child care to legal support. Parents and families were engaged and excited to learn more. The energy was infectious!”

Other partners were tabling all day, a steady stream of attendees learning of free resources to strengthen their families. Community-based organizations present included Housing Rights Committee, La Raza Centro Legal, Mission Neighborhood Centers, Mission Neighborhood Health Center and Support for Families.

Summing up the day’s event, Mission Promise Neighborhood Family Success Coach Manager Amelia M. Martínez C., who spearheaded the event, explained, “It takes a solid community effort to ensure our students are prepared for the school year. We had families lining up a couple of hours before we opened the door for registration. This showcases the need in the community — a need that I am proud to say was successfully fulfilled today. Not only was that need fulfilled, we also put forth the message of advocacy, which is vital in our community. Thanks to everyone who contributed to this event.”

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The Mission Promise Neighborhood would like to thank our Education Forum 2016 event sponsors:

DoubleDutch
Factory 2-U
LinkedIn
Mayor’s Office of Neighborhood Services
Mission Lodge 169
San Francisco Public Library
Scholarshare
Univision

Thanks also go out to our partners who were part of our event planning committee:

City College of San Francisco
Good Samaritan
Housing Rights Committee
Jamestown Community Center
La Raza Centro Legal
MEDA
Mission Graduates
Mission Neighborhood Centers
Mission Neighborhood Health Centers
San Francisco Unified School District
Support for Families
Tandem, Partners in Early Learning

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About Mission Promise Neighborhood

18

May

Mission Promise Neighborhood 2016 Survey Underway

May 18, 2016 Survey Department of Education survey , free services mission san francisco , mission promise neighborhood survey

“How often do you worry about being forced out of your home due to increased rent or cost of living?”

“Do you feel safe walking in your neighborhood during the day?”

“What services have you or anyone in your family accessed in the last 12 months?”

Theses are just three of the many questions being asked of parents this month, as the second Mission Promise Neighborhood survey is well underway. This survey, conducted every other year, is mandated by the U.S. Department of Education, the main funder of the initiative; however, these are questions already being asked daily by Mission Promise Neighborhood partners and staff, always looking for ways to better families’ lives.

Explains Director of Evaluation Monica Lopez, “Data is vital to this education initiative. Information gives us the ability to act according to what we see is important to our community. We want to make data actionable.”

These comments are echoed by Evaluation Analyst Morgan Buras-Finlay, spearheading the survey with Lopez to ensure the most accurate information is garnered: “I am excited to dig into data to better the initiative’s providing of services. Data is where it all begins so that families can succeed and students can achieve.”

What was learned from the 2014 survey
When the initial Mission Promise Neighborhood survey was conducted in 2014, guidance was put forth from the Urban Institute, an organization with a mission to “conduct sophisticated research to understand and solve real-world challenges in a rapidly urbanizing environment.” In their guidance document, the Urban Institute recommended a survey approach as the gold standard for Promise Neighborhoods. In their efforts to meet the rigor of a census, three-person teams of interviewers hit the streets with maps denoting addresses for their visits, these volunteers painstakingly knocking on doors of designated buildings in the initiative’s footprint. This proved challenging, for the majority of housing in the Mission comprises multi-unit buildings, meaning randomization was difficult.

The main obstacle was that surveyors had a difficult time finding people at home during canvassing. At times, residents felt uncomfortable opening the door to strangers. Additionally, those who did answer the door did not always fit the needed demographic: Latinos with children. This translated to just 65 surveys being completed after three weeks of canvassing six days a week, with morning and afternoon shifts.

Given the poor return on investment, the evaluation team changed course: strategic locations were chosen to find respondents that fit the demographic and had time to take the survey, with a $10 gift card as an incentive for anyone who answered all of the questions.

The new strategy increased the number of surveys to 350, with data then analyzed to better understand the needs of Mission Promise Neighborhood families.

The new model for 2016
To streamline the survey process this year, Director Lopez drafted a more-targeted proposal – a strategy that made better sense for optimizing the gathering of information on Latinos with very young and/or school-age children. It was also decided that a $50 gift card would be a good incentive for parents completing a longer survey. The incentive has definitely encouraged more families to take the survey.

In terms of outreach, postcards alerting families of a possible call were distributed throughout the Mission, plus some were mailed to families with children, as determined by the Mission Promise Neighborhood partner shared Salesforce database. The idea was to take away any fear of taking such a call and answering personal questions. An ad also ran in a local Spanish-language newspaper.

Data is currently being collected via phone calls to a random sample of households with children attending schools in the Mission Promise Neighborhood footprint. Survey interviews are being administered by seven trained bilingual, bicultural research assistants. Some of these research assistants have ties to the Mission; two of them have even been part of Mission Promise Neighborhood programs, as one has provided free tax preparation program and another has participated in the Mission Techies young adult program at MEDA, the initiative’s lead agency.

Mission Promise Neighborhood’s goal is to accommodate interviewees via appointments at convenient times, conduct surveys in-person and provide options for those who wish to participate. For example, if the prospective interviewees cannot speak at the time called, they can set up an appointment for later. This can even be at nighttime, with research assistants willing to take that extra step for the sake of data collection.

The protection of anonymity is paramount, with answers never tied to survey respondents’ names or other personal information.

The neighborhood survey is child-focused, so information about all of the children in the household is collected. Collecting data for all children is something new this year, as in the previous administration only data for one child in designated age brackets was collected. Age brackets are: infants and toddlers ages 0-5; kindergartners to 8th-graders (elementary and middle school); 9th- to 12th-graders (high school); and those out of high school, but under 24 years of age and still living at home.

Lopez and her team also included questions that were not asked two years ago – questions for which they know answers would be impactful. For instance, marital status is now being asked so as to determine the percentage of single-family households headed by mothers. Questions are also being asked about how often people return to the Mission for services. This is to show if displaced residents — often compelled to leave due to a no-fault the high cost of housing — keep an emotional attachment to the Mission. There is even a question around “formal” versus “informal” housing to determine less-than-ideal living situations, which are detrimental to student achievement.

The goal is to survey 600 households this spring, with one-third of that number already being achieved.

Connection to services
An interesting benefit of doing the Mission Promise Neighborhood survey is that it is branding the educational initiative, plus it ensures that residents know the free services available to help their families.

How does this work? After the completion of the survey, the interviewer asks if the family would like a connection to free services. If the answer is yes, the research assistant passes the family’s information to an evaluation team member, who then coordinates a referral or a call back. This has happened scores of times already.

Stay tuned for data dissemination from the completed surveys, as an insightful story of the Mission’s Latino community will surely be revealed … even better than before.

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About Mission Promise Neighborhood

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