More About Making Connections
Making Connections started in 1999 by the Annie E. Casey Foundation of Baltimore as a theory: children do well when families do well, and families do well when they live in supportive neighborhoods.
It is a community-change initiative that works like this. By investing in the education and health of children and youth in our country’s most challenged neighborhoods, the gap between how well they do as compared to others will close. By increasing access to economic opportunities for their families, the gap between their outcomes and the rest of America will close. Not one, but two generations of people, will benefit in real and sustainable ways. Proof of that the theory works will appear in the results – numbers and hard facts gathered, tracked and analyzed each step along the way.
The Foundation made a 10-year commitment to test this theory of change and chose Des Moines as one of its 10 Making Connections sites. It helped that community leaders and ordinary citizens with a long and distinguished history of helping children and families in Iowa’s capital city welcomed – and went after – the opportunity to try this new thing.
The individuals, groups, churches, non-profits, businesses, government leaders, and others at all levels in our community who come together through Making Connections focus on:
15 neighborhoods near downtown east and west of the Des Moines River
32,000 residents of those neighborhoods, 11,000 households
3,300 households with children age 5 or younger, 34.8% of whom live in poverty
2,700 youth ages 16-19, 13.9% of whom are neither in school or employed
20,000 individuals of working age, 11.6% of whom are unemployed
By leading with ideas, guided by a clear set of principles, and working to build eight key core capacities, Making Connections believes lasing change is possible. In the end, this means positive change and better outcomes in these areas:
Not only will closing the gaps vastly improve conditions for families and children in the 15 Making Connections neighborhoods, doing so will improve the economic vitality of the greater Des Moines area. In that, we all have a stake.
