Leaving a Legacy: Our vision
The enduring work of the Center and its 180 grantees is testament to our vision: together, we can sustain our work, even when grant funding ends. Promoting mental health and preventing youth violence demands that we take the long view-continuously building the support of broad constituencies including parents, mental health providers, schools, juvenile justice, and businesses.
The Center is committed to helping grantees leave a legacy by working with them to enhance community collaborations and partnerships, develop staff capacity to implement evidence based programs and lead change, and deepen their understanding of various strategies to sustain their programs. Our philosophy is to work with leaders, promoting change within a frame of respect and celebration of differences. In the process, we learn from grantees' innovative and creative approaches in their communities and work to connect grantees so that they can learn from each other. Specifically, we focus on eight key areas:
- relationships among community entities such as agencies, coalitions, schools, and parent groups, and between individuals
- community awareness of mental health or youth violence issues
- leadership across and within systems
- policies and procedures
- the use of evaluation data in decision making
- staff competencies and expertise and other program capacities
- the use of strategic planning approaches
- funding streams
Many equate sustainability with finding continuing funding for services developed through a grant. However, a broader view of sustainability entails using various strategies, represented in the wheel below, to maintain the elements of your program that are responsible for its positive outcomes. Embracing this more complex and comprehensive view can help you sustain program elements and outcomes, whether or not you receive additional funding.
Sustainability is a dynamic process. At various points within the grant period, your strategy will change, depending on where you are within your grant period, where you are in thinking through sustainability goals and plans, and what goals you have set.
How can I use this Leaving a Legacy Wheel?
Through this website, the Center will provide the tools, strategies and techniques that will support grantees to lead change in their systems and communities through achieving program goals and objectives.
Click on the words within the outer wheel to find:
- Definitions of sustainability
- Models of sustainability
- FAQ's
- A self assessment of your program's progress towards sustainability
- Examples of grantee approaches to sustainability
Click within the wheel to explore different strategies for sustainability.
Click on Our View of Sustainability to read more about the National Center 's view of sustainability.
