I must admit that one of the things I miss most at this time of year is fresh garden vegetables. With all the holiday munching it is too bad the good weather has past and there aren’t as many locally or home grown items readily available to keep us healthier. My funder today’s offers a gardening funds to promote an understanding of gardening and the know how to make it happen.

This week’s pick: Welch's, the processing and marketing subsidiary of the National Grape Cooperative Association, and Scholastic's Parent & Child Magazine have launched the new Harvest Grants which will help schools across the U.S. to create fruit and vegetable gardens. One of there goals is to make this a very hands-on learning experience for the students.

Five K-8 schools will receive packages from Welch’s valued at $1,000 each; 25 schools will receive $500 packages; and 70 schools will receive $250 packages. Deadline to submit a request is February 6, 2010. To see the full RFP, click here.

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Evaluation 2009 was held at the Rosen
Shingle Creek convention facilities.

I had the privilege to be one of the Improve Group staff who was able to make the trip to Florida for the Evaluation 2009 Conference put on by the American Evaluation Association last week. It was my first trip to the national conference and I was pleased with the quality of the presentations I attended.

I flew in for the final 2 days of the conference to be part of a roundtable discussion on blogging and the possible merits of a more unified effort to share knowledge among evaluators using our collective blogs. I was surprised to learn that there is a huge disparity in evaluator’s opinions on the value of blogging. I also discovered that tweeting is well used among many of the evaluators present. Time to create and maintain a useful blogging exchange was the biggest concern in the room. After a lively discussion the group decided to sign up for committees that will create more definitive steps on the use of blogging in our profession.

I also attended sessions on: technology use in social service evaluation; an historical context on post-war evaluation; storytelling to communicate evaluation results; evaluation accountability, context, and transparency in the new administration; online classroom technology observation tools, and more.

I appreciated the time I was given for this professional development event and I hope to bring all that I learned into practice at the Improve Group. Please look for upcoming blogs on specific presentations that gave special insight into the work we do.

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While on last week’s trip to the American Evaluation Association Conference in Orlando, Florida, I was pleased to see that the huge hotel that housed the event had a very special amenity – a nature trail. Both Leah and I took the trail at different times during our stay and enjoyed the execise and the beautiful plants that were noted along the way. In a time when it is so easy to lose track of the importance of getting a little fresh air and exercise, I was very pleased to have this resource so readily available. My funder today also believes in getting outdoors and taking a good walk in through nature.

This week’s pick: In order to keep America’s public trails protected and accessible, the American Hiking Society offers the National Trails Fund. “The Fund's grants help give local groups the resources they need to secure access, volunteers, tools and materials to protect America's public trails.”

Ten applicants will each be awarded $5,000. Members of the Alliance of Hiking Organizations receive 5 bonus points on their National Trails Fund applications. Deadline for an application is December 15, 2009. Click here for more information.

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I had the chance to collaborate with Tom DeCaigny of Performing Arts Workshop today to share some of the lessons we've learned about evaluation in the arts. With our participants we had a great discussion about figuring out the best questions to get the information you need, helping people to be honest and courageous during an evaluation, and ways to build buy-in and support for evaluation activities.

Our PowerPoint presentaiton can be found here. We had two handouts, one on developing a logic model and the other on choosing the right evaluation instruments.

Questions or comments are welcome - feel free to contact me!

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A good book can change your life. When I was still in elementary school I recall 2 books that really opened up my imagination and gave me a sense of the world beyond my smaller Wisconsin town. I read The Once and Future King by T.H. White and Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell. Thanks to those books and their authors I believe I started a life-long love of history as well. To help more generations appreciate the transformative power of literature my funder today offers the following opportunity.

This week’s pick: The Big Read is a program of the National Endowment for the Arts in cooperation with Arts Midwest. The mission of this program is to revitalize the role of literature in American culture. Grants will be made to museums, colleges, and universities partnering with libraries that encourage reading by participating in The Big Read (September 2010 through June 2011).

Approximately seventy-five grants of up to $20,000 in matching funds will be awarded. The deadline to apply is February 2, 2010. In an effort to keep the application process green they request that materials be accessed online.

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A few weekends ago I had the pleasure of volunteering at the ARC Ecumenical Retreat Center just outside of Cambridge, Minnesota. ARC stands for Action Reflection and Celebration. I have had the joy of being a guest at ARC before but this was my first time as a volunteer. My experience was great with a nice balance of work and relaxation time. They are very careful to ensure that their volunteers also have enough free time to use however they like. Volunteers are given their choice of activities to help with, so I decided upon kitchen/ meal duties, which meant lots of washing dishes among other things. ARC currently has a commercial dishwasher on their wish list and let me just say that I strongly would encourage donations in this direction. J

Food is a specialty at ARC and every meal is prepared from scratch, including freshly baked bread with every meal. The majority of the meals are vegetarian, so that all the scraps can be composted, and they will arrange for special diets if you have needs. The weekend I was at ARC there were two women staying there who had a long list of dietary restrictions, and the folks at ARC went above and beyond to ensure that either the whole meal fit their needs or that they had delicious substitutes.

Danielle is pictured with Jan Wiersma the Director of ARC Ecumenical Retreat Center.

The grounds at ARC are very calming and the woods in the area are original. The founders of ARC wanted a place where people could go and be restored so that they could continue in the work they do. There are plenty of walking paths, and there is a small stream that runs through the ground. There is also a lake nearby, but I have yet to figure out how to get there.

The greatest thing about being a volunteer is you spend time working with and getting to know the ARC community members who work hard to ensure that people have someplace wonderful to spend their retreat. Plus you get to eat and sleep for free, so it is a great way to take a low-budget retreat! I would highly recommend it!

ARC is located 8 Miles Northwest of Cambridge, MN. More information click here.

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Over my life I have found that it is our past that helps shape us into who we are today. Sharing that past is part of the joy of the holiday season, when we connect with those who “knew us when” and see what we’ve become today. Understanding and preserving cultural history is also a great tool of education. It keeps a foundation under us and educates youth on their important ancestry. My funder for today’s Grant Gazing has helped many people in preserving and honoring their cultural history.

This week’s pick: Steven Spielberg established the Righteous Person’s Foundation to build a diverse and vibrant Jewish Community in the United States. The Foundation funds many aspects that assist the Jewish community including:

• Using the arts, culture, and media to engage a broad audience in what it has meant and can mean to be a Jew today;
• Engaging with youth and young adults on issues of Jewish identity and community;
• Promoting understanding between Jews and those of other faiths and backgrounds;
• Encouraging Jews to participate in the work of tikkun olam (social justice)\;
• Educate people about the events of the Holocaust

Grants typically range between $15,000 and $250,000 and funds may be issues over multiple years. Letters of inquiry can be submitted two times a year and the next submission date is December 1, 2009. For more details, click here.

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As my colleagues at the Improve Group know, each month I can be found crunching numbers in my role as Treasurer of the Minnesota Public Health Association (MPHA). I’ve been Treasurer since June, and have really enjoyed my increased involvement with the organization. Part of what drew me to the MPHA in the first place is their annual policy forum series. Every year, MPHA tackles a new public health topic by bringing together leaders in our community for a series of four to five policy forums. This year, the forums focus on evidence behind a number of Public Health controversies. The series will kick off on at 7:00 am on November 13 with a forum titled Unhealthy Influences: The Impact of Advertising on the Health of Children. This topic is of particular interest to the Improve Group right now because of our needs assessment and evaluation work with Statewide Health Improvement Program (SHIP) grantees. SHIP aims to reduce tobacco use and obesity through environmental and policy changes, and we know that advertising to children is one factor that can contribute to youth tobacco use and unhealthy eating. For more information about registration for the MPHA policy form, please click here.

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