STRENGTHS
OPPORTUNITIES
ASPIRATIONS
RESULTS
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STRIVE LOCATION
[Transcribed] Hi, my name is Sara Wilson. I proudly serve as the deputy director of the Department of innovation and Economic Opportunity with the city of Birmingham. I have had the pleasure of working with queue entry and her team at strive over the last. I would say, two years basically, since strike came to Birmingham and it has been nothing but a collaborative and pleasant experience, I think what is so exciting about the work that strive is doing and one of the Biggest I would say accomplishments, is that ever since its Inception in Birmingham and its launch strive has completely 100% ingrained itself in community. A lot solution that they just want to throw at the at the opportunity. And I think strive completely took a different approach and really asked a lot of questions in the beginning and was always very true. And very honest Who they wanted to reach. And I think that that's an accomplishment, I think one of the other things that's really striking for me, is the fact that now after having been in the market for a couple of years, strives name comes up as a problem solver as an of times organizations, even nonprofits that are most well- meaning, come in and have a
[Transcribed] I think we have a ton of opportunity as we look at this work and the communities that we serve, I think strives Mission and the work that they do align with these needs and in terms of threats I just I think that the needs of the people that we serve are complex. It's not just a matter of solving for transportation and solving for childcare solving for housing. It's like when you dig deep and you really peel back the layers of what people are actually experiencing and really understanding the If the experiences of the people that we serve, it's not just childcare, right? It's not like, oh I'll pay for your child care and then, you know, that solves the issue its overnight care. It's understanding that, you know, if you're a single parent and your child gets sick, there is no other option besides you. It's also like what do you do during the summer when you can't send your child to school and you have to pay for care. It's also understanding that there's like, you know, that that a mom or a dad who you know, wants You say yes to more opportunity is going to have to make some changes and make some concessions in their life and it's how do we create systems that support people in. The
[Transcribed] I think that in the Workforce Development space, there's this term that's used and it's widely used, which is hard to employ populations, and it's kind of just like such a weird way to describe people because who wants to be called a hard to employee population. And a lot of times when you peel back the layer of like what makes someone hard to employ, there's like a very solvable barrier that is existing that that that's limiting that person's participation in our Workforce or even our economy more broadly, And so I think that that's a space that strive can really excel in. Is that strive doesn't shy away from serving populations that are most in need. I think that strives Brendan brother is how do we help people and understanding that people have barriers, people have complex, you know, limiting things whether it be a belief system whether it's like a tangible barrier. Like something that can be solved for like housing or, you know, just childcare Transportation, whatever those barriers are. And so I think that that's where strive I can really lean in and make a really big difference, is being Advocates and, you know, standing up and when it, whether it's, you know,
[Transcribed] I think as an ecosystem we have to do a better job of measuring long-term success. I think that there's a couple of ways that we can do this in a in a way that that feels good but also screams outcome one. We have to do a better job with data. I think. When you think about data, you think about quantitative data you know what are the number of people coming through your programs, what are their outcomes 36 months three years? After going through your program, how do we prove prove? The efficacy of what we're trying to do. So I think that we need to be able to track and measure that and we need to do that in an effective way that's easy for the practitioner, but also easy for the person, it's easy to digest for the person, reading it or reviewing it. And then we can also use that data to apply for other Grant programs or apply for other funding or to just be able to prove to to funders and donors that what we're doing matters and And it actually moves the needle for people and then I think we have to do a better job of tracking, the lived experiences and real stare storytelling opportunities that are present in a lot of the programs that
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