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Initiatives Please browse this selection of initiatives in which DMT is currently or has previously been involved. Click here to learn more about DMT’s recent progress and involvement in current projects such as the National Guard Youth ChalleNGe Program, the Compassion Capital Fund, and Mentoring Children of Prisoners. Angel Tree Angel Tree, a national ministry program to the children of prisoners, mobilizes more than 15,000 churches to serve nearly 600,000 children each year. DMT worked with Prison Fellowship’s Children, Youth & Families Division to redesign and develop an enhanced Angel Tree program with breakaway scale and effectiveness. The redesign and streamlining of this flagship program saw a twenty-two percent growth rate in the first year of reorganization. Angel Tree's expanding ministry of Family Reconciliation includes year-round features. Angel Tree Camping results in over 7500 prisoners' children enjoying a week of summer camp and encouragement. Expounding upon that program, more than 2300 young people, whose parents are incarcerated, are now involved in strong mentoring relationships designed to overcome the odds that indicate that these children, by virtue of their circumstances, may be six times more likely than other youth to end up in prison themselves. The growing reach of Angel Tree is making a difference. http://www.angeltree.org
APAC APAC is a highly successful, low cost, faith-based correctional
program created in Brazil and replicated in South America, Europe, and
Asia. The program has served thousands of prisoners and their families.
While recidivism rates among other prisoners are marked at eighty percent,
this faith-based alternative has yielded rates as low as four percent.
DMT was hired by the Eckerd Foundation to research and document the best
practices within APAC that drive its success. This research was published
and promoted by Prison Fellowship International, resulting in the expansion
of the program in eleven countries. http://www.pfi.org/programmes/apac Church-Based Disability Programs Dare Mighty Things provided research and design for multiple national-scale models that have served as the basis for several church-based disability programs. Wheels for the World, which has distributed more than 25,000 wheelchairs to more than sixty countries and trained hundreds of ministry and community leaders, including people with disabilities, is one example of these programs through Joni and Friends. http://www.joniandfriends.org
Communities Empowering Youth The Communities Empowering Youth Program (CEY), launched under the Presidential Initiative Helping America’s Youth (HAY), collaborates with faith-based and community organizations to address and eliminate gang involvement and violence. CEY confronts this national problem by promoting positive youth development and offering capacity building strategies to organizations funded by its program. Dare Mighty Things (DMT) supports CEY by equipping its grantees with the resources that they need to effectively run and sustain their programs. This work includes conducting research for the program’s e-clearinghouse, engaging subject matter experts in the field, and guiding a thorough needs assessment from its execution to its completion. CEY Program.
Compassion Capital Fund Compassion Capital Fund , organized under the Department of Health and Human Services, is part of President George W. Bush's faith-based initiative to increase the scale and effectiveness of faith-based and community organizations. DMT was engaged in 2002 to run the National Resource Center, a provider of training, technical assistance, and information to equip the grantees funded under the Compassion Capital Fund.
DeVos Urban Leadership Institute DeVos Urban Leadership Institute, a national leadership-training
program, provides intensive breakthrough training for the emerging leaders
of urban youth programs in eighteen states nationwide. The DeVos family hired
DMT to create a national prototype for a ministry that would reflect the
family’s core values and interests. After careful evaluation, DMT steered
the DeVos family toward the development of a leadership training initiative
for urban youth ministry leaders. Building on the organizational values
and core competencies of the DeVos family, DMT developed the framework for
the DeVos Urban Leadership Foundation, which has equipped over 400 urban
youth leaders with the tools to increase the size, scope and effectiveness
of their outreach. http://www.devosurbanleadership.org/ Employer Support for the Guard and Reserve (ESGR) Employer Support for the Guard and Reserve (ESGR) is a Department of Defense organization. Established in 1972, ESGR's mission is to coordinate cooperation and understanding between Reserve component members and their civilian employers and to create resolution for conflicts arising between the civilian employers and the Reservists' military commitment. All operations are handled through volunteers throughout the nation, Guam, Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, and Europe. Recently, Reservists have become fundamental in adding manpower to military pursuits abroad. DMT works with ESGR in order to provide training and technical assistance to volunteers in order to gain and maintain active support from all public and private employers for the men and women of the National Guard and Reserve. http://www.esgr.org GAP Teams GAP Teams, an initiative
of Prison Fellowship International, mobilizes and sends teams of volunteer
professionals to Eastern Europe, Africa, and Latin America to provide
economic aid and medical assistance to prisoners, ex-prisoners, and their
families. DMT was tasked with the evaluation and redesign of the GAP program
initiatives, the review and research of strategic partnerships, training
of regional GAP program directors, and technical assistance for pilot
sites. In 2003, 8,000 inmates in eight countries received medical attention
through the generosity of this program's volunteer force. Global Assistance Programme GEO Trust GEO Trust, an international economic development venture, employs
thousands of ex-prisoners and their families in Africa, Asia, and Latin
America. DMT worked with Prison Fellowship to design and develop the Humaita
Bread Factory in Sao Jose dos Campos, Brazil, the first initiative of
the GEO Trust. This initiative, located within the pioneering faith-based
Humaita Prison, involved the identification of corporate sponsors, mobilization
of volunteers for onsite business planning and building modification,
and enterprise start-up and monitoring. The Humaita Prison was cited as
having an extremely low recidivism rate among former prisoners, in an
exploratory study of the impact of religious programs on recidivism. Heroic Choices Heroic Choices, a program designed by the Todd M. Beamer Foundation
in the wake of September 11th, 2001, helps children experiencing family
trauma to overcome their circumstances by making heroic choices every
day. DMT provided program research, design, and development expertise
to this asset-based program that features long-term mentoring relationships
and curriculum-based training. DMT forged strategic partnerships on behalf
of the Beamer foundation and led the development and testing of the initial
prototype in the New York City area. Hundreds of traumatized children
are engaged in the program. http://www.heroicchoices.org/
HopeShare HopeShare was established by the Salvation Army to break the cycle
of despair among high risk children by providing them with a safe place
to meet their spiritual and emotional needs. DMT worked with HopeShare
to design a program portfolio consistent with existing best practices,
market demand, and opportunities for growth; create marketing, program
development, operations, and financial plans that will ensure successful
market entry and national rollout; and build a strong case for financial
investment in the HopeShare ministry venture among potential donors. http://www.hopeshare.org
InnerChange Freedom Initiative InnerChange, a program of Prison Fellowship Ministries, is a nationally acclaimed, faith-based, volunteer-driven prison model. Based on a restorative prison model in Brazil, InnerChange now operates prisons in Texas, Iowa, Kansas, Arkansas, and Minnesota. Fiscal year 2005 saw the first such program for female inmates, established in Minnesota and adding to the original five men's program in operation, bringing the FY 2005 enrollment to 1,170 prisoners. http://www.ifiprison.orgDMT conducted market research and program design by leading a team of correctional, legal and criminal justice experts to Sao Paulo, Brazil to observe APAC, a restorative prison model developed by two local lawyers driven by a desire to see true rehabilitation among the incarcerated population. By assessing this genuinely rehabilitative prison environment, DMT was able to translate APAC’s success in Brazil into a program model suitable for replication in the United States. After extensive site visits to several states including North Carolina, Alabama, Mississippi, California, and Texas, the program model was approved and a Houston-based prison was identified as the prototype site. DMT led an integrated team of PFM executives and consultants in the development of a business plan and case statement to guide the launch of InnerChange. The business plan addressed all aspects of the new venture, including operational and facility requirements, legal strategies and risks, and financial considerations. DMT led the team in presenting the business plan to a small group of potential funding partners who subsequently agreed to finance the launch of the venture. DMT engaged their proposal development and negotiation expertise on behalf of Prison Fellowship to respond to a request for proposal issued by the state of Texas. DMT wrote the winning proposal to start a faith based prison in the Jester II correctional facility in Houston, Texas and subsequently negotiated terms with the Texas Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ) in consultation with and on behalf of Prison Fellowship. DMT led an integrated team of PFM staff, TDCJ employees, and DMT consultants in the development of a working prototype of the faith based prison model in Houston, Texas. This initiative included the development and execution of detailed operational protocols, the hiring of key staff, and the development and rollout of a 24/7/365 curriculum designed to prepare prisoners for their release and reintegration back into the community. DMT staff ran the prison program during critical months of the start up phase.[View Case Study]
MatchPoint is based on a national, award-winning program developed in New York by Dave Van Patten and successfully replicated in multiple locations. DMT designed, prototyped, and implemented this faith-based mentoring program for juvenile offenders. DMT researched and designed the national program model, developed all mentoring program collateral including operations and training materials, and provided in-depth national and local training and technical assistance to program leaders. Mentoring Children of Prisoners
Dare Mighty Things transformed the Post-Residential Phase of the program by developing a new mentoring model, a consistent set of nationwide program standards, operational materials, and mentor and mentee training curricula. ChalleNGe’s mentoring aftercare program is the recipient of two national awards and is recognized as the second largest mentoring program in the nation. DMT designed, developed, and now operates the National Challenge Institute (NCI) on behalf of the National Guard Youth ChalleNGe Program. The institute focuses on professional development, offering more than thirty-two fully accredited courses and trains more than 1,400 people annually. This functional training program offers a rich, interactive learning environment facilitated by highly qualified and dynamic instructors. DMT also plans and manages several national workshops and conferences each year to support and promote the goals of the program and the institute. Benchmarking is the foundation of effective training and technical assistance programs within ChalleNGe. DMT is currently in the process of conducting a two-year cycle of benchmarking research on the eight core components within the ChalleNGe program. This process informs both the instructional design and the substance of ChalleNGe training, effectively supporting program personnel in their professional performance and growth. The National Guard Youth ChalleNGe Program website www.ngycp.org was designed and implemented by DMT. Over the past several years, DMT has coordinated and carried out two successful overhauls of the original site to maximize usability and effectiveness and to promote national visibility for the program. In addition, DMT maintains all thirty program websites. NCI Online was also conceived of and executed by DMT and serves to increase communication and peer-to-peer learning through a customizable interface. Staff benefit from online resources and technical assistance as well as distance learning opportunities via the web.[View Case Study]
NBA Mentoring Initiative NBA Mentoring Initiative is a week-long intensive mentoring program designed to provide professional basketball players with the life skills they need to become productive citizens within their communities.Passage Passage, an initiative of Promise Keepers, is a national movement of young men who complete a rites-of-passage, mentor-assisted curriculum designed to cast vision, ignite passion, and build capacity to become godly men. DMT designed, developed, and launched this nationally recognized program. In 2002 and 2003, Passage events held in Ohio and California reached a combined 24,000 young men, fathers, mentors, and leaders. http://www.promisekeepers.org[View Case Study] Prime Time Prime Time is a national faith-based, after-school program designed
to provide children a safe place during the critical after school hours
from 3 p.m. to 6 p.m., where they are engaged in a group mentoring curriculum
delivered by caring adult volunteers. DMT assisted Scripture Union in
the research and design of this initiative. There are now twenty-four active PrimeTime programs, with ten additional programs in the start-up phase. Scripture Union has partnered with The Salvation Army and World Vision in order to implement PrimeTime on an even greater scale. Strengthening the Services' Capacities of Community and Faith-Based Provider Organizations Sycamore Tree Project Sycamore Tree Project is an eight to twelve week program that
connects offenders with crime victims (unrelated to the offenders' crimes)
to talk about the harm and impact of criminal offenses. In 2003, STP held
operations in six countries across the globe. DMT researched and designed
the Sycamore Tree Project and wrote the prototype curriculum. http://www.pficjr.org/programs/stp Teamworks Victory Generation Victory Generation, a program of the Black Ministerial Alliance of Greater Boston, provides grant funding, technical assistance and support to ten after-school programs serving 450 youth, ninety percent of whom come from low or very low income families in Boston’s communities of color. DMT developed the program model for Victory Generation, which provides a nurturing, culturally enriching learning environment for children grades K – 8 primarily from the towns of Boston's Dorchester, Roxbury, Chinatown, and Mattapan communities in Massachusetts. In addition to homework assistance, participants receive instruction in literacy and mathematics skills based on the standard guidelines set by the state of Massachusetts. Evaluation results show that 100% of program participants were promoted to the next grade level in 2007. BMA BostonWorldChair Limited WorldChair Limited, an international manufacturing company in Kenya, Africa, produces affordable wheelchairs for disabled children worldwide. DMT researched and developed the WorldChair prototype, researched and wrote the business plan, secured international NGOs as customers, and helped our client secure first round funding to launch the venture. |
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