UNITED WAY OF CENTRAL IOWA
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Mission Statement
United Way of Central Iowa's mission is to improve lives by uniting the caring power of our community. Our Vision is to engage community to empower all. Our core values are compassion, integrity, community engagement, responsiveness, and striving for excellence.
About This Cause
For more than a century, United Way of Central Iowa has played a unique role by bringing together people from every part of our community – donors, volunteers, advocates, nonprofit organizations, community leaders, elected officials, and people with lived experience. TOGETHER, we look at the big picture when it comes to the future of our community to identify gaps and best leverage points to create sustainable impact. We are UNITED in taking on some of our community’s critical challenges, addressing them at their roots through investments and strong partnerships. In addition, we identify specific barriers limiting out community’s ability to provide equitable opportunities to EVERY central Iowan. United Way of Central Iowa invests in hundreds of local nonprofit programs focused on creating progress in the 5 Elements of a Thriving Community: • Essential Needs • Early Childhood Success • Education Success • Economic Opportunity • Health & Well-Being For each of the five elements of a thriving community, we have identified a dashboard of metrics and measures from our community. These will be used to set goals, measure impact, and track our progress over time. As we focus on results, the goals set will be well-defined and measurable so our community can clearly see the real and apparent impact of the work you generously support. In the past, for each area of work (education, income, and health) one metric was used to measure progress and represent impact. Volunteer advisors and subject matter experts have helped identify these key indicators and are now using them to guide the United Way of Central Iowa team to develop specific goals and strategies for each element. United Way of Central Iowa focuses on the following strategies to move our community forward in the 5 Elements of a Thriving Community. Essential Needs: • Increase availability of and reduce barriers to accessing healthy food for central Iowans with limited resources and access. • Provide supports needed to keep people in affordable, stable, and healthy homes. • Increase opportunities for safe, health-promoting spaces where central Iowans live, work, and play. Early Childhood Success: • Address barriers to prenatal care and improve birth outcomes. • Increase access to and availability to prevention, early identification, and early intervention services for children birth-5 years to promote healthy physical and mental development. • Increase access to and participation of children in a quality childcare or preschool settings that promote kindergarten readiness. • Advocacy: Policies and practices to improve Early Childhood systems and provide equitable access to central Iowans. Education Success: • Improve student success in elementary, middle, and high school. • Increase access to quality, culturally relevant, and engaging activities/programs to promote learning, positive social emotional wellness and reduce school absences for student K-12 -Promote successful transitions from middle and high school. • Increase student access to career exploration, activities, and awareness -Increase high school students who graduate with a plan for the future. • Advocacy: Policies and practices to improve Education systems and provide equitable access to central Iowa youth. Economic Opportunity: • Provide access to skills and supports leading to jobs that provide income needed to be self-sufficient with the opportunity to build wealth. • Provide access to adult basic education, post-secondary education, training, and supports required for quality jobs. • Provide individuals access to financial services and supports to manage their money, save for assets, and purchase/invest in assets - including developing, financing, and sustaining small business. • Maximize use of the tax code to boost income through appropriate filing status and use of tax credits and deductions. • Advocacy: Policies and practices to improve Economic Opportunity systems and provide equitable access to central Iowans. Health & Well-Being: • Reduce barriers to accessing regular, quality, culturally appropriate physical and mental health care (i.e.: stigma, language, trust, cost, proximity, availability of workforce). • Promote and support central Iowans’ sense of purpose, belonging, and connectedness. • Advocacy: Policies and practices to improve Health and Well-Being systems and provide equitable access to central Iowans. United Way of Central Iowa has funded programs in central Iowa for more than 100 years. In 2008, United Way moved to a community impact model of bringing together partners across many sectors and working toward large-scale community change. At that time central Iowa adopted three broad community goals for Education, Income, and Health. Under these goals, strategies were identified for achieving reaching them. The same will be done under our new UNITED to THRIVE strategic focus as we strive to meet our goals and key indicators of success. Volunteer experts make decisions about programs to fund under the strategies within each of our five areas of focus. United Way requires that all of the programs it funds report outcomes. United Way has a data team, individuals who work with funded programs to help with tracking client outcomes and with measuring program results. All programs funded by United Way report program outcomes on a regular basis, and they then meet with a funding cabinet made up of volunteer leaders to make investment decisions for the upcoming fiscal year. United Way of Central Iowa has the highest four-star rating from Charity Navigator for the past 18 years – making it among the top one percent of all charities nationwide. For more information about United Way of Central Iowa, visit www.unitedwaydm.org.