Alliance to Impact the Future

In the summer of 2010, the Southeast Regional Office (Region IV) of the Administration for Children and Families decided to use Recovery Act Funds in a bold new way. The RO created an alliance of four agencies to sponsor a summer employment and character competencies initiative for 250 disadvantaged teens in the City of Atlanta. The participating agencies, ACF, the Georgia Department of Human Resources, the City of Atlanta, and the privately funded Global Peace Festival Foundation, formalized the initiative with a Memorandum of Agreement. The Atlanta Summer Youth Employment Program Character Competencies Initiative provided youth with a combination of work experience, training and skills acquisition through summer employment along with instruction in positive character development.

The combination of a summer employment program and a character competencies curriculum is an example of the sum being greater than the two parts. The program evaluation indicated that the teens benefited from both the employment program and the curriculum, carrying with them the experience, skills, knowledge and values that will empower them toward educational, economic and social success throughout their lives.

No single agency alone had the skills and expertise to make this initiative happen; many agencies had to join forces. Various names have been given to this process including interoperability, coalition building, partnering, collaboration and networking. No matter what it’s called, the success of this initiative depended on the combined skills, knowledge, resources and expertise of all four of the participating agencies.