Grant Proposal: The Isla Vista Youth Project
- Your organization's history and accomplishments
The Isla Vista Youth Project (IVYP) is a non-profit, NAEYC accredited organization founded in 1971 through the combined actions of the Humanitas Foundation and the University United Methodist Church. The organization was created with the purpose of serving the families and children of Isla Vista by providing them with access to affordable childcare and afterschool programs. In the last 44 years, the IVYP has expanded from a classroom of 12 children to providing their services to over 1,800 clients. This drive to expand services to more members of the community earned IVYP the Non-Profit of the Year Award from the Goleta Valley Chamber of Commerce in 2014.
2. Your current programs and activities. Include the constituency you serve, with specific demographic information. How are they actively involved in your organization and/or how do they benefit from your organizations work?
IVYP’s constituency encompasses children and families in the Isla Vista community, and the communities of Santa Barbara and Goleta. Children are given access to professional child care, which includes free pre-kindergarten classes, infant and toddler care, and specialized programs for children learning English. The organization strives to put each child on a path to success with a high-quality, structured learning environment built on fundamentals of self-expression, communication, and problem-solving.
The organization also provides parents with resources and learning materials to improve their child’s home environment. Daily interactions between parents and their child’s teacher’s are encouraged. This facilitates a trusting atmosphere where parents feel comfortable approaching the organization for the resources offered. The organization holds social gatherings outside of the classroom to build a communal atmosphere among parents where reading material, parenting workshops, and affordable social services like healthcare and food stamps are made available. A 2014 survey held by the IVYP found that:
- 90% of the program’s full-day preschoolers were assessed as “building” or “integrating” in the domain of Self and Social Development.
- 92% of parents affiliated with IVYP report that the program is helping them reach their goals for their family and that they know how to use the resources available to them to meet their families needs.
- 40 families were provided with individualized case-management services and 1,223 other clients were given family support services like referrals to health care, dental care, and legal services.
3. Your organization’s relationships - both formal and informal - with other organizations working to meet the same need. In what way does your work differ from that of other organizations?
The IVYP has partnered with community-minded organizations such as the Isla Vista Recreation and Parks District, The Santa Barbara Food Bank, and the Santa Barbara Neighborhood Clinic with the goal of connecting the families in the program to beneficial community resources.
IVYP works with many organizations that serve the community’s youth like the local YMCA’s, the Boys and Girls Club, and the Isla Vista Teens Center, but the IVYP is the only organization that specializes in professional childcare while acting as a source of assistance and resources to low-income or single-parent households in the Isla Vista area. Keeping the organization based in the small community of Isla Vista provides a deeper understanding of the challenges that children face in the community.
Funding Request
- What need or problem does your project work to address?
IVYP provides at-risk children growing up in unstable environments with a constructive learning environment, facilitated by trained professionals as well as passionate volunteers from the surrounding communities. The organization provides inclusive, high-quality childcare to those who could not afford it normally. Though IVYP holds classes throughout the year, there is not a structured curriculum for the summer period, which goes from June 15th to September 15th.
This grant would assist IVYP in starting the “Isla Vista Youth Project Adventure Days”, which will provide children with a fun, hands-on daycamp to occupy their summer vacation. Parents in low-income or single-part households have trouble finding daycare or babysitters for their younger children, particularly during the summer months when school is out of session.
Children
The Adventure Days Program will provide children ages 4 to 10 with a constructive learning environment during the summer, meant to provide intellectual stimulation through teamwork exercises and environmental education. The program will teach children about the world around them, specifically the diverse ecology of Santa Barbara and Goleta.
Adventure Days will be split into two, six week long programs that will take place from June 15th to July 31st and again from August 3rd to September 15th. Each week of the program will consist of classes that combine indoor learning with outdoor, tactile experiences. On Friday of each week, the children will be taken on inexpensive field trips to environmentally significant areas in the county ranging from the Butterfly Preserve and the Goleta Beach tidepools. Children will benefit from these experiences, as they will be able to take in-class knowledge and apply it to real world concepts in their own community.
The six-week curriculum is as follows:
The summer months between school sessions are crucial moments in a child’s cognitive development, due to the fact that they are no longer receiving daily schooling and instead spend time outside of the classroom. Adventure Days finds a balance between the fun of summer and the educational aspects of formalized schooling. It is a hands-on approach to environmental education that will get children excited to learn about the world around them.
Parents
Parents of children, particularly parents working multiple jobs or supporting single-parent households, will benefit from having access to 6 weeks of affordable daycare. Rather than leave their child at home with a sitter, parents will be able to leave their child with trained professionals in a structured learning environment. Taking the added-stress of finding a sitter out of the equation will contribute to the parents stress-levels and create a positive environment for the child at home as well as the classroom.
The Local Community
Santa Barbara is known for its landscapes and preserved natural environments that range from beaches to mountainous hiking trails. Because of this, there is a great level of importance placed on environmental activism and awareness. By exposing children to nature at an early age, and demonstrating that their actions can help or hurt the plants and animals around them, IVYP hopes to create a bond between the Isla Vista youth and their community that will carry on into adulthood.
Many of the Adventure Days field trips will be focused around preservation. The Creek Restoration Project will take children to a nearby creek and show them how simply picking up trash can beautify the environment in just a day. Children will see how their teamwork and individual actions heal the local flora and fauna.
2. In a short paragraph, tell us your project’s (or organization’s) goals and the specific outcomes you project for the grant period (i.e. numbers served, behavior or attitudes changed, capital project completed, etc.).
The IVYP Adventure Days Program class will educate 250 children per session, serving 500 children over the course of the summer. The participation fee will be on a sliding scale based on financial background, with the maximum price to participate capping at 300 dollars. This amount can either be paid all at once or over the course of the 6 week program. The projected outcome of the program would allow for the program to provide more financial assistance to families that cannot afford summer babysitters. The projected outcome will also include more children demonstrating environmental awareness and more confidence in their teamwork abilities.
3. Describe your project or the capital items requested, including:
Whether the project is new, ongoing, or expanding
The Adventure Days program is a completely new program that has come as a combined effort between IVYP and other local environmental organizations. The organization wants to incentivize parents to enroll their children in the program over finding a sitter, therefore a grant would allow IVYP to absorb some of the cost of the program , reducing the overall enrollment price for families who need the assistance.
Target audience, including specific demographic information:
The program will be offered to children between the ages of 4 and 10. These children will primarily come from low income households or single-parent families in Isla Vista, as do many of IVYP’s existing constituents. The program will also be offered to families in the surrounding communities of Goleta and Santa Barbara. IVYP emphasizes the importance of providing services to all families and children regardless of race, ethnic background, or financial history, therefore the Adventure Days project seeks to be as inclusive as possible.
Activities and strategies that will be used to meet your stated outcomes:
IVYP will advertise the program throughout the year as a summer alternative to childcare that is both educational and affordable, largely due to the financial aid opportunities provided through this grant. The program is relatively inexpensive, as most of the field trips taken are to locations that do not charge admission.
General timeline for the main objectives of your project:
Advertising for the Adventure Days program will begin in early May. Flyers will be sent home with children and handed out during parent conferences and social gatherings. Once children have signed up for the program, school busses and field trips will be booked. Financial aid will be offered on a need-based system two weeks before the program begins (June 1st and July 19th). The first program will begin on June 15th and end on July 31st. The program will then start over with new students on August 3rd and end on September 15th.
4. If this is a request for General Support , what are your organization's most pressing needs?
Any additional support offered through this grant will go back into the program, taking the financial burden off of families who cannot afford the admission fee and paying for the more expensive field trips that require admission like the Santa Barbara Zoo.
5. How do you plan to evaluate the effectiveness of or impact of the project?
The effectiveness of the Adventures Program will be measured in terms of enrollment numbers and the observed effects the program has on the participants. The program will be deemed effective if children who have gone through the program demonstrate a heightened awareness of the environment and their impact on it.
6. Summarize the skills and relevant experience of key staff/volunteers essential to the project’s success. If other organizations are collaborating on this project, note which ones and in what ways.
Juan Pimentel: Program Director of IVYP’s after school program. He and his staff of childcare operators have been running the program for 15 years. Juan also oversees all programs that involve the community such as local picnics and speaker events.
City of Santa Barbara: Creeks Division: Recognizing the importance of water conservation, the Creeks Division of Santa Barbara has provided touring and field trip opportunities as well as free school busses for environmental fieldtrips.
7. If full funding is not available, what is the contingency plan for securing additional support and/or how can you modify your proposal?
IVYP will continue to seek funding through alternate grants listed under their Donors page on their website.