Our latest conversation starter: Golden

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By Barry Rochford, strategic communication officer

It’s here!

Golden, our conversation starter that celebrates young people ages 13 and beyond, is here. This book encapsulates seven time-tested youth development principles that inform our grantmaking and apply to our mission of promoting economic freedom through education.

Golden has been a long time in coming. It’s based on our research and understanding of youth development — in this case the teen years, which is a period of remarkable transformation in a young person’s life. We titled it “Golden” because we believe the teen years are exactly that. Too often, teens are viewed negatively, but we don’t think that should be the case at all. We think teens are promising, brilliant, and VALUABLE. Teens have so much to give to the world.

The principles found in Golden aren’t necessarily new. They’re not groundbreaking or even all that unique. But they are paradigm-shifting in the sense that adults can’t direct a teen’s transformation. They can, however, help prepare caring, supportive environments for teens as they make the journey to adulthood.

The seven principles in Golden are:

  • Mutual respect underlies EVERYTHING.
  • Real really matters.
  • A little sweat builds a lot of equity.
  • Attention and commitment come from within.
  • Patience is faith in action.
  • You need to see it to be it.
  • There is more in us than we know.

For the past several days, we’ve been sharing these principles on our Facebook page. And, of course, there’s much more information in Golden about them. We encourage you to read it yourself and see if it meshes with your own thinking. If you’d like a copy, please email me at brochford@dekkofoundation.org, or you can message us on our Facebook page. You can also read an online version of Golden on our website here.

Golden is the fourth of our child development conversation starters that we’ve produced over the years, the others being our Owner’s Manual for newborns through age 5; Sturdy Stems for young people ages 6-12; and 7 Simple Ideas to Make Your Classroom Bloom! for educators and parents.

We call them “conversation starters” because they’re intended to do just that: begin a dialogue about the great things that happen when adults step back and consider what young people need to grow and develop. But they’re not written in stone. We believe the principles described in them are timeless, but our understanding of them is updated and changed as we learn more — especially as we work with grantseekers who are trying to do what’s best for young people each day.

I stated earlier that the teen years are a period of remarkable transformation. In fact, they’re a lot like a chrysalis — the last stage before a caterpillar becomes a butterfly. Interestingly enough, the Greek origin of “chrysalis” means “gold.”

Like the caterpillar, teens experience a time of intense, inward-focused development that prepares them to one day step forward in the world with all of their beautiful colors on display.

We hope you enjoy reading Golden and find it valuable in your own work.

Still committed to arts programming

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By Barry Rochford, strategic communication officer

We recently notified educators and arts organizations about our decision to end our Art Dekko proactive grantmaking initiative. I wanted to take this opportunity to explain a little more about how we came to that decision while also affirming our continued commitment to investing in arts experiences for young people.

First, it should be said that we as a foundation love the arts. Our board and our staff love the arts for their ability to spark creativity, growth and change in young people. That’s why for more than 15 years the Dekko Foundation has invested more than $1.5 million in our grantmaking areas in Indiana, Iowa, Minnesota and Alabama through Art Dekko. On top of that, we’ve invested in other arts-related programs through our responsive grantmaking.

For those who might be unfamiliar with Art Dekko, each year in January we issued a request for proposals to invest in arts-related programming. If you’ve kept tabs on our Facebook page, you’ve seen some of the results of those Art Dekko investments.

As an organization, we, too, should grow, change and get better over time. Our founder, Mr. Chester E. Dekko, would certainly expect us to. So that’s why as we’ve thought about Art Dekko in recent months, we wondered if we could be making an even greater impact through our investments in arts programming. We believe the answer is yes.

What does that look like? When will that happen? To be honest, we’re still working on it. But we’re excited about what the future will bring, and we certainly welcome any feedback you might have.

In the meantime: We still want to invest in arts programming. We continue to welcome arts-related proposals through our responsive grantmaking process. We accept proposals daily, but since our responsive grantmaking is different from our Art Dekko initiative, we hope you’ll keep in mind the following:

  • You will need to complete an application online at dekkofoundation.org/apply-now. Our staff is always available by phone to answer any questions. Once your proposal has been received, someone will come out and meet with you to learn more.
  • Please allow 90 days prior to needing the funds for our staff to learn more about your proposal.
  • Please be prepared to talk about how your proposal will build the skills, knowledge and character young people need to live economically free lives.

If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to contact us at 260-347-1278, or email me at brochford@dekkofoundation.org or Kim Davidson at kdavidson@dekkofoundation.org.

You give us hope!

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By Sharon Smith, Program Director

One of my most memorable days at the Dekko Foundation—and I’ve had lots of memorable days—happened one summer about ten years ago.  One of our grantees from Lamoni, Iowa named Benita Booth, was driving through Indiana on her way to the east coast. She wanted to stop in to see our office, say hello and meet our president.

Since we go out to visit our grantseekers, we don’t have that many office visitors—especially not people from out of state. We welcomed Mrs. Booth and sat in our president’s office for some polite small talk.  That’s when she dropped a thought so profound that I think about it to this day.

“You know,” she said, “the money you give us is really important.  But what you really do is give us hope.”

What an amazing way to synthesize the impact of grantmaking.  Giving hope to schools and nonprofits that want offer their young people the very best learning experiences.  Giving hope to communities that their young people will be ready for rewarding careers and independent lives.

When Mr. Dekko started our foundation in 1981, he left us with this mission:  To foster economic freedom through education. He believed that education offered all people hope that they might lead lives of economic freedom.

Thanks, Mrs. Booth, for giving us a new and memorable way of looking at things.

To learn more about grants from our foundation:

https://www.dekkofoundation.org/grantseeker-support/

Feel free to call and discuss an idea for a grant proposal:

260-347-1278

Just do it!

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If you’re putting off calling our foundation to ask a question, then we have a question for you.

Why?

Organizationally, we’re 36 years old, and it’s hard to imagine there’s a question we haven’t heard.  Plus, our board of directors has sized our staff so that, during business hours, there’s always someone around to help you in person.

Think your question might be dumb?

It’s probably not dumb.  We go to work at a foundation every day.  Most people don’t.  You guys need a little help understanding how to work with us.  We get that.

Still don’t want to make that call?  Maybe we can help.  Here are some of our most frequently-asked questions:

·         How much money can I propose?  (We get right to the point, don’t we?)  Our foundation doesn’t have set grant amounts.  When we make grants, we factor a lot of things into the equation.  We consider how many children you serve, the amount of change you’re proposing to make in their lives and even the community where you live.

·         If I ask for too much money, is that the kiss of death for my grant proposal?  NO!  See our answer above, as in: We go to work at a foundation every day.  Most people don’t.  You guys need a little help understanding how to work with us.  We get that.

·         When is your next deadline for grant proposals?  We don’t have a proposal deadline.  Instead, we ask you to consider your project and when you want to start it.  Then we ask you to send us your proposal at least 90 days before you need to know whether we’ll make an investment.  When you consider all of this, it may seem like we want to work with people who are planners. That’s true.  Good planning makes for great projects.

STILL have that case of phone call avoidance?  We give up!  You can always email us.   dekko@dekkofoundation.org

Grant Rant

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Maybe it’s all the rain we’ve had this spring.  Maybe it’s all of the division along political lines.  Whatever it is, we’re grumpy.  We have something to get off our chest.  We feel a rant coming on!

SO many people misuse the word grant!

Since we work in the world of grantmaking, we notice it.  A lot!  We’d like to offer clarification.  Here we go:

  • When people sit down to apply to our foundation or any other, they often say, “I’m writing a grant.” In truth, these folks are writing a grant proposal.
  • A grant proposal only becomes a GRANT when decision makers—in our case, our Dekko Foundation board of directors—vote YES!
  • People who write grant proposals for a living often call themselves grant writers. In truth, they are proposal writers.

So, now, it’s off our chest!  As rants go, it was mercifully short.  We hope it’ll be useful for you and help you professionalize your work.

Whew!  We feel better.