Faith-Based

Repair the World, a national organization that seeks to make service a defining element of Jewish life, learning and leadership, commissioned BTW to conduct an exploratory study on the impact of short-term immersive Jewish service-learning (IJSL) on communities served by IJSL programs.

While a number of studies have been conducted on the impact of service projects on individual participants, BTW’s 2010 study is one of only a few that focus on the impact of service projects on the communities they serve. The study included interviews with representatives of host community CBO/NGOs involved in IJSL projects in the US (New Orleans, Miami and Los Angeles), Israel, Nicaragua, Ghana and Ukraine as well as an in-depth review of recent relevant research and writing about best practices in secular and faith-based service learning.

BTW found that when IJSL projects are well planned and executed, negative impacts are anticipated, and potential problems are addressed proactively, then positive impacts for host communities predominate.

The Jewish Student Union (JSU) is a national organization that aims to enhance the Jewish identity of Jewish teens in public high schools in the United States. JSU’s program model achieves this goal by creating an engaging and appropriate in-school educational experience that is delivered by program coordinators to Jewish teens in public schools.

BTW is currently working with three national and regional funders to assess the program and organizational growth of JSU’s staffed program model, focusing on its existing program in Chicago and expansion to public schools in Denver, South Florida, and Westchester/Connecticut. The first stage of this work was the development of a theory of change that describes JSU’s purpose, strategies and outcomes and serves as a framework for the program’s evaluation.

The Interfaith Youth Core (IFYC) is a Chicago-based social change organization that is building a movement of young people from different faiths who work together to apply the core value of service to others. In fall 2010 IFYC launched the “Better Together” campaign at colleges across the US to inspire interfaith dialogue, cooperation and action on campus.

BTW is working with IFYC to evaluate the effectiveness of the campaign and identify the key factors that lead to success on a campus as well as assessing the personal and leadership development of campus campaign leaders.

The Bay Area Jewish Healing Center (BAJHC) is a Jewish organization dedicated to providing spiritual care to those who live with illness, care for the ill, and cope with bereavement. In Spring 2008, BAJHC asked us to assess how its unique and innovative programs fit within the larger field.

BTW conducted a strategic plan and organizational assessment with three key goals: Clarify BAJHC’s strategic framework, address the organization’s financial strategies and identify organizational areas for development.

As a result, BAJHC has refined its financial strategy, increased the breadth and depth of its funding and reenergized and focused the work of its board of directors.

In Fall 2007, the Charles and Lynn Schusterman Family Foundation, the Nathan Cummings Foundation and the Jim Joseph Foundation commissioned BTW to assess the landscape of Jewish service learning. The foundations wanted to better understand what service programs existed, and where their investments could have the greatest impact.

BTW responded with comprehensive field research and a related action plan. That plan resulted in the emergence of Repair the World, a new organization dedicated to building support of authentic, high-quality Jewish service learning for Jews of all stages of life. With BTW’s guidance, Repair the World granted $1.7 million to Jewish service learning programs in its first year alone.

A funders collaborative in Houston, led by the Rockwell Fund, Inc., asked BTW to help plan and evaluate a new initiative to build the capacity of Zip Code Assistance Ministries (ZCAMs) in the region. ZCAMs are faith-based nonprofits providing emergency social and human services.

The ZCAM Organizational Development Program drew its initial design from BTW’s previous work with the Organizational Capacity Grants Initiative.

To build common purpose and new knowledge about capacity building, BTW designed reflection and learning sessions for the funders, ZCAM executives and key program partners. We tailored an evaluation framework tailored to the small, faith-based organizations in the Initiative.

This work resulted in a more cohesive funders collaborative and greater commitment from grantee organizations to engage in cooperative projects and shared learning. Ultimately, the grantees became new partners in a citywide effort to tackle homelessness.

In 2008, the San Francisco Jewish Community Federation (JCF) engaged BTW to lead a planning process to support more effective interfaith outreach in the San Francisco Bay Area.

BTW began by engaging a core planning group of representatives from JCF, Jewish Community Federation of the Greater East Bay and Bay Area Jewish interfaith outreach practitioners. Collectively, the group and BTW considered community needs for expanded interfaith programming. From there, we were able to articulate the potential creation and design of a centralized interfaith outreach resource.

To research comparable Bay Area efforts, BTW designed and implemented a data-collection and analysis process that involved a large number of community stakeholders. Based on those findings and in collaboration with the core group, BTW created a guiding Theory of Change. This informed a framework for organizational design that JCF can use going forward.

Nazarene Compassionate Ministries (NCM) wanted to support faith-based U.S. grassroots organizations working to alleviate poverty. How best to do that? They engaged BTW to help evaluate their options.

BTW helped NCM adopt and administer a tool to assess organizational capacity. Once NCM had a clear picture of its capability to undertake this work, the assessment results were used to address specific organizational needs with one-on-one supports and group trainings.

Using the tool developed by BTW, NCM can now assess capacity needs and progress on an ongoing basis.