The Georgia Division of Family & Children Services (DFCS) has announced the winners of the State of Hope initiative. Tom Rawlings, Director of of DFCS, announced the winners via YouTube earlier this month.
“Developing strong families and keeping children safe takes the combined resources of communities, extended families and public agencies like the Division, and it’s gratifying to see so many local community organizations stepping up to serve,” said Rawlings.
The program is part of a partnership with Georgia State University’s Center for Professional Excellence – part of the School of Social Work – and the Georgia Family Connection Partnership. More than 120 “big ideas” from across the state were submitted for consideration. Approximately 100 were selected as official State of Hope sites and out of those, ten were selected to receive state funding and specialized technical assistance for their projects.
“This is the kind of great work that we are doing, not ourselves, but in partnership with these organizations. We’re very excited not only about these grant winners but we are also very excited about all of those that have come up with great ideas and submitted them to our State of Hope program. They will be working with us in our ecosystem and receiving technical assistance. In the fall we are going to have a summit for all of our State of Hope sites.”
This is the second round of the State of Hope initiative and brings the total to approximately 150 State of Hope sites, including ones that have received grants and those that are in the ecosystem. The winners came from every region and city size of the state:
· Union County Family Connection
· Clement Arts – Columbus
· Chatham County Safety Net Planning Council
· Georgia Campaign for Adolescent Power and Potential
· Communities in School – Troup County
· MUST Ministries – Marietta
· Chosen for Life – Watkinsville
· Heroes in Action – Snellville
· Wellroot Family Services – Tucker
· Auburn Avenue Coalition – Atlanta
DFCS launched the State of Hope initiative last year to encourage nonprofits, philanthropies, government, businesses and other community members to collaborate with a focus on four specific areas: education, trauma-informed service, quality caregiving, and economic self-sufficiency. There are also additional programs named as Emerging Sites. These, along with the State of Hope sites become part of the “Hope Ecosystem,” where they can find technical assistance and opportunities for more funding, partnerships and learning from each other.
“It’s great to see the staff in our organization actively connecting with individuals and groups from all across the state and putting those local ideas and local organizational dreams and making them reality, putting them into action,” said Rawlings.
