Organizational Capacity Building Opportunities
Pottstown Area Health & Wellness Foundation invests in the growth and development of the nonprofit sector and offers a range of capacity-building opportunities at no cost to your organization. The Foundation listens to organizations about their needs and challenges and designs programs based on this feedback. If you are a Pottstown Area Health & Wellness Foundation grantee, please review the different opportunities below and reach out to Craig Colistra, or your Program Officer, if you have any questions.
Peer Learning Circles
Small groups of eight participants will meet monthly for two hours over a total of eight months, creating a facilitated learning community for ongoing problem-sharing and solving among peers in a confidential, supportive environment. A La Salle Nonprofit Center facilitator will encourage frank and open discussions about problems, issues, concerns, and challenges. Participants should be committed to attending all sessions, and pledge confidentiality, both of which create a positive bond that helps the circle flourish and yield productive results.
The following Peer Learning Circles are available. Registration is available here for any of the peer learning circles.
Catchafire Capacity Building Partnership
Pottstown Year 1 Program Highlights
Catchafire is an online tool that connects organizations with talented professionals looking to donate their skills. This resource provides organizations with expert support in areas like marketing and communications, web development, operations, strategy, and more. The Pottstown Area Health & Wellness Foundation has a limited number of scholarships available for nonprofit organizations to have access to highly skilled professionals—at no cost—that can deliver project needs (presentation creation, brochure writing, translations, donor letters), or help talk through organizational challenges.
For example, S.O.U.L (Saving Our Underprivileged Lives) has completed 6 projects and calls, which would have cost nearly $30,000 had consultants done the work. The organization’s mission is to invest resources in underserved youth in Montgomery County, providing them with programs specifically designed to address their work, education, relationships, community, health, and creative needs. This year, a volunteer assisted S.O.U.L. in improving transparency and accountability with clarified rights, policies, and other expectations in a revised employee handbook.
If you would like to apply for expert support from Catchafire, please submit an application.
To learn more about how Catchafire supports organizations, you can visit their website here. Applications will be reviewed and organizations selected in December with a start date of January 1, 2024. If you have any questions, please reach out to Craig Colistra.
Hello Insight – Youth Development Survey Tool
Hello Insight helps organizations continually evaluate their youth development programs and respond to what young people need through a range of survey tools—based on the latest research in Positive Youth Development (PYD) and Social Emotional Learning (SEL). With easy-to-administer tools, organizations are able to understand, enhance, and share the impact they are having on those served. Visit Hello Insight to learn more about what tools are available and the outcomes that they measure.
To learn about the local organizations that are leveraging Hello Insight to turn research-based recommendations into ongoing improvement, click here. Kelly Grosser, Chief Impact Officer of the TriCounty YWCA, states:
"Non-profits can struggle to have the capacity and tools for program evaluation that support high quality programs and adaptable approaches youth need to thrive. Not only does Hello Insight inform us on how we're doing and where there's room to grow, the expansion of the types of tools they offer allows us to customize evaluation tools to meet the needs of diverse programs. The tool, the data, and the overall focus on youth development benchmarks also support our funding attraction, as Hello Insight is a solid platform that is widely recognized. We can't say enough about it: We LOVE Hello Insight!"
If you are a youth-serving organization and current grantee of the Pottstown Area Health & Wellness Foundation, and would like to explore how this tool could support your youth programs and participants, reach out to Craig Colistra.
Impact Capacity Assessment Tool
The Impact Capacity Assessment Tool (iCAT) is an assessment and planning tool that helps nonprofits better understand their organizational capacity based on direct input from those who know the organization best—the staff and key stakeholders. This easy-to-administer organizational capacity assessment will highlight nonprofits' strengths and challenges on key capacities and provide a dashboard of results and recommended strategies to strengthen your nonprofit.
If you are a Pottstown Area Health & Wellness Foundation grantee and interested in the iCAT, please review the Frequently Asked Questions. After reviewing, submit organization information here to get you started. This opportunity is available at any time throughout your grant term.
The Pottstown Area Health & Wellness Foundation will offer a limited number of spots to organizations that would like 2 hours of support from the La Salle Nonprofit Center to interpret results and plan for improvement. If interested, you may select this option within the application.
Impact Measurement Clinic
In this two-session clinic, you will learn how to develop a powerful theory of change, identify clear impact goals, set up easy-to-use creative measurement tools, and craft vibrant sharable stories of impact. You will leave with a clear impact measurement plan, creative measurement tools, a customized impact tracker, and a template for your next powerful impact report.
This clinic includes an hour of 1-on-1 consulting between the two sessions.
See below for clinic details. Registration is available for the Impact Measurement Clinic here. The deadline for registration is December 31, 2023.
Session One: Measuring What Matters
1/25/24, 10 a.m.-2 p.m. (online)
At the start of the session, we will review what we learned from the group pre-assessment about where we all are in our learning as a group. We will briefly walk through the program and how it will build on participants’ current knowledge, so they are clear on what to expect. In session one, facilitators will work with participants through the stages of an open-source impact planning worksheet. Working 1-on-1 with our trainers and in small breakout groups, participants will get to help each other brainstorm a clear set of impact goals. Participants will also discuss what counts as data and how it can be utilized while building an impact tracker that their teams can put into practice.
Session Two: Gathering Impact Data
2/22/24, 10 a.m.-2 p.m. (online)
In this session participants will work together in small groups, as well as with facilitators, to continue looking at what counts as data and how what is collected can be utilized to understand the project journey and the deeper impact of the story. The group will connect about utilizing an impact tracker to help collect and track data as well as to take the next step in telling the story of the project or program's impact in creative ways using impact report templates. We will also cover building out systems to continue the work of organizations to connect with participants and community members around sharing the collective impact of collaboration.
Submit A Grant Application
