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National CASA (Court Appointed Special Advocates) Association
NEW! Click
here for our Public Service Announcement Video
(windows media player file)
Final Update on JFC’s
2005-2006 Champions for Children Grants
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In the
2005-06 grant cycle, JFC’s support made it possible for more
than 1,000 abused and neglected children from around the country
to receive high-quality advocacy and support services from CASA
volunteers. As indicated by the case stories attached to this
report, JFC’s funding has produced life-changing outcomes for
many of these children.
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A
total of 73 state and local CASA programs received funding from
JFC during the 2005-06 grant cycle, with five programs receiving
$25,000, 56 programs each receiving $10,000, and twelve Gulf
area programs receiving special support in the wake of Hurricane
Katrina. During the last six months of the grant cycle, these
programs collectively served more than 10,000 new children and
trained almost 2,000 more CASA volunteers.
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Many
programs had success in generating awareness of the CASA/JFC
partnership, often in partnership with local retailers involved
with Jewelers for Children. Newspaper and online news sources
featured JFC’s support of CASA, as did local television spots.
On the local, state and national levels, CASA web sites and
newsletters also highlighted the partnership. This publicity was
highly valuable in generating greater awareness of CASA’s work,
which in turn enabled programs to recruit more volunteers and
supporters and serve more children as a result.
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General use video – the recruitment and general outreach video
funded with JFC’s support received a tremendous response from
the CASA network. One local CASA program director echoed the
feelings of many of her peers when she said “[i]t is the best
video National CASA has ever made. It is compelling and touching
and will empower CASA programs nationwide to reach new
volunteers and supporters.” The video has been used at volunteer
recruitment events and public outreach meetings, in corporate
presentations, at galas and other large events, for media
outreach, with legislators and government agencies, and in many
other contexts. It will be shown tens of thousands of times
around the country this year and for years to come.
The 2006-07 Champions for
Children Grant Cycle
With JFC’s 2006-07 award to
National CASA, we began a new round of local CASA program grants
this fall to support advocacy for abused and neglected children
around the country.
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Grant
awards were made to 70 programs this fall. CASA programs in
Tampa, Denver, Philadelphia, Nashville, Flint, Michigan and
Southwest Missouri received $25,000 awards, and 64 programs
received awards of $10,000 or less.
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As in
the past, each local CASA program receiving JFC funds has
received a toolkit to assist help in making the best use of
JFC’s funding support, strengthen their relationships with local
JFC participants, and spread the word about the important
support that JFC provides to abused and neglected children.
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We
continue to work with David Rocha and his staff to identify JFC
participants who are interested in working with CASA programs to
promote JFC’s support at the local level. We have participated
in recent events in Baton Rouge, New Orleans, LaCrosse,
Wisconsin, Glendale, Arizona, Florence, Alabama, and Cedar
Rapids, Iowa.
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In
this grant cycle, approximately 15% of JFC’s CASA funding is
being used to recruit more volunteers to serve foster children
living in urban areas, where the unmet need for CASA volunteers
is greatest. Our strategic plan calls for the national network
of CASA programs to serve 100,000 more children annually by
2008, and greater efforts in volunteer recruitment are a key
component of the achievement of this objective. We have targeted
intensive recruitment and awareness efforts to take place in
several strategically selected urban areas, the first of which
have been Chicago and the San Francisco Bay Area. The combined
number of children in foster care in these two areas is over
30,000, of whom less than 5,000 have CASA volunteers. These
special recruitment campaigns will begin in 2007.
Other Updates
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On
December 5, 2006, we specially recognized JFC at a National CASA
reception in New York City. David Rocha attended and accepted an
award in recognition of the outstanding support that JFC has
provided to the CASA network since 2003.
We are grateful for the
tremendous impact that JFC’s support has had in bringing hope and
stability to thousands of abused and neglected children since 2003.
On behalf of the children whose lives you have helped us to change
so significantly, we thank JFC for its continued support of National
CASA.
Click here
for CASA Child Profiles
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