Mrs. Alma Powell, Chair, America’s Promise Alliance--Opening Keynote Address at the Points of Light Foundation/CNCS Annual National Conference on Volunteering and Service
Philadelphia, PA - July 16, 2007
It is a privilege and an honor to be here with you today.
In so many ways this feels like a family gathering for me… a family reunion. We have been down many of the same roads together in the past 10 years.
It was 10 years ago here in Philadelphia that the America’s Promise Alliance began. A number of you were there. The Points of Light Foundation and the Corporation for National and Community Service were two of our Alliance’s founders — and have remained among our staunchest partners.
At that summit 10 years ago, the living Presidents issued a call to all Americans. It was a call that centered around our responsibility as Americans to keep five Promises to our young people — the Promises of caring adults in their lives… safe places… a healthy start… an effective education… and opportunities to learn the value of giving back through their own service.
The call was about “the responsibility of us” — and you have responded through “the power of we.”
The “power of we” was the animating idea behind the America’s Promise Alliance. It is the idea that we accomplish far more for young people by working together than any of us achieve alone… an idea that Ben Franklin expressed a little more directly and in a somewhat different context here in Philadelphia 230 years ago when he said, “We must all hang together or we will surely all hang separately.”
But maybe that remark is fitting for this context, too — because, in a very real way, our shared future hangs on how effectively we prepare our young people to succeed.
Through the “power of we,” much has been accomplished in the past 10 years. Hundreds of thousands of young people have gained mentors in their lives. Four million more children have health insurance. The number of teens who are victims of violent crime is less than half of what it was 10 years ago. This summer, someone will become the 500,000th person to serve as an AmeriCorps member. And those members over the years have made a remarkable difference in the lives of millions of Americans.
Let me share just a couple of examples of how volunteering and national service have applied the power of “we” to deliver the Five Promises.
In Minnesota, a statewide Alliance With Youth serves as a collaborative network of partner organizations, schools and communities working together to keep the Five Promises for every young person in the state. The Alliance hosts the AmeriCorps Promise Fellows, who work directly with Alliance partners to support our key strategies. Last September the third “corps” of 60 fellows began a year of service. And because they work together with and through partners, their impact is far greater than you’d imagine that 60 people could make.
In Fox Cities and Appleton, Wisconsin, the Volunteer Center of East Central Wisconsin has been at the forefront of collaborative volunteer efforts on behalf of children and youth. Thanks to their lead in an area-wide initiative, thousands of young people have become engaged in community service and service learning. In fact, it’s part of why the Alliance named Fox Cities one of the 100 Best Communities for Young People in 2007.
As I said, these are but two examples. It may be impossible to recognize you all, but it is also impossible to overstate the importance of what you are doing. The Corporation – with AmeriCorps, the great Senior Corps, and service-learning – is leading big goals around mentoring disadvantaged young people and engaging them in service. The Points of Light Foundation – and the network of 360 Volunteer Centers – engage 2.5 million volunteers in solving critical community issues each year. On behalf of the America’s Promise Alliance, and on behalf of our nation’s young people, thank you for all the great work you have done in delivering the Five Promises in thousands of ways and millions of lives.
The Challenge We Face
In looking to the work ahead and the challenge we still face, I sometimes think of the famous Xerox commercial that some of us here are old enough to remember. It takes place in a monastery, and a monk is proudly showing the abbot a page of illuminated manuscript he has just completed. The page is beautiful, and it’s obvious the monk has been working on it for days. The abbot admires the monk’s handiwork and he says, “Very nice, Brother Dominic. Now… can you make me 500 more sets?”
That’s not so far from where WE are in our effort to keep every Promise to every child. For every great effort like the Volunteer Center in Wisconsin or the Minnesota Alliance With Youth, we need many more just like them. The needs of our young people are urgent, and they will not wait.
I know I’m preaching to the choir today. But let me preach for a minute the message that the rest of our nation needs to hear, because millions of Americans are not aware of the seriousness of the threat to our young people.
Most Americans would be shocked to learn that our nation — the richest in the history of the world — finished next-to-last among 21 developed nations when it comes to child well-being. That’s what a report by UNICEF recently revealed. Next-to-last.
Americans might be shocked to learn that between 25% and 30% of all students fail to complete high school. The rate is more like 50% for students of color.
It’s shocking to learn that babies born in this country are less likely to see their first birthday than babies born in more than 20 other countries, including Cuba — and that infant mortality among African Americans is double the national average.
But more of our fellow citizens NEED to be shocked, in a way that leads to action.
We know that all children need a critical combination of assets in their lives — the Five Promises. Yet in spite of all our best efforts, less than 1 in 3 of our young people are getting enough of these resources to succeed More than 20% of our children are experiencing zero or only one Promise and heading for failure. We cannot ensure the kind of future that our children deserve and America needs unless we reverse this tide.
Our Response
So how do we go about it? I think the answer is still in the Power of We. But how do we magnify that power? How do we create a whole that is much greater than the sum of our individual efforts?
That is a question we have been wrestling with at the America’s Promise Alliance. I think that we have done many things well over the years. But there are many that we could have done much better. We have taken a long, hard look at where we are and where we need to go.
As we begin our second decade as an Alliance, we are going to redouble our efforts to make sure that Americans get the message that, when too many of our young people are at risk, our nation’s future is at risk. Our prosperity is at risk. Our values are at risk. More Americans need to understand not just “the power of we” but “the obligation of us.” All of us.
To make sure that the needs of young people and families are reflected in our national budget priorities, our Alliance has formed a policy affiliate called First Focus.
But most of all, we have been about turning our Alliance of common purpose into one of concerted action. We are moving toward an effort that is truly unified, beyond traditional silos and agendas. I believe that is the only way we will harness the full power of “we.”
Our Goals
The partners in the Alliance began by setting a bold and ambitious goal. In the next five years, by working together, we intend to improve the lives of 15 million young people with more of the Five Promises. We are focusing especially on disadvantaged young people, because we know that by fulfilling more of the Promises to these children most at-risk, we can reverse the tide of dashed hopes and dismal futures.
How will we know that we are turning the tide? We have made improving high school completion rates our top priority. It is not just a measurable result; it really is THE single most important result. Here’s why:
Young people who fail to complete high school are twice as likely to end up in poverty… three times as likely to be unemployed… and eight times as likely to go to prison. Improving the high school graduation rate by just one percent will contribute $1.8 billion to our economy.
When we bring more of the Five Promises into the lives of more young people, we believe we will see real improvement not only in high school completion rates but on a whole range of indicators. We know it is a good investment. But it is not just an economic imperative. It is a moral one.
National Action Strategies
So how will we get to our goal?
Earlier this year, our Alliance partners and prospective partners came together and agreed on three National Action Strategies. A common denominator you’ll notice is that our work is increasingly partnered with schools. Partly, that’s because of the overarching importance of a high school diploma. And partly it’s because schools are the natural place where young people congregate, and a focal point for families, too.
Our first action strategy is to go Where Kids Are – starting with using schools as hubs for delivering a whole range of services to disadvantaged young people. There are 11 million children enrolled in Title I schools; that is, who qualify for free or reduced-price lunches. There are another 6.5 million in after-school programs. Reaching these young people through their schools makes it much more likely they will receive the support they need from people who already know them by name.
Second, every child needs decent health care. But 9 million today aren’t covered by any kind of health insurance. Of these, about six-and-a-half million are ELIGIBLE for Medicaid or the State Children’s Health Insurance Program but not enrolled. We will see that these 6.5 million children get the coverage they’re eligible for. Our rallying cry is All Kids Covered. The schools are one of the best places where we can coordinate this effort — just one example of how our strategies work together.
Our third strategy involves service learning and career exploration for over 11 and a half million middle-school aged young people. Let me tell you why this strategy is so important. Middle school years are a pivotal time. HALF of all the dropouts in this country occur in the 9th grade. And the majority of those who quit say they began disengaging during their middle school years. If we wait till high school to begin addressing the problem, we’re too late. So our strategy is to engage these young people in service learning and opportunities to explore careers, so they are motivated to succeed in school and Ready for the Real World.
Working Together
Today, through the America’s Promise Alliance, there are more than 125 national organizations, representing every sector, committed to reaching our goal together. They have committed to shared decision-making, shared accountability and collaboration like never before.
To us, it is unacceptable to sit by while millions of young people fail to complete high school, or fail to get the healthy start they need, or get into trouble because they don’t have safe places to go. So we will not accept it.
History teaches that social change comes when people become less concerned about what is possible than about what is acceptable. I believe that we are now on the cusp of one of those moments of momentous change.
That is an encouraging thought for all of you who have been on the front lines for so long — who have been pioneers in the movement to engage more Americans in volunteering and national service. But I believe it is more than a wishful thought.
More organizations than ever before are joining us from every sector because they recognize the urgency of the need and the necessity of “we.” Now it’s up to us to roll up our sleeves once more and apply the “power of we” in our states and communities. As we do, we will bring this nation closer to the day when the promise of America is a reality for every American child.
Thank you so much.