Students Run Philly Style

Students Run Philly Style

Development and Marketing Coordinator

Project Goal(s)

The general goal of the Fellow will be to assist Students Run Philly Style in raising funds and increasing awareness of the program. All of the Fellows’ efforts will contribute to the overall goal of Students Run Philly Style, by providing the program with the financial support needed to continue the program’s services providing mentorship and marathon training to Philadelphia’s at-risk youth.

Agency Information

Website www.studentsrunphilly.com

Agency Mission Students Run Philly Style is the only program in Philadelphia that offers marathon training to help youth succeed in life. We do this by connecting students with adult mentors who help them imagine and accomplish goals beyond their dreams, including the completion of a marathon.

Address 123 South Broad Street, 18th Floor; Phildelphia, PA 19102

Total number of Agency Staff Members 3

Agency Budget $643,147

Community Need

Please state in measurable and quantifiable terms the specific community need that the Philly Fellow will address

Youth participants in Students Run Philly Style are from virtually every zip code in Philadelphia but are concentrated in neighborhoods most deeply affected by poverty, including West Philadelphia, North Philadelphia, Kensington, Germantown and the lower Northeast. In the 2011 season, 650 students particapted from 50 sites. In Philadelphia, a disproportionately high number of youth are underserved, under-resourced, and unaware of their capacity for success. Additionally, Philadelphia is home to neighborhoods with some of the highest rates of poverty, obesity, heart disease, violent crime, and school dropout in the state. Philadelphia’s youth need access to resources that can help fulfill their needs in three areas: Health, Violence and School Performance/Attendance. Health: In Philadelphia, an astounding 46 percent of children from the Students Run Philly Style target area are obese or at risk of obesity, and 15.2 percent of youths are at or above the 95th percentile for body mass index (BMI) by age and gender—significantly higher than the national average. Young Philadelphians also outrank their peers by reporting that almost 51 percent watch three or more hours of television per average school day while 76 percent report not attending physical education classes on a daily basis. Violence: 45 percent of Philadelphia youths reported having been in a physical fight in the previous year, 10 percent higher than the national average. Close to 10 percent reported that they had skipped school at least once in the previous 30 days because of feeling unsafe at school or en route to school. While violent crime has decreased slightly in recent years, the numbers, especially for youth, are still shockingly high. Between January 1 and May 18, 2007, there were 648 shootings in Philadelphia. More than half of the victims were less than 26 years old, and 72 of the victims were 17 or younger. On average, one Philadelphia youth was shot every two days during this time period. School Performance/Attendance: Between 2006 and 2008, 21 percent of Philadelphians over 25 years of age were high school dropouts. And in the 2005-2006 school year, only 57.4 percent of youths graduated from high school in four years. For that same class of students, the combined SAT math and reading score, which is a good indicator of preparedness for college, fell to its lowest point in a decade, dropping 58 points from the 1996-97 school year.

Describe how your agency addresses this need, and how the new capacity created by this fellow will help alleviate the problem

Students Run Philly Style, the only program of its kind in Philadelphia, has been serving at-risk and underserved youths from across the city for six years. The program’s mission is to pair teams of youths with dependable adult mentors who meet three to four days per week in pursuit of a common goal: the completion of a marathon. Built on a mentorship model that emphasizes the translation of running skills to life skills, Students Run Philly Style helps youths develop positive relationships with adult mentors, learn to make safe choices, set and achieve attainable goals, and live a healthy lifestyle. In its seven years, the program has served more than 2,500 students and has shown consistently outstanding outcomes, such as decreased BMI, increased self-esteem, and improved concentration in school as determined by self-report via pre- and post-season surveys. Surveys Report: • The self-esteem, goal-setting and discipline our youth learn through running translates into improved performance in the classroom. • Students Run addresses childhood obesity by getting students off the couch and into a healthy lifestyle. • Students Run combats soaring youth violence by providing students with a safe after-school activity led by strong adult role-models in the form of our running leaders. With the chief responsibility of development and marekting, the Fellow will expand Students Run Philly Style’s capacity to serve its constituents by securing funding from both previously committed and new corporations, foundations and individuals and by increasing the program’s visibility to these same groups as well as take the lead on marketing initiatives to the general public. The Fellow will help Students Run Philly Style solidify and refine its fundraising and communication efforts, helping the program to achieve sustainability and continue to deliver services to Philadelphia youth as well as lead marketing efforts including but not limited to tradational and social media.

Describe the level of community involvement in the fellow’s project

The Fellow will have a relatively high level of community involvement in working to fundraise and increase awareness of the Students Run Philly Style program. Many of the program’s fundraising events are highly intertwined with community members. In particular, fundraising initiatives such as Run for Philly’s Future, Sponsor-a-Student and Young Friends require a high level of community interaction. The Fellow will also attend all of Students Run Philly Style’s community events and, in both these settings, will seek out the individual stories of participants, family members, community volunteers and funders. Primarily through interviewing these key community players and engaging the wider community in communication work such as the newsletter and blog, gathering and relaying these stories will be paramount to the Fellow’s communication and marketing work.

Job Description

Please outline in list form the fellow's duties and responsibilities

• Compose narratives for and write grant proposals to foundations

• Interview donors, volunteers and students for marketing pitches

• Manage online donor database, determine areas for improvement

• Assist in organizing special fundraising initiatives and events

• Increase points of contact for donors and potential donors

• Increase knowledge and awareness of the program by contributing to communications and marekting projects such as press releases, newsletters and the Students Run Philly Stylefacebook Page

• Develop systems to aid Development Manager in meeting fundraising goals

• Serve as liaosn to graphic designer for website and all marketing related projects

Please outline in list form the skills/qualifications a fellow should have to succeed in the position

Strong communication skills (writing, listening, speaking)

Ability to synthesize information

Creativity & resourcefulness

Organizational skills

Initiative and desire to lead projects independently

Able to work in a team

Please describe your agency's plan to orient and train the fellow

In the first two weeks of the Fellow’s service with Student’s Run Philly Style, he/she will be oriented to the program by the program staff with the help of an orientation handbook created by our outgoing Philly Fellow. Orientation will involve concrete training in administrative tasks, software and databases as well as a more abstract component that will acquaint the Fellow with Students Run Philly Style’s program philosophy and history. The Fellow will be introduced to the program’s large network of volunteer mentors during our summer clinic series and will also meet independently with key board members and donors. In the final phase of the Fellow’s training, he/she will work with the the Devlopment Manager to get a comprehensive introduction to non-profit development work. Fellows are also encouraged to attend external trainings in non-profit management, grant writing and marketing.

Name and title of the fellow's immediate supervisor

Amber Adamson; Development Manager

Please briefly describe plans for supervision of fellow

For the majority of the projects, the Fellow will report to the program’s Development Manager For program marketing, the fellow will report to the Program Manager. The Fellow will primarily work independently and will often work together with staff to complete development and marketing projects.

Will fellow be working at the same address listed above? Yes

Will the fellow have their own…

Office? Fellow will not be provided with Desk? Fellow will have their own Computer? Fellow will have their own

Please approximate the percentage of time the fellow will work…

Independently 40

As a team member in a group setting 40

As a team leader in a group setting 20

Will the fellow be expected to travel as part of the position? Yes

If so, how often and where? 10% local travel

Will the fellow need the following to carry out the position…

A driver’s license? No

Their own car? No