December 12, 2012

Great Circle is One of Five National Winners of $100,000 Grant for Strategic Planning
Two-year grant will fund cutting-edge strategic planning transformation project
Great Circle (formerly Boys & Girls Town, Edgewood Children’s Center) only agency in Missouri to be selected
 
ST. LOUIS, Mo. (Dec. 12, 2012) — Great Circle, one of Missouri’s largest providers of behavioral healthcare for children, won a two-year $100,000 grant from the national organization, Alliance for Children and Families. The grant comes from the Alliance’s Strategy Counts program—a multi-year pilot project designed to enhance the social impact of nonprofit human service providers by increasing their focus on strategy and its effective deployment. The Alliance is a Milwaukee-based national nonprofit association with a member network of nearly 350 nonprofit, human serving organizations.

Great Circle touches the lives of 11,000 children and family members annually through its campuses and community based services in St. Louis, Columbia, Hillsboro, Kirksville, Springfield, Steelville and St. James. Great Circle will incorporate the Baldrige Model of Performance Excellence to align and focus the entire organization on a single strategic vision that defines and implements institution-wide outcomes measurement, evidence-based practices, stakeholder feedback and decision-making.

This transformational project will enhance Great Circle’s effectiveness in fundamentally altering the life trajectory of children, youth and families served; enabling them to secure stable employment, maintain financial security, and effectively break cycles of poverty by fostering academic progress, developing skills for independent living, and improving interpersonal and long-term resilience skills. 

“This grant enables Great Circle to not only improve our own services and ultimately the quality of life for community members,” said Vince Hillyer, president and CEO. “It also means we are part of an exciting program that is closely examining how nonprofit human service organizations can be even more effective throughout the country.”

Only agency in Missouri to receive award
Great Circle is one of five agencies selected from 72 applications for the Strategy Counts Transformative Projects in 2012.  Great Circle is the only agency in Missouri participating in the Strategy Counts initiative.

The intent is for the pilot sites to test and model how nonprofits can be more nimble in adjusting to change, more data-driven in making decisions, better positioned to partner, and more able to innovate in ways that have meaningful client and community impact on improving the lives of children and families.

The 20 agencies currently serving as Strategy Counts pilot sites participate in a cohort learning group throughout the project. The Alliance is committed to sharing the results of this initiative in order for the pilot projects to contribute a new depth of understanding about the role of strategy in nonprofit organizations that share a mission to improve the lives of children and families.
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About Great Circle®
Established as a result of the merger of Boys & Girls Town of Missouri and Edgewood Children's Center, Great Circle provides treatment, education, prevention and support services to children with a history of abuse or neglect, children with emotional and behavioral disorders and children with autism. Great Circle's mission to "reshape vulnerable lives through a community of partners, teachers and leaders, giving children and families the confidence to create bright futures" is fulfilled through campuses in St. Louis, Columbia, Springfield and St. James, Missouri. As one of the largest providers of behavioral health services in Missouri, the organization annually touches the lives of more than 11,000 children and family members and employs more than 700 staff members. For more information, please visit the website at www.great-circle.org.

The Alliance for Children and Families is a national organization dedicated to achieving a vision of a healthy society and strong communities for all children, adults, and families. The Alliance works for transformational change by representing and supporting hundreds of nonprofit human serving organizations located in North America to translate knowledge into best practices that improve their communities. Working with and through its member network, the Alliance strives to achieve high impact by reducing the number of people living in poverty; increasing the number of people with opportunities to live healthy lives; and increasing the number of people with access to educational and employment success. Go to alliance1.org for more information.

The Kresge Foundation is a $3.1 billion private, national foundation that seeks to influence the quality of life for future generations by creating access and opportunity in underserved communities, improving the health of low-income people, supporting artistic expression, increasing college achievement, assisting in the revitalization of Detroit, and advancing methods for dealing with global climate change. The foundation works in six program areas: arts and culture, community development, education, the environment, health, and human services. In 2010, the Board of Trustees approved 481 awards totaling $158 million; $134 million was paid out to grantees over the course of the year. For more information, visit kresge.org.