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Collaboration in the Nonprofit Sector
Celebrating Success and Stretching for the Future
How can non-profits and public human service agencies do their work in a new way that is less tiring? How can the Greater Grand Forks Community provide a safety net for our most vulnerable populations? How can we best leverage existing resources to support our human service agencies? These are the questions being addressed at a training sponsored on October 14 by United Way and the Community Foundation, with funding from the Otto Bremer Foundation. An expert on non-profit collaboration, Karen Ray, will be present to help the participant explore a response to these questions.
Many problems are facing our communities including child poverty, family violence, limited access to mental health treatment, problems securing affordable housing, and others. Nonprofits and local human service agencies should no longer be expected to do more with less, but be provided with the tools to examine new opportunities to collaborate. United Way of Grand Forks East Grand Forks and Area is interested in facilitating this discussion. At the spring board retreat, United Way’s Board began discussing how to address the common sources of the problems rather than waiting to fix separate symptoms. Sponsoring the summit is one of many steps United Way plans to take to help with prevention efforts in our community.
“We need to think of long-term changes as well as short-term actions”, said United Way Board member and Chair of the Department of Social Work at UND, Thomasine Heitkamp. “Bringing diverse stakeholders together, melding their resources, and stretching their creative energies to embrace new ideas are essential to resolving our problems”, Heitkamp continued. This also is a key element in our role in establishing a community presence for the United Way LIVE UNITED brand.
Heitkamp agreed to Chair a committee that began meeting over the summer to discuss the potential of a Nonprofit Summit on Collaboration. The PLANING Committee includes a cross section of the nonprofit and public human service community including Kelly Greenlees – Bremer Community Service Representative, Shelia Bruhn – Executive Director of The Community Foundation, Keith Berger – Director of Grand Forks County Social Service Center, Randy Slavens – Business and Regional Supervisor and Assistant Director for Northeast Human Service Center, Emily Wright – Grand Forks Housing Authority, Heather Helgeson – UND’s Nonprofit Leadership Program, Pete Haga – Grand Forks City Government and United Way Board Member, JoAnn Brundin – St Vincent de Paul Society, Deb Thompson – Y Family Center, Kristi Hall-Jiran – CVIC, and Deb Johnson – Prairie Harvest Human Services Foundation.
The Summit will explore responses to the questions above. It will be held on October 14th at the Alerus Center from 8:30 a.m. .until 3:30 p.m. Hands-on learning will be the workshop approach with participants working on case scenarious. Attendees will receive a Collaboration Handbook, certification of participation and UND Department of Social Work Social Work CEU's.
Karen Ray will facilitate the daylong workshop. She has a Master’s Degree in Applied Behavioral Sciences and specializes in staff training and organizational development, with a focus on collaboration, team building and leadership.
On November 20th, community leaders, elected officials and Directors who serve on nonprofit Boards will be invited to a special gathering to hear a report on the future plans that were developed from the October workshop.
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