1. Chi Nguyen, ’18
2015 Summer Field School Fellow
Upstate Institute at Colgate University
Chenango United Way
Mid Year Site Visit Project
What is a site visits?
Figure 1. Community partners apply for funding using the
Chenango United Way’s RFP application form. If they are
successful, after receiving 2 quarterly allocations, programs
must go through mid year site visits.
● With the national focus area of education, health and income, Chenango United Way promotes the
development of the community by allocating funding to community partners through the RFP
process.
● The Mid Year Site Visit, conducted every July - August after agencies have received 2 quarterly
allocations, tracks and evaluates the progress of the programs, and how they have achieved
compared to their projected outcomes proposed in the RFP.
● Review panels consist entirely of volunteers who are objective and constructive to the programs
they review.
● This year, the mid year site visits are conducted with 22 programs that receive funding from the
United Way.
Importance of a site visit
● To the agencies, a site visit is an opportunity for them to receive feedbacks from the review panel
on improving the programs’ impacts on the community, overcoming any existing challenges, and
preparing for next funding year’s RFP in October.
● To the review panel, members are able to have closer and more intimate looks into the programs
and the agencies, share their achievements and challenges, and offer their best advices to the
programs.
● Site visits also contribute 15% to next funding year’s RFP and help determine significantly which
programs would get funding in the competitive RFP process.
Evaluation criteria
Figure 2. Mid year score rubric is used to evaluate all the programs
in a consistent manner and record their scores. The score rubric is also
sent to the program directors in order to prepare a short 30 to 45 minute
presentation addressing each component during the site visits.
● Outcomes remain align with one of the United Way’s national area of focus, and meet at least 30
to 40% of the projected outputs and outcomes in the RFP applications.
● The process of tracking outcomes and their impact in the community is addressed.
● Program runners are able to utilize diverse resources through collaborations.
● Program budget aligns with the revised proposal and is sufficiently explained.
● Revisions were modified appropriately and submitted in March, after programs receive the results
of their RFP applications.
Challenges
Figure 3. The Impact Project utilizes
several media platforms to market their
services to the community, such as their
2015 Spring Newsletter.
Figure 4. Legal Aid seeks to expand their
collaborations within Chenango County
and open a part-time office in Norwich.
Funded programs faces many challenges, while constantly coming up with solutions to address those
difficulties:
• Legal Aid suffered loss of a major funding stream, and the time taken to process an SSI case and
receive court’s decision is getting longer, up to 18 months of waiting time. Legal Aid will expand
their collaborations in the future and open a part-time office in Norwich to reduce money and time
attorneys spend commuting from the main office in Utica to meet and interview Chenango County
clients.
• The Impact Project, having difficulties in finding clients to serve from the Chenango County, is
pushing their marketing strategies to get their services known to the community, through
distributing their fliers in the Greater Chenango Cares IRT event, and through system of referrals
with the Catholic Charities and with past clients.
Achievements
Figure 5. Reaching Out No Cost from
Family Planning of South Central NY
offers confidential health care services
to women, prevent unwanted pregnancies
from at-risk teenagers and domestic violence.
Figure 6. HYCC children volunteered at
Chenango Historical Society as part of collaboration
between HYCC and Youth Historical Shadowing.
Source: The Place Facebook page.
A few of programs’ achievements are listed below to illustrate the significant impacts on the
improvement of the community, utilizing United Way dollars:
● Reaching Out No Cost program is able to educate women on birth control and spacing
subsequent pregnancies healthily, prevent at-risk female teenagers from unwanted pregnancies
and protect women and children from domestic violence.
● Youth Historical Shadowing program offers various workshops on the history of Chenango
County to local youth. Collaborating with other funded programs enhance the capacity: school
children from KIDS and HYCC programs can enjoy the history workshops during their after-
school hours. Elders enrolled in RSVP can volunteer as educators for the history workshops.
● Literacy Volunteers program is able to help adults improve their basic literacy (reading, writing,
math and English as Second Language), measured by the TABE. Success stories recount a
woman who barely spoke any English, after the program, is able to obtain a driving license and
now become an entrepreneur.
Various programs
The project visits 22 programs from 13 agencies. The variety of programs address the needs of
the community in various aspects of education, income and health.
● In the income area of focus, the goal is to promote financial stability and independence, through
projects such as housing reconstruction and stabilization, free tax preparation that also helps
working families access the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) and many other credits, and free
legal representation to SSI cases.
● In the health area, the goal is to improve people’s lives. Meaningful programs target at different
aspects of health: free or discounted subscription to prescribed medicines, assistance in getting
access to health insurance for people lacking medical coverage and to treatment for women with
breast cancer.
● In the education area of focus, the goal is to help children and youth achieve their full potential.
Funded programs provide opportunities for children in the county to receive lessons in interactive
ways, spend after school time doing homework and participate in extracurricular activities with
the guide of high school tutors, and engage in volunteerism.
Reference: 1. Chenango United Way 2015 – 2016 Request for Proposal. 2. Chenango United Way 2015 Mid Year Score Rubric. 3. The Impact Project, Spring 2015 Newsletter. 4. Legal Aid,
Overview of Achievements 2013-2014. 5. Family Planning of South Central New York Inc., 2014 Report to the Community