After the horrifying news last week about the kidnappings in Cleveland, here’s something in the city to feel good about.

An unsung organization, Youth Opportunities Unlimited (aka Y.O.U.), provides services to youth ages 14-19 who are at risk of dropping out of high school.  They get work and life skills as well as help with job development, recruitment, and placement.

In an economy that prizes post-secondary skills, the prospects for those who don’t even have a high school diploma are bleak.  Yet, many low-income kids who are susceptible to drugs and/or violence are inclined toward dropping out.

Y.O.U. intervenes at a critical juncture in these kids’ lives, pairing each with a mentor who provides academic support and access to job skills while showing them how to plan for their future.  This relationship builds kids’ resilience.

Here are some indicators the organization is making a difference!

• 85% of youth in grades 9-11 will advance to the next grade
• 85% of youth in grade 12 will graduate on time from high school
• 80% of graduates will go on to college, other post-HS study, military, and/or employment.

There are many ways to get involved and donations are greatly appreciated.

Kids who grow up in low-income families without strong adult role models have been dealt a bad hand and need help.  Otherwise, they’re at risk of turning to drugs, violence, and crime.

That’s why the work of Friends of the Children is so critical.  With chapters in Boston, Seattle, New York City, and Portland (OR), the organization matches kids with professional mentors who maintain a presence in the kids’ lives from kindergarten through high school.  Consistent mentoring helps them to become resilient and successfully transition to adulthood.

We can see these successes in Crystal and Antonio.  Getting involved would help many more kids like them.

Many of the college seniors I’ve taught are counting the days until they adorn cap and gown in May and receive their much-coveted diplomas.

It’s a great moment, and especially for those who are the first in their families to go to college.  They are American success stories — people from lower-income families whose bachelor’s degree represents their ascent into the middle class.

Yet this success is hardly a given since low-income students are susceptible to dropping out.  Many are not adequately prepared either academically or emotionally, and lack confidence in their abilities.  And even with financial aid, many cannot afford to stay in school.

Fortunately, there are lots of nonprofits that help kids surmount these hurdles by working with them during middle and high school to stay on track academically.  Several students I’m teaching this semester are living proof of the power of these organizations.  One told me she wouldn’t be in college if it weren’t for Dynamy; another stayed focused during the time she spent at the Boys and Girls Club; a third developed the motivation to succeed when she worked at More Than Words.

Because it is a great story when low-income students graduate from the nation’s best colleges, it’s no wonder that a recent study about the dearth of high-achieving, low-income students at these schools made the headlines this week.

The bigger story that deserves publicity is that middle-of-the-road kids who strive to “be the dream” often drop out, and that there are lots of nonprofits  quietly working every single day to reverse this trend.

It’s become conventional wisdom that a college degree is essential for getting ahead in today’s economy.  Yet, the deck is stacked against low-income students — even high-achieving ones — from attaining higher education.  New research indicates class-based gaps in academic achievement are on the rise.  These trends increase the likelihood that low-income kids will remain poor as adults.

Efforts to reverse the tide can be tricky.  Some elite colleges – like Harvard, Stanford, and Amherst — offer a completely free education to any qualified applicant with sufficiently low family income.  However, as NPR reports today, this policy attracts very few takers.  Many high schools do not have mentors with connections to these colleges and lack a peer group of high-achieving students who similarly have their sights on going to one of them.

For most poor kids, who don’t have the grades or test scores to reach for elite schools, many programs exist to help them with college admission and completion.  Yet, these programs are no magic bullet either.  Last month the New York Times profiled three 2008 high school graduates who had been helped by the federal Upward Bound program and were each attending college.  Yet, two had dropped out and are in serious debt.

Some organizations, however, deserve praise for having achieved tremendous results.  Take Barrio Logan College Institute, for example.  This nonprofit in San Diego runs programs beginning in 3^rd grade and continuing until college completion.  The parents and kids it serves get exposed to the same college pressures and informational sources (about preparing for college, its academic demands, and how to access financial aid) that wealthier students get at home.

Incredibly, 100% of program graduates have enrolled in colleges and universities across the country!  Here’s a sampling of Barrio Logan’s success stories.

Learn about the many ways you can help this impressive organization.

Ncholas Kristof’s piece in the New York Times earlier this week chronicled the significant work Save The Children is doing to provide enriched early learning opportunities to kids born into low-income families in the U.S.  These opportunities are valuable because they can enable disadvantaged kids to make something greater of their lives.

While Kristof has a platform for spotlighting the worthiness of investing in early childhood education, this issue typically goes under the radar.  In interviews for my next book, directors of nonprofits have reported to me that enrichment programs for low-income families are a tough sell to funders precisely because, ironically enough, they are preventative!

One director commented: “When you’re working with a child from birth to three, the change that we’re seeking is not going to be measured pre and post in the way that a high school dropout who then goes to college can be measured and also quite visible in the impact.  We tend, as a society, to stand around and wait for things to happen and try to fix the situation.  When we’re trying to fix something and you can see that it’s broken first and then fix after, that kind of evidence is far more dramatic and compelling to people in terms of the demonstration of change that we seek to make.”

The fact that people may not view enabling very young children to avoid a life of despair to be as compelling as helping adolescents or adults overcome adversity is shortsighted thinking we need to overcome.  If we are to help poor children gain greater access to the American dream, we should begin as early as possible, regardless of what kind of feel-good story we can attach to our efforts.

There is no better time to address the educational achievement gap than before it has fully manifested itself.  That means intervening in the lives of at-risk children while they are still very young.

This work is being done effectively in the Dallas area by Educational First Steps.  Its aim is simple yet powerful: to improve the availability and quality of early childhood education for economically disadvantaged children.  The organization provides services to childcare centers and preschools in low-income areas.  It offers teacher training, educational field trips, and funding for classroom materials.

Recent evidence indicates that kids born into low-income famlies are likely to experience cognitive deficits that grow substantially over time and contribute to a substantially greater likelihood relative to their peers of dropping out of high school.  Yet other, more encouraging evidence shows that this trajectory is reversible; it just depends on making investments in high-quality early childhood education.

Educational First Steps’ work unfolds in four stages:

• Working on-site in the classroom to develop age appropriate, well-run child learning centers that earn national accreditation for educational excellence
• Professionally training teachers and center directors in low-income neighborhoods through EFS own teacher curriculum and subsidized achievement of Child Development Associate certificates
• Providing quality educational materials and enrichment directly to impoverished children
• Engaging parents/guardians in their child’s learning and social-emotional development

This work is making an impact — on children’s test scores in the early elementary grades, on their general excitement about and investment in learning, and in engaging parents and guardians in their child’s learning and social-emotional development.  Such dramatic successes, coupled with the significant and growing need, are sure indicators that EFS’ work deserves greater support!

Here is how you can make a donation or become a volunteer.

Part of what distinguishes Obama and Romney is their stances on how best to make college more affordable – an issue that may hold sway with some voters.  Yet, there is a crucial piece of this issue that neither of their platforms fully addresses: how to make the academic experience of college more successful for the students who are most prone to dropping out.

At Framingham State University, where I teach, faculty and administrators talk about improving the “retention rate.”  That’s shorthand for taking steps to boost the experience of students so that they will not only return the following year but thrive academically and socially.

It’s unclear how well colleges and universities can succeed at this endeavor.  By the time students they have contact with students, it’s often too late.  Better results arise if interventions occur well before students arrive on campus.  Fortunately, there are organizations successfully doing this type of work.  Take College Bound.  This St. Louis nonprofit provides promising high school students from disadvantaged backgrounds with the academic and social supports they need to succeed in four-year colleges.

Consider these amazing results: EVERY person in the program’s first four graduating high school classes earned admission to a four-year college or universities and 93 percent of them re-enrolled their sophomore year.

Among College Bound’s successes is “Get Your Prep On.”  It is designed specifically for the families of kids in 9th grade, a time when academic decisions a student makes can significantly impact not only the rest of high school but also whether s/he aspires to go to college.

College Bound was founded by Lisa Orden Zarin, who grew up in a low-income neighborhood of Newark, New Jersey and saw firsthand how many students dropped out of high school and how few went to college.  Her dream to reverse this trajectory for St. Louis youth has become a reality!

Consider making an online donation.

Lately and with good reason, a lot of attention has been given to the widening opportunity gap in the U.S. between those who have the money, skills, contacts, and other resources to attain financial success in life and those who don’t.

Of particular concern is how the American dream is slipping away for so many young people, a theme driven home yesterday by Nicholas Kristof in the New York Times.  Opportunity Nation, a national campaign comprised of over 250 organizations across different sectors working to facilitate greater social mobility, is drawing significant attention to this issue and the presidential candidates are talking about it as well.

As the build-up to November 6th highlights the question of how much the government should or should not do to address this problem, lots of nonprofits are quietly working behind the scenes.  Many do good work and they need no electoral approval to do it.  Of particular note are those that are making headway in providing kids from low-income families access to a high-quality preschool.

Just one example is the Seattle organization The Denise Louie Education Center, which carries out both Head Start and Early Head Start programs across the city.  See for yourself the difference this organization is making in people’s lives!

There are so many ways YOU might choose to get involved:

* Making a direct cash gift or giving money in other ways.
* Volunteering
* In-kind donations
* Hosting a third-party event

This Wednesday, September 19th Opportunity Nation, a national campaign comprised of over 250 organizations across different sectors working to facilitate greater social mobility in the U.S, will hold a summit in Washington, DC.

The critical topic at hand is how to enable youth – and particularly those who are non-college bound — to access pathways for future life success.  Making greater headway toward this goal would be monumental given the findings of a Pew Research Center study published earlier this year: just 54 percent of people ages 18-24 held jobs, the lowest rate for this demographic since the government started tracking these data in 1948.

Part of the agenda at the “Opportunity Summit” will be to highlight the significant work nonprofits are doing to redress this problem.  One organization that deserves particular mention is Genesys Works.  With sites in Chicago, Houston, and the Twin Cities its principal goal is to enhance the life chances of low-income high school students for whom college likely won’t be in their future.

Youth in the program are given the opportunity to work in internships at major corporations during their senior year in high school.  After an 8-week intensive training program, students are placed at a company.  The experience enables them to discover that they can succeed as professionals in the corporate world, a model that other nonprofits like Year Up have proven works.

To help Genesys Works promote greater opportunities for disadvantaged youth, consider giving online.  A donation of $2500 provides the funds necessary to train and support a student during the 14-month program…and change a life forever!

Now that we’ve heard the rallying cries from both candidates and we’ve seen just how divided the two parties are, it’s clear how much the nation needs a unifying change agenda.

We’ll have to look outside politics to find one.

Here’s an agenda around which democrats and republicans should be able to agree: Helping Neighbors Help Themselves.  Those four words have guided the work of Neighborhood House for over a century.  This Portland (OR) nonprofit is a resource for low-income people and recent immigrants, enabling them to overcome the challenges in their lives that impede their attaining success and independence.

It’s a soup-to-nuts organization that offers programs for young children, teens, families and seniors.  Head Start, employment assistance, transitional housing — these are just some of the many ways this organization makes sure that no stones are left unturned in helping vulnerable people to access greater opportunities.

Declining public funding means Neighborhood House depends on private donors now more than ever.  Contribute online.
* $50 can provide a term of after-school tutoring for two youth.
* $100 can provide four sessions of employment counseling.
* $250 can provide a month of guidance for at-risk youth.
* $1,000 can purchase 5,000 pounds of food to feed the hungry.

The organization also needs volunteers.  If interested, please fill out an application.