Do the Homeless Count?

poster abstractEach year since 2007, the Indiana University Policy Public Institute (PPI) has worked with the Coalition for Homelessness Intervention and Prevention (CHIP) to conduct the Point-in-Time Homeless Count in Marion County. This presentation will present results from the 2012 count conducted and considerations for policymakers. It will also have an interactive component to challenge stereotypes of homelessness

Fostering Public Service by Linking Benefits to Community, Campus, and Students: A Case Study

Experiential education can take many forms and is now common throughout undergraduate and graduate curricula; in part, because of the presumed public benefits of connecting an educational curriculum to community problem solving (Kuh, 2008). Given the joint involvement of university and community institutions in experiential education and the diverse motivations for encouraging student community involvement, this academic practice can be viewed through three lenses: (1) for the student as a form of student learning, (2) for the campus as a public policy instrument to promote civic engagement, and (3) for the community as a service delivery tool for community organizations (Littlepage, Gazley, & Bennett, 2012). Most of the research about student service learning has focused on the first two aspects (Bailis & Ganger, 2006; Imperial, Perry, & Katula, 2007; Jones, 2003). This poster will examine all three sides of the relationship through the lens of a service learning class called Do the Homeless Count. Since 2007, the Indiana University Public Policy Institute, part of the School of Public and Environmental Affairs, has partnered with the Coalition on Homeless Intervention and Prevention (CHIP) to conduct the point-in-time count of the homeless population (referred to hereinafter as “the count”) in Indianapolis, Indiana. The length and nature of this relationship has fostered benefits for the community through providing trend data and analysis to policymakers, raising awareness of the issue of homelessness and homeless serving agencies among the students, and providing volunteers for agencies

IU Public Policy Institute and Center for Homeless Intervention and Prevention, 2011 Homeless Count

poster abstractSince 2007, the Indiana University Public Policy Institute (PPI) under contract from the Coalition for Homelessness Intervention and Prevention (CHIP) has conducted a count of the persons experiencing homelessness in Marion County. On January 27, 2011, a team coordinated by CHIP administered the annual point-in-time count of homeless individuals. Our research discusses the details and background of the count as well as findings and thoughts for policymakers concerned with improving services for the Indianapolis community homeless population. The street count was carried out by teams assigned to designated areas of the county. The teams consist of outreach workers and at least one Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) student. The shelter count was administered by employees of the facility or by a survey assistant, usually an IUPUI student. The IUPUI students volunteered as part of the course Do the Homeless Count in which part of their coursework is to observe and participate in the annual homeless count. The students from the class were trained by outreach workers and practiced interviews in preparation for the count. Four teams consisting of two officers from the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department, one IUPUI student, and one employee from CHIP, searched abandoned buildings and aided in areas outside the immediate downtown area

It’s not all the same: Implemented and perceived HR practices in the volunteer context

Being strategic and intentional in the management of volunteers is increasingly important to tackle volunteer retention and improve other volunteer outcomes. Drawing on strategic human resource management (SHRM), this inductive study utilizes qualitative data from interviews to explore how volunteers in a large youth organization perceive HR practices of training and recognition. Volunteer accounts are supplemented with focus group data from front-line staff to capture how HR practices are implemented. Findings indicate a disconnect between implemented and perceived HR practices in some, but not all, areas. Inconsistent and unintentional communication was the main driver for negative volunteer perceptions

“Don't you want to stay?” The impact of training and recognition as human resource practices on volunteer turnover

Managing volunteers is a difficult undertaking. This study draws on human resource (HR) management theory and literature to investigate the effect of two HR practices—training and recognition—on volunteer turnover. We use longitudinal administrative data collected by an Indiana nonprofit organization, which contains individual volunteer characteristics, organizational HR practices, and information on actual turnover behavior. We found that recognizing volunteer contributions with awards predicted volunteer retention in the following year. Training did not have a direct effect on volunteer turnover, but interacted with gender; men who received training were more likely to stay than women. The study contributes to the literature on HR management in the volunteer context, adds to the emerging literature on awards as incentives for volunteers, and addresses the common method bias by using longitudinal data

What WorX: Measuring the impact of faith-based service and social justice programs on Catholic youth

The Center for FaithJustice (CFJ) offers innovative programs that engage youth in faith, service, and social justice. With the Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy at IUPUI, they developed a survey to evaluate their programs and measure their longitudinal impact on alumni in those three focus areas. This report will offer related insights on youth engagement and suggest how CFJ’s programs relate to larger trends of youth disaffiliation within the Catholic Church. This study examines survey results from alumni and parents of alumni of CFJ’s youth programs, which are collectively called the “WorX” programs. These include curricula for middle school students (ServiceworX), high school students (JusticeworX, New Jersey Service Project/NJSP, MercyworX, and CommunityworX), young adults (LeaderworX), and adults (FaithJustice Fellows and adult volunteers). The results of this study focused on CFJ’s three core areas of interest: faith, service, and social justice

The effect of marrow secretome and culture environment on the rate of metastatic breast cancer cell migration in two and three dimensions

Metastasis is responsible for over 90% of cancer-related deaths, and bone is the most common site for breast cancer metastasis. Metastatic breast cancer cells home to trabecular bone, which contains hematopoietic and stromal lineage cells in the marrow. As such, it is crucial to understand whether bone or marrow cells enhance breast cancer cell migration toward the tissue. To this end, we quantified the migration of MDA-MB-231 cells toward human bone in two- and three-dimensional (3D) environments. First, we found that the cancer cells cultured on tissue culture plastic migrated toward intact trabecular bone explants at a higher rate than toward marrow-deficient bone or devitalized bone. Leptin was more abundant in conditioned media from the cocultures with intact explants, while higher levels of IL-1β, IL-6, and TNFα were detected in cultures with both intact bone and cancer cells. We further verified that the cancer cells migrated into bone marrow using a bioreactor culture system. Finally, we studied migration toward bone in 3D gelatin. Migration speed did not depend on stiffness of this homogeneous gel, but many more dendritic-shaped cancer cells oriented and migrated toward bone in stiffer gels than softer gels, suggesting a coupling between matrix mechanics and chemotactic signals

Valuing Social Returns on Social Investments: Comparing the State-of-the-Art in the U.S. and Europe

As practitioners in the U.S. and Europe alike adapt business concepts and techniques for use in a nonprofit or social enterprise context, we need to know more about the organizational challenges of implementing specific techniques such as social return on investment (SROI) measurements and about variations across cultural contexts. This paper identifies and describes several state-of-the-art approaches to valuing SROI, reviews the organizational challenges and innovative approaches to implementing an SROI measurement process, and examines and compares in detail organizations two in the U.S., two in Europe that have attempted to use SROI valuation methods. Implications for both scholars and social investment/social enterprise practitioners are drawn