Grant Will Fund Impact Measurement

Beat the Streets Chicago received a “Collective Impact Grant” from the Foglia Family Foundation in partnership with UpMetrics, Inc. to measure the organization’s power create positive impact during the 2019-20 program year.  We are one of eleven organizations to benefit from the grant this year.

Measuring impact in order to improve programming, gauge progress and leverage success is a challenge for any nonprofit.  It is especially difficult in a sports-based youth development organization like Beat the Streets Chicago, which focuses on building up then “whole student” rather than athletic achievement.  Coaches and staff at Beat the Streets Chicago will work with UpMetrics, a provider of impact measurement tools and analytics, to create a set of metrics appropriate for our programs and participants.  We are delighted to work with the experts at UpMetrics to determine which social emotional learning and other metrics will best tell the Beat the Streets Chicago story.

The grant also covers license fees for UpActive, a roster and activity management software and mobile app created by UpMetrics.  With UpActive, coaches can take attendance, contact families and post training videos for their athletes.  UpActive does away with the old paper-and-clipboard attendance taking, allowing us to better track – and therefore engage with – our student athletes.

In addition to creating a customized solution for Beat the Streets Chicago, the year-long process provides networking opportunities and shared learning between the eleven organizations in this year’s cohort.  Most of the eleven are similarly engaged with youth sports in the Chicago area.

At the end of the year, UpMetrics will use its data visualization aggregation tool to create a two-page report for Beat the Streets Chicago that shows our organization’s performance relative to specific metrics and benchmarks.  

Email Cathy if you are interested in providing input to this project. 

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