Angels Foster Family Network Accomplishments

Third-Year Investee, Angels Foster Family Network will be graduating from SDSVP in June. Founder and Director, Cathy Richmond gave a final presentation at the June First Friday to discuss the growth of the agency and the incredible results of our partnership with them. Congrats to Angels on a successful partnership with San Diego Social Venture Partners! Thanks for all you do for our little ones and for being such a dynamic leader in the community!

Read below to learn more about Angels’s capacity building and program accomplishments.

Capacity Building Accomplishments

• Increased Staff and Budget
• Engaged and active Board of 17 members, well-functioning committees
• By-laws revised
• Larger and more attractive office space
• Financial reporting and control systems in place
• Consistent branding through UCSD Marketing class and SVP assistance
• Website revised, functions as main foster family recruitment source
• Evaluation Study conducted by Children’s Hospital, demonstrated positive, measurable outcomes
• Strategic Planning Process in place
• Fund Development Plan created with case statement
• More stable funding base (individual donors and foundations that give funds in consistent years)

Program Accomplishments

Growth in Babies Placed

• Year 1 – 33 babies
• Year 2 – 64 babies
• Year 3 – 54 babies (as of May 31)

Growth in Foster Familes Certified

• Year 1 – 9 certified
• Year 2 – 29 certified
• Year 3 - 18 certfied (As of May 31)

Growth in Revenue

Revenue generated in Calendar Year:

• Year 2006 $298,480
• Year 2007 $317,812
• Year 2008: $387,168
• Five months into May 2009: $210,753

SDSVP Partner Support

• Accounting & Financial Management - JoAnne Berg
• Bookkeeping set-up (in house) – Lenore Hawkins
• Board Development and By-Laws Revision - Joyce Ross, Richard Bockoff and Gary Kloehn
• Marketing and Mission – Richard Bockoff , Alan Sorkin, Sherri Neasham and Amy Larson
• Executive Selection - Joyce Ross
• Grant Assistance – Callie Craig
• Event Support – Diane Wintress and Amy Larson
• SVP Liaison - Peggy Kidd
• Lead Partners – Amy Larson and Joyce Ross

Angels Places 300th Foster Baby

On Track to reach record goal for 2009

San Diego, CA – This week the Angels Foster Family Network placed its 300th foster baby. Angels is on track to place more than 60 foster babies this year – a record for Angels. The organization is also celebrating its 10th anniversary this year.

“This is a great way to kick-off National Foster Care Month by celebrating our 300th placement,” said Angels Founder, Cathy Richman. “But baby number 300 isn't just a number, she isn't just another child we tally up along with the other 299 babies placed thus far. She trembles from the agony of withdrawals her little body must ward off from her exposure in the womb to toxic drugs. She is now safe from further harm with her Angels foster parents.”

This newborn baby girl went home to Jim and Janet O’Leary. The O’Leary family became foster parents with Angels because “We wanted to do something meaningful. Angels really touched our hearts and we knew this is what we had to do.”

As mentioned above, May is National Foster Care Month (www.nationalfostercare.org). There are more than 7,000 children in the San Diego County foster care system, one third whom are under the age of three. The distinctive Angels program is the only California licensed foster agency that focuses on and exclusively meets the critical needs for babies from newborn to 24 months.

Angels placed its first baby in 1999 and this year will celebrate its 10th year of rescuing babies who have fallen victim to neglect and abuse.

Learn more about Angels at www.angelsfoster.com.

Angels Recruiting Through Website

By Monica Schrader - Executive Director, Angels Foster Family Network

When San Diego Social Venture Partners notified Angels Foster Family Network of their three-year grant award, founder Cathy Richman knew exactly how to put that funding to good use. Angels immediately hired a web designer to overhaul their web site with a fresh new look and feel as well as improved flow. The primary goal for the website was to recruit new foster families.

Angel’s mission is to rescue abused, abandoned and neglected babies by matching them with a select group of foster parents to ensure maximum emotional, social and intellectual development of each child. With such a powerful mission and newly revised website, the campaign was launched to reach more children than ever by recruiting more foster families. The new website was also listed on multiple search engines to ensure Angels name was predominate when individuals were tooling around the internet looking for fostering options.

The launch was a success with Angels going from 25 placements in 2006 to 54 placements in 2007 and nearly at goal for placing 60 children to date in 2008. The Angels website has become the primary source to recruit families to become foster families. Check it out at http://www.angelsfoster.com/. Thank you SDSVP!

Angels Foster Family Network

Amy Larson, Lead Partner

“The partnership between Angels and SDSVP has been a great one since day one. The talent and support of many of their members has been an impetus, resulting in more funding, successful marketing, and a record-breaking number of babies being rescued.”

Cathy Richman, Founder and Executive Director

Founder Cathy Richman developed the Angels foster program’s unique methodology in 1998 because she saw a need for a new way to address a chronic problem—how to protect the most fragile of children within a system that can do further damage by constantly moving infants and toddlers from foster home to foster home.

Angels is a licensed, private nonprofit foster family agency with a unique emphasis on the stable placement of abused foster infants with healthy, nurturing families who promote emotional bonding, helping the children grow into happy, productive, secure adults. Since January 2000, Angels has placed 250 babies with some of the finest, most loving and committed foster families available, and the organization expects to place an additional 60 babies in 2008.

SDSVP has provided a capacity-building grant and committed Partners who have helped establish a marketing brand for Angels, helped create a five-year strategic plan, assisted with board development, and financed an outside funding consultant who helped hire their first Director of Development. The social return on investment will be measured by the number of children now living healthy, happy lives and families that have been made whole after what seemed like such a tragic start.