When Rebecca Asmo became executive director of the Boys & Girls Clubs of Columbus in 2010, the organization was at one of its smallest points. It served 1,500 kids at two different sites.
The nonprofit’s leadership, however, put together an ambitious plan to expand. It hopes to serve 10,000 kids by 2020, increase its footprint and position itself as the top youth organization in Columbus.
Today, the Boys & Girls Clubs of Columbus is well on its way — it was just named one of The Columbus Foundation’s five nonprofits to watch in 2015.
“With Growth for Great Futures, we’ve grown from having two sites back in 2010 to seven sites right now,” Asmo says. “And I expect by the end of the decade, we’ll have at least 10 sites, but it could possibly be more.”
The organization also now serves 4,000 kids.
Asmo says that because the organization is nationally affiliated with access to evidence-based programs, professional development, marketing and more, the Boys & Girls Clubs of Columbus is well positioned to efficiently serve the community.
Here’s how the nonprofit is providing more out-of-school learning opportunities for kids who need it the most.
Expand quickly through partnerships
In order to hit the ground running, the Boys & Girls Clubs of Columbus is growing by partnering with others.
“It means that we can expand our footprint without doing a capital campaign,” Asmo says.
For instance, the organization operates a club at the KIPP Journey Academy. All investment goes to staff and program experiences, rather than operating a building, which makes the site more efficient.
Other partnerships include the Godman Guild Association, the Reeb Community Center and Homeport.
“It’s great. There’s so much physical infrastructure in this community that we can take advantage of,” Asmo says. “It allows us to just be nimble and flexible and move with the needs of the community.”
It also means the nonprofit can focus on what it does best — helping kids.
“Kids can actually spend more time in a Boys & Girls Club than they can in school,” Asmo says. “It’s such a critical piece of the equation that for too long in our community was looked at as an afterthought.”
By the time a low-income student graduates from high school, that student has, on average, 6,000 fewer hours of learning than a middle or upper income peer. That achievement gap, due to a lack of learning opportunities in the summer and after school, starts to close with Boys & Girls Clubs.
Take the best examples
Asmo says when the organization set its sights on 10,000 kids by 2020 her team benchmarked other successful Boys & Girls Clubs in greater Milwaukee, Austin, Texas, and the Twin Cities to look for traits to model after.
Those clubs grew quickly over a short period because the growth was dependent upon partnerships.
“Our philosophy of investing in kids and not real estate, we borrowed that from the Boys & Girls Clubs in Austin, Texas,” Asmo says.
The most successful clubs also had a strong partnership with a public entity, whether a municipal or county entity, school district or parks and recreation department, she says.
Finally, those organizations were willing to shift programs, even if a club had been in a neighborhood for a long time.
“If the neighborhood was changing, the organization changed along with it to best meet the needs of kids,” Asmo says.
That’s something the Boys & Girls Clubs of Columbus is looking at now. Some places need to be re-evaluated because neighborhoods are gentrifying, residential housing has decreased or it’s hard for kids to get to the site.
Pluses and minuses
Throughout its growth, the Boys & Girls Clubs of Columbus has come up against some struggles, but Asmo says these struggles have helped them find a better way to do something.
By working with partner organizations, the nonprofit has had to step up the amount of attention it pays to those partnerships.
“So we’re not just out there making sure we have good relationships with our donors, but we’re stewarding a lot of other organizations and partners that we work with to make sure that we’re providing the kinds of services that they want,” she says.
The other challenge is filling in the front layer of staff as the organization promotes people.
Asmo says the reason why the nonprofit has been so successful so far has been the passion of her staff. And the key to getting kids to come back day after day is on-site staff who create the right mix of learning and fun.
“A club can’t feel like a school building because that’s too long of a day,” Asmo says. “But it also can’t just be a complete free-for-all, because it’s important that as a community we set expectations for the kids, especially when they are in our care.”
But even as obstacles crop up, others became smaller.
Asmo says the Boys & Girls Clubs of Columbus fundraises more, but as it has grown, fundraising has gotten easier. The organization is gaining momentum and can show donors a broader, more collective impact.
For example, its budget was about $750,000 a year with two sites. At seven sites, the budget is only $1.8 million, which demonstrates economies of scale.
“When you’re able to talk to people about a vision that you have and talk to them about the results that you have been achieving, and that you want to scale in the community — that’s something that people want to get behind,” Asmo says.
