Look What You Helped Us Achieve in 2017!
2017 was a banner year for Big Brothers Big Sisters of Central Texas. As we head into 2018, our 47th year of service in the community, we have just experienced an exceptional year of fundraising success, exposure, and support for the agency, along with the honor of having won a number of important awards. Most important, however is the growth we achieved in the number of children served – a terrific 5% increase over the previous year, which amounts to almost 1,000 kids and families served, about 300 new matches made, and approximately 60,000 hours of volunteer service given by Bigs.
“Our focus has always been on serving a lot of kids, really well,” said Brent Fields, CEO of BBBS. “We always want to maintain our emphasis on building quality mentoring relationships, while at the same time striving to help more and more kids get that one-to-one one mentoring support that can change their lives forever. We were able to achieve the success we experienced in 2017 because of our incredible volunteers, families, staff, donors, board members, community partners and other BBBS supporters.”
In addition to growing the total number of children served in 2017, BBBS launched several new initiatives designed to expand the organization’s impact and reach. A Bigs in Blue program was launched in partnership with the Austin Police Department. Bigs in Blue is a national initiative aimed at recruiting law enforcement personnel to serve as mentors to youth in their communities.
BBBS also initiated a Big Futures program that offers matches the opportunity to continue their relationships with one another, and with BBBS, beyond high school graduation. This new program provides on-going support to Bigs and Littles, helps them fully utilize the current Scholarship Program, and offers resources and guidance regarding post-secondary education and career readiness.
BBBS’ Promising Futures Scholarship Program is beginning it’s 32nd year of awarding scholarships to Littles in our program. In 2017 BBBS promised $445,250 in new college scholarships to graduating Littles.
“We are also using our new mentoring center to bring people together in new ways. We offer monthly Youth Activity Center (YAC) nights for our matches that allow them to come together to enjoy games, events and quality time together. We hold a big Fall carnival for matches on site, and we host numerous community meetings and gatherings in our mentoring center, strengthening our relationships and partnerships within the community.”
BBBS has also worked hard to maintain its strong financial status. In a new building that costs twice as much to operate as the old one, the agency came in under budget on expenses in 2017. BBBS’ Board of Directors gave and raised about $275,000 for the agency, which accounted for about 14% of the agency’s total budget. The agency also raised almost $200,000 more in funds over the previous year via special events such as Ice Ball and Bowl for Kids. The Ice Ball Gala alone achieved an unprecedented $670,000 in funds raised.
Helping more kids, launching new initiatives, utilizing our space for community events, engagement and benefit, and increasing overall revenue resulted in the agency receiving numerous awards in 2017. The agency received Big Brothers Big Sisters of America’s (BBBSA) National Gold Standard Award, BBBSA’s National Board of the Year Award, was a BBBSA National Agency of the Year award finalist, was selected as an Austin Business Journal Best Place to Work, received a 3-star energy rating, and our CEO, Brent Fields, received the Austin Business Journal’s Non-Profit CEO of the Year award.
So, what will 2018 bring?
“We are excited about the future. We have an engaged, mission-driven team in place,” said Brent. “We also have a beautiful new space that can handle more staff and offer more resources and support to our matches and to the community as a whole. We are ready to move up to the next level. Now we need to achieve an even greater level of financial support in order to move the 600 kids who are waiting into the life-changing, one-to-one mentoring relationships they need and deserve. Quite simply, we want to continue to serve more kids. Our greatest challenge and our greatest opportunity lies in finding the resources to do so.”
As we look to the new year, we deeply appreciate your ongoing support, participation, and engagement. Thank you for all that you have helped us achieve, for all the children, families and volunteers whose lives we have been able to affect, and for all of the great things that we will continue to do together to help children and families in our community moving forward.
Together we can do great things. We already have. And there is still much great work to do.