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(CentroNía is formerly the Calvary
Bilingual Multicultural Learning Center)
Fact
Sheet |
Leadership
| Investment
Summary | Impact Summary »
Please note: this Investment Summary represents
VPP's perspective at the time of the investment agreement, February,
2004, as well as CentroNía's former name Calvary Bilingual
Multicultural Learning Center).
In February, 2004, VPP entered into a multi-year investment
partnership with Calvary Bilingual Multicultural Learning Center
(which has since changed its name to CentroNía), a dynamic
organization that provides a wide range of family services to
residents in the multi-ethnic neighborhoods of Columbia Heights,
Mt. Pleasant, Shaw, and Adams Morgan in Washington, DC. The core
of Calvary’s offerings is childcare and after-school programs,
and youth development for 400 children from infancy through high
school. Through this investment partnership, VPP will provide
significant funding and strategic assistance that will help Calvary
achieve its aspiration of becoming the premier educational leader
for bilingual, multicultural children in the Washington, DC metropolitan
area, expanding its services to serve new families and communities,
by 2009.
VPP will provide funding up to $2,200,000 over a four-year period
to Calvary and will augment this funding with significant strategic
assistance to the organization during that time. This brings VPP’s
financial commitment to Calvary to a total of $2,420,000, including
the $220,000 provided for the development of their comprehensive
strategic plan. Under the terms of this agreement, $600,000 in
funding will be disbursed to Calvary in the first year, with the
remaining $1,600,000 in funding contingent upon Calvary’s
achievement of annual milestones over the remaining three years
of the investment partnership.
OPPORTUNITY
Calvary plans to expand from a single facility in Columbia Heights
that currently serves 400 children and 250 adults, to managing
child development programs, charter schools, and adult learning
services in at least three additional sites, ultimately reaching
1,600 children and 800 adults over the next six years. This expansion
plan includes serving new neighborhoods in the District and the
region. The specific aspirations and objectives of Calvary’s
strategic plans are to: 1) establish charter schools in two locations
in the District of Columbia, 2) recruit key management and staff,
3) establish new governance structures related to its expansion
plan, 4) define and implement strategies to finance the organization’s
growth, and 5) implement an outcomes framework to assess program
effectiveness and contribute to ongoing management.
INVESTMENT RATIONALE
Key factors that underpin the thinking behind our investment in
Calvary include:
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Social impact: Calvary’s
service area encompasses the following neighborhoods: Columbia
Heights, Mt. Pleasant, Adams Morgan, and Shaw. Its constituents
are low-to-moderate income working families, many headed by
single parents. The neighborhoods served by Calvary are predominantly
Latino, African-American, and multiracial. Children who receive
Calvary’s services benefit in a number of ways including:
a. improved readiness for school;
b. access to a safe, nurturing environment that prepares them
to understand and adapt to cultural and linguistic differences
in America; and
c. exposure to a creative learning environment that encompasses
the creative arts and technology.
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Demonstrated performance:
Calvary has a 16-year track record of delivering youth and family
services to a diverse constituency. Its reputation, particularly
in its delivery of early-childhood and out-of-school programs,
is excellent. Several young adults who attended Calvary as youngsters
now have their children enrolled in the program; others have
returned to work or volunteer at the center. Calvary has a formula
for success. The model is to provide programming that engages
the family throughout the child’s development from birth
through the 12th grade. Despite more than doubling the number
of children served in three years, there is a substantial waiting
list for enrollment in Calvary’s programs. Supported by
a Kellogg grant, Calvary is in the process of documenting its
model so that it can be packaged and shared with others.
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Future aspirations:
Calvary plans to build on its reputation and demonstrated performance
in underserved, multi-ethnic communities to become a market
leader. Calvary’s future goals include increasing the
level of services provided to its current constituency as well
as taking those services into other neighborhoods with similar
demographics. Calvary is anxious to partner with others to expand
its service delivery. In the first stage of expansion, it is
looking at nearby organizations like the Carlos Rosario Charter
School and the Dance Institute of Washington as partners for
its early-childhood program. Partner organizations in other
neighborhoods have not yet been identified, although Calvary’s
executive director has made contacts and begun to explore ideas
in neighborhoods including Petworth, Langley Park, Silver Spring,
and South Arlington.
SUCCESS FACTORS
An investment in Calvary is likely to be successful in light of
the following:
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Longevity/sustainability:
The organization has a track record that spans nearly two decades.
It has a proven model for service delivery. It is an organization
that has already proven its ability to grow its organization
and the breadth and depth of its services. In the most recent
three-year period, Calvary has doubled its budget, staff size,
and numbers served. Calvary’s executive director led a
successful capital campaign to raise $2.3 million of the $5.6
million cost for completely renovating a 73,000-square-foot
facility, transforming an abandoned building into a state-of-the-art
facility that includes a childcare center, a dance studio, a
community technology lab, a commercial kitchen, and a rooftop
playground. The balance of the funds was secured through Community
Development Block Grants and bank loans.
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Leadership, management team, and
board: Calvary has a competitive, charismatic,
highly impassioned leader in Beatriz “BB” Otero,
and one who has proven adept in managing rapid growth. She has
grown Calvary from a grassroots “group of moms”
effort housed in a local church basement to an organization
with a staff of over 100, a 73,000-square-foot facility, and
an annual budget of $4 million, providing a comprehensive range
of services to an expanding constituent base. She has also shown
strong leadership within the Latino community and among nonprofit
organizations in the District of Columbia. Calvary has built
a strong management team for its organizational stage, including
a program director who is an authority in the area of child
development, a finance director who is a CPA with corporate
experience, an admin/ops director who is a home-grown product
of the Calvary model, and a development director who has over
10 years experience in the nonprofit sector and a proven track
record as a fund raiser. Calvary’s board is also diverse,
effective, and engaged. The board’s chair, Chuck Bean,
is executive director of the region’s new Nonprofit Roundtable.
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Community support:
Calvary is first and foremost a community organization—one
that enjoys the support of the communities served and that takes
special care to incorporate community resources. Calvary is
especially proud of the extent to which critical staff have
been recruited from the surrounding neighborhood.
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Established relationship:
Calvary was a partner organization in the Morino Institute’s
Youth Development Collaborative (YDC) Pilot. Calvary worked
in an intense relationship with the pilot staff from 1998 into
2001, so the groundwork for a trusting relationship has already
been well established.
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