After 21 years of experience in NZ – and 41 years in the US – we know that I Have a Dream works well in practice.
The good news is that it also works well in theory.
Over the past 9 years of these newsletters, we have often included academic reports and sector whitepapers that lend credence to our programme design. We're especially pleased to include two NZ-produced reports today:
- Emily Mason was the co-founder, along with Sir Bill English, of ImpactLab. The explanation of her Mason Curve illustrates a profound truth of the Govt's social sector services, i.e., they are designed to be mass-delivered to the "average" citizen. Standardisation helps to lower delivery costs and ensure consistency of services … but, of course, there is no such person as the "average" citizen.
- The Social Investment in Action report from Deloitte is yet another excellent analysis of the situation, part of a series of helpful reports produced by Deloitte Partner, Adithi Pandit, and her team.
These reports call out some of the key design principles underlying the I Have a Dream programme, e.g.,
- A robust pathway from prototypes to pilots to scaled change.
- A decade of social investment approaches, locally and globally, provide evidence on what works and insight into what is possible across population cohorts.
- A single point of accountability and investment budget is required. The public sector is set up to deliver efficiently, effectively and separately.
- Specific and localised service provision effectively provides integrated responses for those with highly complex needs.
- Cross-sector collaboration needs to have a stronger mandate for action and push into delivery for wider populations – not just the most challenging to serve.
- People underserved by each agency represent an "under the radar risk" with increased likelihood of escalating into at-risk.
- Our current systems of support – which are often issue-based – are not effective for people experiencing multiple barriers.
- Evidence supports a small set of core interventions that – delivered in a coordinated and sustained way – stabilise and improve the outcomes of those with multiple and complex issues.
- There are key characteristics – grounded in evidence – of successful social investment programmes, in order to successfully deliver social and economic benefit for underserved populations.
As we seek to expand the reach of the I Have a Dream programme, and especially to engage with iwi and Government, it's important that we continually assess and evolve our model to take account of new thinking in the sector as well as our on-the-ground experience.
Nga mihi,
Scott Gilmour
Chairperson, Board of Trustees
I Have A Dream Charitable Trust
A Word from I Have a Dream's new CEO, Andrew Te Whaiti
He aroha whakato, he aroha puta mai. If kindness is sown then kindness you shall receive.
One of the things that has 'blown me away' is the quality of people that we are privileged to work with. I am a little over 3 months in to my role and not a day goes by where I don't meet someone who is committed to our kaupapa, wanting to help, or asks "what can we do?" In other words, it's a demonstration of kindness. Being kind not only has a direct effect on our Dreamers, and us as an organisation but also a positive impact on us all. Doing things for people not because of who they are or what they do in return, but because of who you are. And, we appreciate you.
Over the next 3 months we will be further strengthening our team and resources so we are able to continue and expand on the amazing mahi being done by our Navigators and prepare us for expansion to other areas of Aotearoa. I look forward to updating you on our progress in the next communication.
Remember, there's no such thing as a small act of kindness. Every act creates a ripple with no logical end.
Nga mihi, Andrew
Shooting Goals
Congratulations to Dreamer Ezra Papuni Evans who was recently announced as an ambassador for the Charitable Trust and IHAD Dream Partner, ReSport. Ezra is an up and coming netball star who currently travels from Whangarei to Auckland for netball, coaches young kids, manages a high school team, and has been selected for U18's Waitakere and NZ Nationals, all while excelling academically at Tikipunga High School. Thanks to an introduction from IHAD, ReSport are now getting behind Ezra to help raise his profile and generate possible funding to help this talented young athlete to stay in the game.
But it doesn't stop there, this term ReSport have also provided a whole raft of sporting equipment and goods to allow our Dreamers of all ages to participate in sports. This includes netball bibs and balls, boxing gloves, a hockey stick, gym shoes and wetsuits.Thanks ReSport we really appreciate the ongoing support you consistently provide for our Dreamers.
ReSport are one of our Dream Partners, a new programme that was introduced last year. Dream Partners helps us to recognise the many different ways for supporting I Have a Dream in addition to financial support. This allows us to create relationships with local businesses and other organisations who might not be able to give us funding, but we can still develop a long-term strategy to work together.
Volunteering
We have had another very busy term with our I Have a Dream Volunteer crew! We have a big group of volunteers in our whanau contributing in so many ways across programmes. We are hugely grateful and could not do what we do without them all.
This term was special as National Volunteer Week was held during June. Kirsty and the team managed to deliver special hand made gifts to every single one of our Volunteers and it was so lovely to connect and hear that everyone is enjoying and getting a lot out of the volunteering experience. We want to make sure that all our Volunteers have opportunities to grow, learn, be extended and rewarded through their volunteering experiences.
We were overjoyed to take some of our team along to the National Volunteer Awards hosted by Volunteering Northland. We would like to especially mention and congratulate Te Wairere Tepania for receiving an individual long service award. Te Wairere has volunteered across events, holiday and after school programmes for I Have a Dream for several years. Huge congratulations also to our team of Volunteers from Pompallier Catholic College who received a group certificate. Some photos from our special evening are below.
A Winning Experience
Mid last year Donor Patricia Giblin was announced as the lucky winner for our Dream Week promotion. Trish was the fortunate recipient of a luxury getaway for two which would take her on a biking and boat adventure to Clyde and around Roxburgh and Lake Dunstan, a prize that was generously donated by the Luxury Trail Company. This is the same company that generously sponsored 9 Dreamers and 2 Navigators on the Otago Rail Trail back in 2019. At the start of this year, Trish was finally able to take her trip and as a thank you, has shared these photos and this short piece about her experience with us. Thanks again to the Luxury Trail Company for donating this amazing prize for us to giveaway and to all the Donors who donated during the promotion.
Togetherness
In late June our Year 2 Navigators held a Dreamer and Whanau Event based around the theme of Matariki. They held the event as a way of bringing these junior Dreamers deeper into the IHAD kaupapa as we don't provide after school programs for this year group. It was a great way for showcasing our IHAD values of whanaungatanga (relationships), aroha (love) and tumunako (hope). It was also a great new way of engaging and connecting with whanau. 20 Dreamers and their whanau attended. The evening kicked off with a meet and greet and family photos. They then had some matariki themed activities, kapahaka performance, shared kai and a rongoa workshop to finish off. It was a beautiful event of kotahitanga (togetherness) which resulted in pure happiness on the faces of the Dreamers.
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