Category Archive
One of Urban Initiatives’ six core values as an organization is impact. We engage in data-driven decision making to achieve positive outcomes, and each year we spend a great deal of time, effort, and resources evaluating each of our programs’ impact. By intentionally evaluating each program, we can effectively determine which of our program goals…
Urban Initiatives utilizes research-backed, evidence-driven curriculum to guide our program sessions. This summer a team of Urban Initiatives staff and Board members worked together to improve our elementary schoolers’ health and education soccer program curriculum. We sat down with Urban Initiatives Program Director, Sara Shanley, who oversaw the project to chat about the updates.
Urban Initiatives uses sport and play as a key strategy to positively impact our program participants’ social emotional learning (SEL). Play can have profound impacts on youths’ SEL, and Urban Initiatives has intentionally developed its recess curriculum and overall program approach to positively impact SEL outcomes through intentional, active games and SEL skill-building.
Although pop culture has led many to believe that leadership is a talent or a set of innate skills possessed by few, leadership skills are practicable. By breaking down what it means to be a leader and what specific skills and capacities it takes to lead, we can encourage leaders from all backgrounds, experiences, and…
On Friday, February 1st, our Team Captains in our leadership development program — Take the Lead- participated in a leadership retreat at MB Ice Arena. MB Ice Arena is the Chicago Blackhawks’ official practice arena and we were so grateful for the Blackhawks partnership in executing an incredibly successful retreat.
Urban Initiatives is excited to announce that our 2017-2018 data and evaluation results are complete and our programs have once again showed strong results in physical activity, academic success, and social emotional learning. Urban Initiatives is committed to being a proven organization that continually evaluates our programs to determine success and to make curriculum and…
As we approach the start of a new school year, high school juniors and seniors are contemplating their future — whether headed towards the workforce or a college experience — and they are weighing their grades, extracurricular activities, and test scores to determine next steps to reach their goals. Regardless of their SAT scores, their…
On Friday, April 13th, 140 of our Take the Lead team captains traveled to Allstate headquarters in Northbrook, Illinois for their fourth retreat. The theme of the retreat was conflict transformation.
Over the last fifteen years, Urban Initiatives’ Work to Play program has grown from 12 students to 1,350 students in 44 Chicago Public Schools. Coinciding with this incredible growth is the increasing costs of transportation for our participants and their families. Busing remains a critical portion of our programming and mission. In order to continue…
Urban Initiatives is thrilled to announce that the The Chicago Blackhawks Foundation has granted us $50,000 for the third year in a row. We are so thankful for their continued support and know that their funds will go to great use for the Work to Play Program at Beidler Elementary, Otis World Language Academy and…
