Getting Ahead graduate reports (data provided by CharityTracker)

CharityTracker provides regular reports on Getting Ahead in a Just-Gettin’-By World outcomes that are related to improvements in stability, resource development, and financial return on investment. The latest report covers the time beginning on September 11, 2013, and ending on June 30, 2024.

Some highlights from the report are:

Financial resources increased by 14% .
Motivation resources increased by 13%.
Housing stability improved by 23%.
Expenses were reduced by 25%.

Communities that offer Getting Ahead workshops to people in poverty are defining success in three very concrete ways: the development of 11 resources that are needed for a comfortable and secure life; the development of 15 stability factors that make it possible to develop those resources; and third, the tracking of return on investment made by the community.

These communities also realize but may find it difficult to measure the impact that Getting Ahead graduates have when helping to solve community problems. Getting Ahead graduates often join planning and decision-making tables and work beside people in middle class and wealth to address the barriers that graduates run into on their journey out of poverty. Some communities measure the outcomes of the organizations that apply Bridges and Getting Ahead constructs.

Poverty is defined by the level of 11 resources that an individual has (see the attached chart). The investigators (as the participants are called) do rigorous and sometimes painful self-assessments of their resources and stability during Getting Ahead and after.

In this report, the average interval between assessments was 334 days, short of a full year. Anyone who has set out to transform their own lives would recognize the commitment to change represented in these numbers.

The improvements on the Stability Scale tell an interesting story. Note that the lowest scores are for those aspects over which a person has less control—these are employment, legal issues, and the behavior of children.

Highest scores tend to be aspects of life over which a person has a higher degree of control. In the chart, you will notice that the highest improvement was in time horizon. This points to the value of the theory of change in Getting Ahead, which is shared with the investigators in the second module. The point is to move from living in what we call a concrete world to an abstract world. In Getting Ahead terminology, they are living and thinking in the “tyranny of the moment,” where they are busy solving immediate concrete problems all day long and over and over again.

The theory of change in Getting Ahead frees investigators from thinking in the concrete so they can take in new information—in other words, to value learning. A vivid example of the value of abstract thinking is to know that predators base their business model on their victims who live in the tyranny of the moment and need an immediate concrete solution.

In the final section of the report, the focus is on finances: income, decrease in monthly and total debt, increase in assets, and decrease in use of benefits. We have learned that Getting Ahead graduates are increasing their debt because they are taking out loans to buy cars and homes. That’s not a bad thing.

The work began with each Getting Ahead investigator completing a self-assessment of fifteen stability indicators in Module 2 and a self-assessment of eleven resources in Module 7. This has to be done at least two times; once during the Getting Ahead program, and a second time several months later.

Collecting and reporting this data is just a small part of the effort that the numbers represent. We appreciate all the communities that contribute their results to make this data rich. Behind this are Getting Ahead graduates who, day by day and month by month, make concrete changes to increase stability in their lives and build resources.

This data allows you to compare your community with others across the country. It is also valuable to support your grant applications for continued growth and support in changing lives. We trust this information is helpful to the sites that have provided Getting Ahead and to communities that want to offer start offering Getting Ahead.

Click here to read about more Getting Ahead success stories.

Click here to download three PowerPoint slides for your use.

About the Author: Philip DeVol

Phil DeVol is an international consultant who has been working with aha! Process since 1997. He used aha! Process concepts to make institutional changes at the addiction treatment center where he was the executive director for 19 years. During this time he also co-wrote Bridges Out of Poverty with Ruby Payne and Terie Dreussi-Smith. His book Getting Ahead in a Just-Gettin’-by-World is being used to engage people in poverty in the work of building communities where everyone can live well. It worked so well that DeVol used it as a basis for a prison reentry model called Getting Ahead while Getting Out. He works with community leaders to help them move quickly from an attraction to application of Bridges concepts. Getting Ahead and Bridges are being used in hundreds of communities in the U.S., as well as a number of sites in Canada, Australia, Ireland, Scotland, Slovakia, and the Czech Republic. His books have been translated into Spanish, Slovak, and Czech.