Ready by 21® Publications

These publications are recommended by Forum staff as an introduction to Ready by 21. For those of you more advanced, we have included publications that are core reading for anyone learning about and implementing Ready by 21.

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Building Quality Improvement Systems: Lessons from Three Emerging Efforts in the Youth-Serving Sector

Quality is fast becoming a policy priority in states and localities around the country. As a result, formal and informal networks of youth organizations are seeking and developing strategies to help them assess and improve performance.

03/01/2007
Business Leadership: Supporting Youth Development and the Talent Pipeline

The Forum for Youth Investment has partnered with Corporate Voices for Working Families to support a Youth Transitions Task Force charged with identifying and promoting the corporate and public policies necessary to ensure that young people ages 14-21 have the opportunities to develop the skills and knowledge needed to be successful in work and in life.

02/15/2007
Core Assumptions About Change

This two-pager summarizes the core assumptions that philanthropists, planners and policy makers consciously or unconsciously take into account when making decisions about where to focus their efforts to bring about change.

12/15/2006
READY BY 21®: Taking Aim on the Big Picture

READY BY 21: Taking Aim on the Big Picture describes the basic process that can be used by cities, states, funders and programs to coordinate their policies and services to support young people and their families. This tool is the "closet organizer" of youth policy.

 12/01/2006
Adding It Up -- Brochure, Rationale and Guide to Mapping Public Resources for Children, Youth & Families

Brochure: Offering the highlights of what a CYF resource map can do, and why a state or community might benefit from one, the brochure can help you make the case and spread the word about your efforts.

12/01/2006
Ready for Work

In the past, much attention has been paid to the leaks in the “education pipeline”, but now employers, youth and communities are focusing on repairing the “work pipeline” to ensure that young people are ready for work by age 21

 09/01/2006
Ready by 21 at One: Read the One-Year Update

Read about the work the Forum and its partners have done in the first year since launching the Ready by 21 Challenge.

 07/01/2006
Ready for College

Much has been written lately that asks the question -- are young people across this country ready for college? The Forum for Youth Investment, Connect for Kids, Voices for America's Children and many state Kids Count organizations have developed this series for state advocates to share the vision, messages and state policies being proposed to improve the college readiness of youth.

 04/01/2006
What Do You Want to Take Stock Of?

There are multiple types of information that are needed to translate goals into action effectively - information on children and youth, programs, policies, public and political will. This one-page handout provides a list of common ways that states and communities “take stock.”

 03/15/2006
President's Remarks: Moving Ideas to Impact to Change the Odds for Youth - Charting the Forum's Course to 2010

Reflecting on her life as a teen growing up in the low-income neighborhoods of Washington, DC, Karen Pittman spells out why she is determined to have the Forum meet its goal of challenging national partners and state and local change makers to ensure that every young person is Ready by 21®.

07/13/2005