Dear Reader,
It is no exaggeration to say that 2023 could be our best year yet at Liberty’s Promise! Our staff is the largest it has ever been, 21 people total, and we are conducting more programs than we ever have before, 29 in all! Liberty’s Promise is growing in all directions, with our new initiatives focused on both younger and older audiences. For the first time in LP history, we have office staff who devote their time to supporting the organization, allowing our Program Officers to focus on what they do best—lead our programs! Furthermore, our leadership team is growing and specializing. It’s exciting times here, and we wouldn’t be doing any of it without the support coming from each and every one of you!
As we start the year, our pride in our mission, and our tenacity in seeking the funding needed to see it grow, has led us to launching a program at our 24th location! Our expansion to E.L. Haynes High School in Washington D.C. is a particularly special addition to our list of schools served because it is our first-ever public charter school. With non-profit funding in the District being so rare and so competitive, this win is something to be celebrated! We wouldn’t have been able to expand without the support of our Director of Development and Alumni Relations, Mr. Ryan Cassidy. Ryan was the first of our non-program officer hires, over two years ago now, and his efforts have been paying off. Liberty’s Promise is proud to announce our largest budget ever, more than $1.6 million this year! This budget has been reinvested into the betterment of our business, which means building up our behind-the-scenes team. In the past six months, we hired our first Operations Officer and our first Alumni Outreach Coordinator. (Read more about her in our Alumni highlight, below.) Next up, we plan to hire a Finance Officer, which will be a major boost for our bookkeeping and invoicing.
As Liberty’s Promise continues to grow, so does our leadership team. We now have two Senior Program Officers, as well as a Director of Northern Virginia and Washington D.C. Programs, and a Director of Middle School Programming. Our middle school program, C&C Junior, is a new component of our work as an organization, and it’s a way for us to deepen our service to immigrant youth at all stages of their lives. In our years working with the teenage immigrant population, we’ve gathered insight, and we’re able to foresee some of the stumbling blocks that our middle schoolers might come up against. By working with younger immigrants, aged 10-13, we can inspire them to see the road ahead—their upcoming high school experience—as an exciting adventure, filled with challenges (which we help prepare them for), and also full of possibilities and opportunities. C&C Junior, like our after-school programs for high school youth (Civics and Citizenship and Civic Engagement for Beginning English Language Learners), aims to give our youth an understanding of their new American home and what they can do to achieve their dreams. Our hope is for our team to be part of their community and that Liberty’s Promise may continue to grow so that we can help even more youth on their road to success.
Best wishes,
