“Transforming Communities One Grant at a Time” is the purpose of Capacity Builders, Inc. (CBI). Founded in 1995 by Dr. Deborah Montgomery — also the founder of GrantWriters — CBI serves the resource development needs of tribal nonprofits and federally recognized tribes throughout the Four Corners.
Grants are critical to CBI’s work within the “Four Corners” community of northwest New Mexico, southwest Colorado, southeast Utah, and northeast Arizona. With help from GrantWriters, this nonprofit not only invests grant funds directly into its service community but also collaborates with GrantWriters to offer grant writing assistance to local nonprofits who cannot afford these services. In fact, grants allow for CBI’s work to be possible in these rural and impoverished areas.
Grants Fund a Worthy Mission
CBI works to improve all facets of life for the Diné, or Navajo People, including fitness, nutrition, academic tutoring, life and career mentoring, economic development, nonprofit capacity building, and much more. “CBI doesn’t turn down any opportunity to serve and better the community,” states Rachel Nawrocki, former Executive Director for CBI. “Our goal is to help wherever and whenever we can. We see funding opportunities that align with our mission and local needs, secure those grants as we are able, and spend the money within the local community to improve wellness and the overall quality of life.”
Grants Create Opportunity and Real Change
In 2009, CBI approached GrantWriters for grant writing assistance. “Not only did we not have the time to write grants, but we also didn’t have the time to learn how to do it effectively,” Nawrocki explains.
Since then, GrantWriters has helped CBI secure more than 55 grants, each one contributing to the deep impact the nonprofit has made within the Navajo Nation. Among its many contributions, CBI has helped to start or improve more than 1,300 businesses, find more than 300 summer jobs for Navajo youth, educate 6,500 Navajo youth about the risks of drug and alcohol abuse as well as teenage pregnancy prevention, provide intensive academic tutoring services to 158 Navajo children, and recruit and train 350 youth service providers to be certified in Youth Mental Health First Aid.
CBI’s first major funding source came from the US Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of Adolescent Health Teen Pregnancy Prevention Grant, awarded in 2010. “This was our flagship grant,” Nawrocki says. Over a five-year period, the grant paid nearly $5,000,000 to CBI to provide a positive development and education program to Diné youth for the purpose of reducing teen pregnancy and increasing awareness around highly prevalent, high-risk activities leading to unplanned pregnancy. According to US census and programmatic data, between the years of 2010 and 2015, there was a 75% reduction in the number of babies born to Navajo teen young women in CBI’s service area.
Nawrocki says, “Because of GrantWriters’ help with writing this grant, CBI was able to successfully facilitate a positive youth development curriculum that reached and changed the lives of thousands of high-needs Navajo students.” This reach included five school districts, 15 schools and youth community centers, and 3,250 Navajo youth.
The grant also opened doors for CBI to receive more resources to educate youth about teen pregnancy and prevention. “This grant made us the authority on teen pregnancy prevention in our community,” reflects Nawrocki. “That recognition has opened up numerous funding streams and has helped to create a number of local partnerships.”
Grants Ensure a Lasting Legacy and Impact
Nawrocki credits almost all of CBI’s work to grants, and she appreciates the role GrantWriters plays in helping secure them. “I find GrantWriters to be so easy to work with,” she says, and “through grants, we’ve strengthened our organization, built our staff and built our nonprofit operational competencies”. Nawrocki recommends setting aside a healthy grant writing budget to make sure a nonprofit continues to grow and make a positive impact in a community.
“Every year, we set aside a healthy grant writing budget; and we make sure to expend that money on writing those grants that most appropriately fit our vision and community needs. That’s how we continue to grow our organization and its impact on the lives of high-needs Four Corners’ citizens.”