Over the past year Innovative Changes has worked with Multnomah County Library to deliver financial education programs to diverse communities across the Portland Metro Area. In particular, we co-taught, collaborated and got to know Joanne Kahn, the library’s Financial Literacy Coordinator. IC$ growing partnership with Multnomah County Library’s Financial Literacy initiatives has helped IC$ to expand our reach in the community as well as to further develop our repertoire of financial curricula. Keep reading to learn more!

What is your role at the Multnomah County Library?

I joined the library in 2010 as Financial Literacy Program Coordinator.  The Library Foundation had recently secured a grant from Smart Investing @ your library, a national partnership between the American Library Association and the FINRA Investor Education Foundation.  Smart Investing grants are awarded to select libraries across the country to increase financial literacy in our communities.  My job is to achieve our grant goals, which include developing programs for low-income families and at-risk seniors, creating a Personal Finance section of our web site, training library staff, and piloting the use of mobile computing as a way to deliver workshops.

I first became interested in financial literacy when teaching my own daughters how to manage a checking account and use debit and credit cards.  Knowing that many children needed those skills, I began volunteering through Banking on our Future in K-12 schools, and that experience led to my work with the library.

What type of activities have you organized since being at the library? What has been successful? What has been challenging?

Previously, there was no information on personal finance on the library’s web site, so the new Smart Saving site (www.multcolib.org/smartsaving) is an enormous step forward.  By partnering with several local organizations, including Innovative Changes, we have also provided dozens of public programs and covered a wide range of financial topics, on money management, credit, foreclosure, social security, and retirement finances.  Upcoming events are posted on the Smart Saving site.  A large portion of my work is outreach.  Because the library had existing outreach channels through retirement communities and Head Start centers where we deliver library services, we used those relationships to begin delivering financial literacy programs.  The Head Start programs we have done with Innovative Changes, especially on Teaching Children about Money, have been very successful.  The most challenging activity for me has been the tablet-computer-based class for seniors, about post-retirement finances, which broke new ground on how the library does outreach.

How does Innovative Changes fit in with your/the library’s work?

Innovative Changes has become our primary partner for budgeting programs, both at branches and in Head Start centers, because of your experience providing nuts-and-bolts tools for families with limited resources.  It is especially rewarding to know that after the program people can follow up with Innovative Changes to get individual help.

Do you have any anecdotes/success stories from our mutual activities through out the community?

Many program attendees have commented that they were more motivated to get their finances under control, which is what it’s all about – to create a budget, get and read their free credit report, and manage their debt.  At one of our budgeting classes, Carmina had explained that the first step, when starting to budget, is to track spending and find out where your money is going.  We distributed little notebooks people could use to jot down their spending, and when I handed one woman her notebook her eyes grew wide and she looked at me in a sort of shock and said “Everything??”   I could see her suddenly realize how much money she was spending without thinking about it.

Chris Cook is the AmeriCorps VISTA at Salem-Keizer Community Development Corporation (SKCDC).  Hailing from Charleston, South Carolina, she made the big move this summer after landing her position as an Oregon Micro-entrepreneur Network (OMEN) Asset Building Corps Member at Salem Keizer CDC and deciding that the Willamette Valley seemed like an ideal location. We sat down with Chris to learn more about her work at SKCDC and partnership with Innovative Changes.

Salem-Keizer CDC’s mission is to help low and moderate income families attain financial self sufficiency through the provision of safe, stable, quality affordable housing, financial asset building opportunities and community & resident services.  At SKCDC, Chris coordinates financial education programs, is working to build an asset management plan for Salem-Keizer properties, and researches and develops processes for fundraising and volunteer engagement.

With three months on the job under her belt, Chris says that so far, she has “enjoyed meeting other people in non profit world, seeing the prevalence of VISTAs in the community and what they do after their year of service, and seeing how people have started partnerships and are working together to make positive things happen.”

Innovative Changes got the chance to connect with Chris and SKCDC in September when Sarah and Carmina hit the road to Salem to facilitate a Training of the Trainers (ToT) session in our Financial Household Resiliency Curriculum. At this training Salem-Keizer employees and volunteers from local financial institutions gathered to delve into class content and learn IC$ methods and techniques for facilitating the four-part, eight hour series that covers basic financial management skills.

In October, volunteers from Bank of the Cascades and Maps Credit Union taught Salem-Keizer’s first round of FHR classes to SKCDC residents and Individual Development Account (IDA) participants. There were seven people in total and Chris reflects that “the volunteers were wonderful- they rocked it! They explained everything to students who loved how accommodating facilitators were, and the information that they gained from the classes.”

Chris reflects that the classes served as an outlet for those who had never talked about their finances before. “One gentleman was very involved in the class.  He was able to interact with people and talk about finances, which was something he had never done. He seemed touched that there were people with similar experiences- in past had to fake that he knew what was doing. People also came to the class not knowing anything about credit and now they have credit building goals!”

SKCDC plans to teach the classes again this month to more IDA participants, Salem-Keizer residents and Salem Housing Authority clients as well. In addition to implementing these financial education workshops, Chris has her hands ful for the rest of her VISTA year. SKCDC is partnering with several community organizations and the nearby Chemeketa Community College to deliver free tax filing workshops.

Innovative Changes strives to provide financial education in a way that is relevant and meaningful to different populations. IC$ created it’s Financial Household Resiliency (FHR) curriculum with the idea that it could be adapted to be more culturally relevant to specific communities.Last fall, as part of our partnership with Hacienda CDC, we began delving into to the process of adapting our FHR workshops to reflect the financial needs of Portland’s’ Latino population. As part of this project we connected with Violeta Rubiani, who dedicated much of her final Masters in Public Administration (MPA) work towards actualizing this project. Violeta did everything from researching Spanish financial literacy curriculum, facilitating focus groups, translating our curriculum, creating new activities and materials and teaching the first pilot rounds of Spanish FHR classes. Violeta has since received her MPA degree and currently works for the Non-Profit Association of Oregon. She will be teaching the Spanish FHR classes again at the end of October at the Lloyd Center for a final stint before she heads off to Paraguay to continue her great work in the development world. Innovative Changes is indebted to her hard work and tireless efforts to see this project through to fruition! Keep reading below to hear more about Violeta’s experience with this project, her advice for future curriculum adaptations and her future plans!

How did you become connected with Innovative Changes? What drew you to collaborating with us?

While doing my Master’s in Public Administration at PSU, I took a class with Dr. Suzanne Feeney called Women’s Development and Microfinance. Carmina was one of my classmates, and both of us went on to join the Summer Program in India. A few months later, when Carmina started working at IC$, she suggested (half jokingly) that I do my final project for the MPA with IC$, which resonated with me for two reasons: one, all through my studies I had focused my interests around credit building and credit models, consumer finances, and microlending and social enterprise – so IC$ was a perfect organizational fit for me; and two, that the skills I would develop and learn while working with IC$ could be applied anywhere in the world and across sectors – for-profit, nonprofit, social enterprise…

Well, that and Carmina insisted.

What were your initial steps in adapting our curriculum?

It’s difficult to say what came first because the process wasn’t linear by any means – everything was happening at the same time! Some of the first steps entailed talking with Talia and Carmina about the curriculum already in place and what they were looking for in the new curriculum. After going through the curriculum together and identifying some needed changes, the next step was translating it into Spanish, which then led to the changes for cultural relevance, etc. Early in the process, we conducted a couple of focus groups that also informed the content, and included partner organizations in the conversation to ensure we were really delivering a solid and complete “product.”

What challenges did you face?

One of the challenges was translating the curriculum in a way that made sense to participants but at the same time respected the correct grammar and usage rules. Having spent a lot of time in the U.S. a lot of us immigrants know financial terminology in English, but not necessarily in our own languages. For example, every time I said “Cooperativa de Crédito” to the group, they asked what that was. But they understood “Credit Union” perfectly. So the question in the back of my mind was always, “How do we convey the technical meaning of the term, in correct language but without confusing the audience?

What was it like teaching the classes that you had translated?

Teaching the classes after having translated the Facilitator’s Guide was illuminating! It gave me a much better sense of how the words and scenarios I had chosen did or did not work in the actual class. For example, the first class we taught went great, but in the second class, we realized the language we were using was way too formal and that it needed revisions in order to reach the intended audience. It wasn’t about “dumbing it down” but it was certainly about using every-day words, speaking in plain Spanish, and making the class fun, not stiff and boring.

Any surprises/funny anecdotes from when you taught the classes?

One of the biggest surprises for me came early on in the process, as we were conducting a couple of focus groups with the folks that would later participate in the class. I was really surprised by how engaged people were, not only about finances or the information that interested them, but also about their community, about the future of their children, and about the lessons (some good, some bad) they had learned. The sharing of experiences that took place was truly great, especially after having been warned that sometimes folks don’t open up about finances. This group had no qualms about telling their stories so that others could learn from their experiences. It was touching.

Do you feel like what you did is a process that we can use to adapt our curriculum to be more culturally relevant for other populations? What advice would you give to others embarking on this project?

I think this process can definitely be useful to others who may want to adapt a financial education curriculum to be culturally relevant to other populations. In fact, that was one of the main objectives of the project. Adapting the curriculum for the Latino community was just a beginning, but we hoped all along that other communities could use our findings to help them adapt their programs as well.

The one piece of advice I would give to anyone embarking on this project is, “Be flexible.” When you’re looking at your pretty plans and your schedule is all in place, it’s easy to forget that life will find a million ways of messing things up for you. Sometimes you’ll even realize that what you thought was a good approach isn’t that good after all… Of course it’s good to plan, but just keep an open mind. Some of the worst disasters you’ll encounter will turn out to be the greatest opportunities.

What type of work do you do with Nonprofit Association of Oregon?

I am the Consulting Team Program Coordinator – I support three consultants; manage their calendars, clients, and files; track projects; and help them prepare their training and consulting materials. I am also the billing coordinator (I do all the invoicing for NAO) and I answer the calls and e-mails that come into the Helpline, a free resource one can contact to ask general questions about nonprofit management and operations.

What lies ahead for you in your move to Paraguay?!

I’m moving back to Paraguay in hopes of finding a great professional opportunity in the development field, maybe something to do with microfinance, credit building, or microenterprise. A rural project would be phenomenal, but I’m open to working with women and girls in urban areas as well. I’ve been so lucky and so privileged that I think it’s time to go give some of it back, you know?