Abundant Assets Alliance

The History of the Abundant Assets Alliance
Though the framework of developmental assets was not introduced until 1990, YMCAs have been building assets since the movement began in North America in 1851. Our History, Our Future gives hundreds of examples of how YMCAs have built assets through the decades.

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What Is the Abundant Assets Alliance?
The Abundant Assets Alliance combines the resources of YMCA of the USA, YMCA Canada, and Search Institute—three distinguished organizations with proven success in building strong kids, families, and communities. The alliance seeks to strengthen the capacity of YMCAs and the communities they serve to provide young people with the support and experiences they need to become healthy, caring, and competent adults. Harnessing the power of extensive research on developmental assets—the essential building blocks of human development—the alliance partners have developed a holistic, systematic approach to improving young people’s lives and involves the whole community.

The Alliance’s Long-Term Goals
The ultimate purpose of the alliance is to tap the strengths of these three organizations and their members to ensure that young people across North America have access to the developmental assets they need to grow up healthy, caring, and responsible. To work toward this vision, the alliance has three broad, long-term goals:

To support the transformation of local YMCAs to be asset-rich resources;
To equip local YMCAs to be catalysts and partners for community transformation; and
To join with other organizations across North America to influence social norms and policies.

The alliance’s primary approach is to build on and undergird the efforts of “asset-building champions” in local YMCAs as they develop strategies to advance asset building in their own YMCAs, in their communities, and across the YMCA movement. The alliance will celebrate and seek to enhance the efforts that are already underway in YMCAs across North America. It seeks to complement and strengthen, not replace, other asset-building initiatives across North America, including Search Institute’s Healthy Communities • Healthy Youth initiative.

History of the Alliance
The Abundant Assets Alliance grows out of years of informal relationships and individual projects among YMCA of the USA, YMCA Canada, Search Institute, and hundreds of local YMCAs that have embraced asset building as a framework for building strong kids, families, and communities. Here are major milestones:

1989		Search Institute begins measuring developmental assets in young people using the survey Search Institute Profiles of Student Life: Attitudes and Behaviors.
1990		Search Institute releases The Troubled Journey: A Portrait of American Youth, which begins to inspire YMCAs across North America to focus on building assets.
1995		Search Institute becomes the evaluator for the YMCA Earth Service Corps, focusing on how these service-learning programs built developmental assets.
1996		YMCA of the USA and Search Institute collaborate to produce Making the Case: Measuring the Impact of Youth Development Programs. This resource introduced the developmental assets framework to hundreds of YMCAs across North America.
1997		YMCA of the USA releases YMCA Youth Programs: A Leadership, Advocacy, and Evaluation Kit. The kit provides innovative tools to demonstrate to funders how YMCA programs build developmental assets. (The kit was revised in 2002 and is now called, simply, The YMCA Purple Kit.)
2000		The YMCA Urban Group, which consists of the Ys in the largest cities in the United States and Canada, passed a resolution urging Y-USA and Y-Canada to form an alliance with Search Institute. A series of follow-up dialogues were held throughout the year.
2001		YMCA presented a proposal, which Search Institute accepted, titled “Abundant Assets,” which outlined a vision of YMCAs across North America integrating asset building into their programs and practices, being catalysts resources for their community-wide asset building, and advocating asset-building approaches on a national levels. The boards of YMCA of the USA, YMCA Canada, and Search Institute formally endorsed the Abundant Assets Alliance, which was publicly announced. Building developmental assets is endorsed as a formal priority in YMCA Canada’s strategic plan. Our History, Our Future: A Celebration of Asset Building in the YMCA Movement is published, featuring examples from throughout YMCA history of how YMCAs have built each of the 40 developmental assets. The alliance and asset building are featured at the national conferences of YMCA of the USA, YMCA Canada, and Search Institute.
2002		January: With major leadership from the YMCA Urban Group, a major training and resource development project is launched that results in Asset Building the YMCA Way training and manual. September: The YMCA Strong Communities Agenda Conference in Minneapolis features asset building and the Abundant Assets Alliance. November: www.abundantassets.org is launched. November: YMCA of the USA and Search Institute release Building Strong Families: A Preliminary Study on What Parents Need to Succeed.

Planning for the Future

YMCA of the USA, YMCA Canada, and Search Institute have announced and begun working on an alliance in recognition of what is already happening across North America at the grassroots level. The organizations are already actively engaged together. The startup activities have been the concrete focus for alliance work in 2002. In addition, the following activities are underway:

Development of comprehensive proposals for a major philanthropic support to provide the resources needed to launch new, high-impact initiatives that will deepen knowledge and strengthen asset-building efforts within the YMCA across North America.

Ongoing refinement of strategies and approaches, including refinement of language, strategies, and approaches that are particular to YMCA Canada.

Ongoing infusion of asset-building approaches into existing YMCA materials and training.

Development of a governance model and staffing infrastructure to guide and coordinate the alliance.

Ongoing discovery of what local YMCAs are doing to build assets, what kinds of supports they value, and emerging areas of readiness within the YMCA movement.