Located in all 159 counties, Georgia Family Connection is the largest statewide network of its kind in the nation. Collaborative organizations are committed to our mission of improving conditions for at-risk children, families, and communities. They work closely with communities to:
•foster relationships with local partners,
•increase policymakers’ awareness of local issues,
•implement proven programs and practices, and
•leverage additional funding to support community plans. Each collaborative organization brings together—at the same table—the social worker, the nurse, the sheriff, the teacher, the minister, the business person, the public servant, and parents, then let them figure out the best way to help their kids thrive. We discuss our visions for our communities, assess the needs in our counties, then decide how our organizations can best work together to meet those needs. Together we set an agenda that establishes our priorities and allocates resources to achieve results for families and children. We measure results for our work by tracking locally selected indicators of child well-being using Georgia KIDS COUNT data. KIDS COUNT is a state and national effort funded by the Annie E. Casey Foundation to track the status of children. We believe that local decision-making—grounded in reliable data and best practices—will drive the change we want to see in our communities. Georgia Family Connection, created by the state and private funders in response to Georgia ranking 50th in the nation in child well-being in the 1991 KIDS COUNT report, develops initiatives to combat child abuse and neglect, teen pregnancy, multiple teen births, and truancy. We also work to keep children and youth in school, and support them in graduating on time. We believe that empowering ourselves with data, sharing information, and combining our efforts with other counties will strengthen the state as a whole over time. While Family Connection is dedicated to working at the local level to build stronger communities, Georgia Family Connection Partnership (GaFCP) is committed to working at the state level to provide support, data, and best practices to the county collaborative organizations and state partners to improve outcomes for children and families. GaFCP, a public-private nonprofit created and funded by the State of Georgia and private foundations, also manages Georgia KIDS COUNT. We want our kids to be healthy, ready to start school and do well when they get there, we want our families to be stable and self-sufficient, and we want them to live in strong communities. We’ve been making that happen for more than 20 years.
