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Policy Portal

Issue #225
May 5, 2008

Last Chance to Sign Up! Johns Hopkins University Michigan Nonprofit Listening Post Project Seeks Participants

If your organization's primary activity focus is Children and Family Services, Elderly Housing and Services, Arts and Culture, Community Development, Health Care (excluding hospitals) or Education (excluding K-12 and higher ed schools), you are invited to become a part of the Johns Hopkins University Michigan Nonprofit Listening Post Project, a cutting-edge initiative designed to identify the major challenges facing nonprofit organizations in Michigan and the promising responses nonprofit executives are taking to cope with these challenges. The project is in partnership with the Michigan Nonprofit Association.

As outlined more fully on the Johns Hopkins University project website (www.jhu.edu/listeningpost), this project has been underway nationally for six years in cooperation with a number of leading nonprofit intermediary organizations and their member organizations.

We are now in the process of creating the Michigan Nonprofit Listening Post Project and are searching for Michigan "listening posts" to actively participate in the project. This is your last chance to sign up to participate. As a Listening Post Project participant, you will be asked to help us identify the key issues on which better information is needed; respond to about three web-based surveys, or "Soundings," per year intended to determine how your organization is being affected by these issues and how you are coping with them (the "Soundings" are web-based in an easy, online format and should last no longer than 20-30 minutes); and help us review and interpret the results. In return, you will have the first crack at the information we generate, be able to benchmark your organization against others in the same and related fields, and have the opportunity to participate - either in person or electronically - in the Roundtables we plan to organize to explore the coping strategies you and your colleagues are pursuing.

If your organization qualifies to participate in this project, we hope you will sign up to become a Listening Post agency and therefore contribute to this effort. Your participation will not only keep you informed of state-of-the-art developments in this field, but also inform funders, the press, policymakers, and the general public about what you are facing and how you are coping.

If you are interested in participating in the Michigan Listening Post Project, please download and complete this response form and return it to MNA by Friday, May 16, 2008.