About Raising Readers Nashville
Raising Readers Nashville is a collaborative community group of over 65 organizations who collaborate to improve the systems and structures supporting Nashville’s families and young children.
The partners involved with Raising Readers Nashville have deep understanding of the complexities of this work and are committed to the communication and collaboration needed to realize long-term change. Raising Readers Nashville works to maintain a highly diverse group of involved partners to more deeply understand varying perspectives, in order to develop more informed solutions and positive outcomes.
Support Team
-
Megan Godbey
Director
-
Julie Gwinn
Associate Director, Early Literacy and Partnerships
-
Nat Flammia
Associate Director, Strategy and Capacity Development
About Collective Impact
Raising Readers Nashville uses a collective impact framework, which is composed of 5 key elements with a priority on actions that center equity. Collective impact is a powerful approach to cross-sector collaboration that is achieving measurable effects on major social issues.
Collective impact groups are supported by a backbone organization, which is an individual organization that provides staff, resources, and skills needed to convene and coordinate participating organizations. United Way of Greater Nashville is proud to serve as the backbone organization for Raising Readers Nashville.
The qualities of a healthy collective impact model include
Strong backbone: an organization dedicated to aligning and coordinating the work of the group
Common agenda: a shared definition of the problem and shared vision for how to address it
Shared measurement: systems that track progress and outcomes in the same way to foster continuous learning and accountability
Mutually reinforcing activities: the integration of partners’ different streams of work to maximize resources and efforts
Continuous communication: consistent communication focused on building transparency, trust, and strong relationships
Backbone organization
Connect with us.
For more information about Raising Readers Nashville, please contact us. We look forward to hearing from you.
Raising Readers Nashville
c/o United Way of Greater Nashville
250 Venture Circle
Nashville, TN 37228