Letter from the Executive Team As we turn the page on another year of serving Northeast Denver, we continue to be awed by the friends and partners who make this work possible. To our board and staff, thank you for sacrificially investing your lives and your love into this community. To our donors, thank you for your commitment to “give different” and generously support our vision. To our volunteers, thank you for acknowledging your own poverty and giving of your time and talents to build community together. To our community partners, thank you for collaborating with us to provide the best possible supports for the individuals and families we serve. And to the neighbors with whom we have the privilege of walking each day, thank you for courageously pursuing your dreams, and for trusting us along the way. We are proud to journey with you all. Sincerely,
Juan Peña, Chief Programs Officer
Jason Janz, Chief Executive Officer
Helen Kaminski, Chief Operations Officer
Board Leadership
Dee Daniels-Scriven,
Lauren Steidl,
Jason Janz,
Board Chair
Board Treasurer
Board President
Terry Bratton
Douglas Ideker
Helen Kaminski
Louise Lee
Juan Peña
Gail Salazar
WHO WE ARE To be at cross purposes is to have a different way of seeing things. Our work began with a question at cross purposes with the traditional approach to poverty in America - instead of asking how to help someone in poverty, we started asking “How do we help someone get out of poverty?” Our holistic career and community development programs are at cross purposes with the idea that poverty is financial only, that relief work alone can solve it, and that mere pennies a day is all it costs to change. As we live different together, we seek to change the very definition of poverty, confront its root causes, and give radically of ourselves to see its end.
WHAT WE DO Through our core development programs, Uprise & Upstream, we seek to prepare and equip our unemployed and underemployed neighbors for meaningful careers with a sustainable living wages. Through a comprehensive 6-month program, we impart essential soft skills, collaborate with online education partners to build marketable skills, and assist in job search and placement. Alongside critical professional development, we engage those we serve in transformative personal development, addressing and overcoming barriers to self-sufficiency through compassionate case management. Finally, through a unique relational component, CrossPurpose brings neighbors together across lines of race and class in mutual mentorship. Program participants are placed in small groups of peers, as well as volunteer ‘Allies’ for mutual support and growth, building community and reweaving the fabric of a frayed society.
MISSIONAL GOALS
Walk with 1,000 men, women, and children out of poverty by 2020
Scale to four CrossPurpose sites
Produce a proven, replicable, and cost-effective model for use in communities across the country
Sheila came to CrossPurpose in the spring of 2017, hungry for change in her professional, personal and spiritual life. Despite earning both a Bachelor’s and Master’s degree, health issues had made stability at work difficult for Sheila to maintain, and at the time of her application to CrossPurpose, she was unemployed. After self-medicating with drugs and binge drinking for most of her adulthood, Sheila met an obstacle during her CrossPurpose interview that continuation in the program required her to be drug-free. She recalls feeling nervous and anxious, knowing that commitment to the program meant giving up things on which she had relied for so long. But Sheila’s commitment to transformation won out and she made the decision to give up drinking and drugs completely in order to fully invest in the program. On her second day of the personal development phase of the program, Sheila faced the trauma from her history of childhood sexual abuse and shared her story with the class, an act of brave vulnerability that catalyzed a journey of healing in her life. She began to realize the ways in which her trauma and addictions were related and found belonging and a new sense of worthiness within the CrossPurpose community. “For the first time in my life, I was noticed and appreciated.” The confidence inspired by this new sense of belonging and worthiness motivated Sheila even more to overcome the barriers she faced, and fully engage in the program and all it had to offer. From CrossPurpose, she learned how to articulate her strengths and experience in a cohesive way, building her confidence and self-reliance. “The consistent mentoring and support allowed me to believe in myself and added momentum to my own motivation to succeed,” she says. Free from the guilt and shame of her past, Sheila was also able to form authentic relationships for the first time, and found love and support through her CrossPurpose small group. Looking back, she laughs, “I think I have a bit of an addictive personality, but now my addiction is to community.” With the support of this community and her newfound confidence, Sheila began applying for jobs and ended up in the second round of interviews for an HR Assistant position, despite her concerns about the level of pay. However, she was so impressive to the hiring manager, that she was offered a higher paying role as the Operations Specialist at Clayton Early Learning. Today, Sheila is earning more than $18/hour in a job that she loves and will celebrate both a year of sobriety and her graduation from CrossPurpose this summer. But she’s not slowing down yet - she hopes to one day write a book and develop seminars to help other survivors of childhood sexual abuse, while giving back to the communities that supported her along the way.
2017 by the Numbers 53
Leaders who entered the program in 2016 successfully graduated in 2017
$1.4
Million ($1,487,150 total) of created wealth in first year of employment
162
new Leaders began the program in 2017, the most in program history
912
hours of one-on-one coaching, personal development, financial health, digital literacy and professional development classes
50
middle skills scholarships provided in 2017, increasing wage-earning capacity
6K+
6,321 hours spent building meaningful, cross-cultural relationships
For more info, visit www.crosspurpose.org/impact
The Patterson’s Story
In March of 2017, Jade and his wife, Beth, attended a ‘Love Thy Neighbor’ forum, hosted by their church. There, they heard D.A. Horton, a nationally recognized pastor and church planter, speak on Racial Reconciliation in the Age of Division. Moved by what they learned about their role in reconciliation, they were compelled to seek continued opportunities to grow. They met Bekah, CrossPurpose’s Volunteer Coordinator, that same night, and according to Jade, “It didn’t take much convincing for us to apply to become Allies - we were already sold!”
“
After undergoing Ally training, the Pattersons were chosen by Rudy, a current Leader in the CrossPurpose program, who became both a friend and It’s not until you get to teacher. Because CrossPurpose’s mission to abolish hear somebody’s story that relational, economic, and spiritual poverty extends beyond Leaders to Allies as well, volunteers are you can really begin to think asked to identify areas of scarcity in their own lives differently. to address over the course of their time with CrossPurpose. For the Pattersons, it was a scarcity of knowledge. Reflecting on their experience, Jade acknowledges “One of the biggest ways we’ve grown is in our understanding of poverty and how it comes to be. It’s easy to have preconceived notions about why poverty happens people are lazy, don’t want to work, etc. - even if it’s subconscious and we don’t claim to believe that, there is often a small part of us that sees a person of another socioeconomic status and thinks “that was their own doing.”
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He pointed to the power of proximity in overcoming these sort of biases and prejudices. In addition to weekly “Family Gatherings”, programmed by CrossPurpose, the Pattersons hosted monthly dinners with Rudy and his wife, and gained a great deal of insight from stories of the couple’s background and experience. “It’s not until you get to hear somebody’s story that you can really begin to think differently. Little setbacks and injustices build up over time, and most people can’t see that.” Knowledge wasn’t all the Patterson’s gained through their experience as Allies. Though they came into the program expecting to provide support for a neighbor achieving financial freedom, they were surprised by the mutuality of the experience. “I wasn’t expecting the deep community I found,” Jade said, “I assumed that I have pretty good community through my church, so I didn’t really think I needed community going in, but was surprised to walk away with strong, new friendships.” This newfound community and cross-cultural understanding remain the biggest takeaways for Jade and Beth, who recently completed their Ally experience and say it shaped how they view people in general, and especially those on the margins, “I think I’ll definitely approach their stories with more understanding and less judgment.”
if you’ve ever...
wanted to engage in the problems you see on the news or in your neighborhood, but didn’t know where to begin, wanted to “reach across the aisle” and build relationships with someone not like you, been dissatisfied with a volunteer experience and wanted something more, experienced scarcity of community and wanted to be part of something bigger than yourself,
join us
or wanted to put feet to your faith and be a part of enacting God’s justice in the world
Become an Ally and join the movement of more than 200 neighbors since 2012 who have given of their lives to abolish relational, economic, and spiritual poverty in Northeast Denver. Learn more at www.crosspurpose.org/volunteer.
FINANCIAL REPORT SUPPORT & REVENUE Contributions Government Grants Program Income Other income
$2,516,365 $39,640 $30,576 ($4,708)
Total $2,581,873
Foundations, Businesses & Churches Individuals Goverment Grants Program Fees & Consulting In-Kind
72% 23% 2% 1% 2%
EXPENSES Program Services General & Administration Fundraising
$2,140,595 $260,473 $295,255
Total $2,696,323 Program Services General & Administration Fundraising
79% 10% 11%
Change in Net Assets ($114,450)
Together we can abolish poverty and
reweave the fabric of a frayed society. Here are some additional ways to partner with us:
GIVE As a CrossPurpose Giving Partner, you can come alongside the ambitious men and women in our program endeavoring to build bright futures out of poverty and support their continued success. Donations may be mailed to CrossPurpose, P.O. Box 2483, Denver, CO 80201 or donate securely online at crosspurpose.org/give.
SIGN UP Join our mailing list to receive quarterly updates on our career and community development form available at crosspurpose.org
GET SOCIAL Help us to educate and empower by interacting with us on social media. Find us on:
facebook.com/crosspurposeX twitter.com/crosspurposeX @crosspurpose linkedin.com/company/crosspurpose vimeo.com/crosspurpose
Together.