Travelers Foundation: Opening Doors of Opportunity

Source: Giving Forum Winter 2012 01/27/2012

Minnesota has a persistent and large achievement gap, by race and socioeconomic level. Low-income students are more than two grade levels behind wealthier peers; black students remain more than three grade levels behind white students in math and more than two grade levels behind in reading.

Travelers Foundation has always supported education. In the past few years, however, closing the educational achievement gap has become the primary purpose of the organization’s giving in St. Paul and Hartford, Connecticut, the company’s headquarter cities.

Creating a Talent Pipeline of Underrepresented Students

“We support education in order to create opportunities for students who wouldn’t have them otherwise,” explains Marlene Ibsen, president and CEO of the Travelers Foundation and vice president of community relations at Travelers. “We’re really building a ‘talent pipeline’ of traditionally underrepresented students who will graduate from college ready to work in the insurance and financial services industry.”

Confronting Systemic Issues

Travelers has worked in the St. Paul public schools for some time, but 2009 was the year the company stepped up its funding of the AVID, Advancement Via Individual Determination, program. AVID starts in fourth grade and intensifies as students move toward high school graduation. It is a national organization that prepares students who are in the ‘academic middle’ for admission to four-year colleges and universities. The 25-year-old program was new to Minnesota when the St. Paul Public Schools started using it six years ago. It is now also employed in the Minneapolis Public Schools and elsewhere in the state.

According to the St. Paul Public Schools web site, AVID confronts the systemic issues that keep students from families living on low incomes and students of color out of college preparatory programs. It accelerates students into more rigorous courses, instead of consigning them to remedial programs. It then incorporates intensive support they need to succeed.

“We’ve been deeply involved with AVID for three years,” says Mike Newman, vice president of the Travelers Foundation and director of community relations at Travelers. “We provide funding for the district to buy the AVID curriculum and support the training of teachers, principals and others that is required to make the program work.”

College Access Isn’t Enough

AVID is a great companion to the unique Travelers EDGE initiative. Travelers EDGE works intensively with about 90 post-secondary EDGE scholars annually, but it starts in middle school. Each year around 5,000 youth increase their general awareness of why academics and college are important and what the insurance and financial industries are all about.

It is a comprehensive effort to educate individuals who will graduate from college ready to work in the growing financial services industry. According to Ibsen, many in the education community have come to realize that college access isn’t enough. “In order to achieve retention and completion, you have to put mechanisms in place to ensure they happen.”

Travelers works locally with five colleges and universities, Admission Possible and Page Education Foundation to recruit students to Travelers EDGE and ensure they receive support as they continue their education. For these students, the program provides scholarships, tutoring, mentoring, academic advisors, opportunities for internships, and support via key on-campus representatives and Travelers employees.

There is also practical help. “We’ve sponsored drives to collect business clothes from our employees,” says Newman. “It’s great to give kids the experience of confidence that can flow from simply putting on a suit.”

Getting Underrepresented Students to College

With the Carlson School of Management at the University of Minnesota, Travelers has also created a companion program called Consulting EDGE Venture, which recruits students to work in groups on real business or nonprofit problems with guidance from university instructors and Travelers staff.

“The program gives students a paid opportunity to work together on very real business problems and then report on their solutions to company executives,” says Mindy Deardurff, director of recruitment and marketing for the Carlson School of Management undergraduate program.

Travelers also sponsors Gopher Business, a week-long summer-access program that brings high school students from across the state to the urban campus to experience first-hand what the school offers and to meet like-minded students.

All programs focus on populations that are traditionally underrepresented in the college community – students from low-income families or communities of color and students who will be the first in their families to complete a college education.

The idea of education as opportunity makes perfect sense to the many Travelers managers who share the experience of being first-generation college students. “We hear again and again that they wouldn’t be where they were if not for organizations and individuals who helped them along the way,” says Ibsen. “It’s a natural fit with our deeply held belief that education provides a foundation that can help break cycles of poverty and open doors of opportunity.”

Sharing Its Model

A collaborative model has been used since Travelers EDGE’s beginning, when the company went to the community and said, “We have a rough idea of what we want to do. Would you be willing to partner with us to figure this out?”

Now all education and nonprofit allies from the three Travelers EDGE cities (St. Paul, Hartford and Baltimore) convene annually to share ideas, learn about issues collectively and understand what they mean for Travelers EDGE going forward.

“Travelers has been a fantastic partner for five years,” says Deardurff. “They support us completely and give us a great deal of latitude in determining what’s best for the students.”

Now that Travelers has a few years of experience under its belt, the company is considering sharing its model and learnings with others. “We welcome other companies to adopt this or a similar model,” says Newman. “Especially if it means more life-changing opportunities for students in our community.”

Travelers is particularly engaged in public school reform and assisting student achievement. www.travelers.com/about-us/community

Educating Citizens

Other ways MCF members help:

In 2002, The McKnight Foundation collaborated with the six Greater Minnesota Initiative Foundations to prepare children emotionally, socially and academically to succeed in kindergarten. Today more than 100 communities are helping ensure their youngest members are ready to learn when they enter school.

The Minneapolis Foundation’s donor-advised funds contributed more than $3.4 million to organizations working with children and youth in 2010.

Target Foundation and Corporation was the state’s number one funder of education in 2010, giving $49,686,905, plus other non-cash support.