Week 9: Brainstorming

These are notes from my first round of meetings with coworkers this week. My next step (which will be another blog post in a day or two) is to develop questions for my meetings with our Executive Director and Office Manager, based on these ideas and the questions from the grant.

Just as a reminder: I'm going to submit to New Belgium Brewing Company for BikeTexas Wellness Rides (and I'm looking for similar RFPs to complete my packet for class and also to submit to later on). Currently, we have 2-3 of these rides every year for TxDOT employees. We'd like to expand to 10 per year and invite more state agencies (Education, Comptroller, Legislative Staff, etc) to participate.

Wellness Rides

Benefits to participants:

• Fresh air
• Blood flowing
• Metabolism up
• We provide snack+water
• Learning how to ride in a group, in traffic
• Staff help by giving pointers throughout ride
• Learning how to shift gears, etc.
• They get an idea of what a bike-shop quality bike (vs. dept store bike) feels like

What we do:

• 3-6 mile rides, based in part on skill level of the group
• Teaching how to ride, how to ride in the group
• Provide promotional materials to the agency to promote the ride internally
• One-on-one time w/ BikeTexas staff for super-new people

Potential improvements:

• Energy drink/sports drink sponsor to provide more than just water
• [Note: I am skeptical about this-- I think that teaching people they can do short sessions of physical activity with just water, instead of Gatorade, Red Bull, etc, is actually a greater benefit.]
• Help them plan a route to work to try commuting once or twice a week
• Open lines of communication with BikeTexas for future questions/issues
• Pointers for commuting, choosing a bike, etc
• Develop brochure re: riding, nutrition
• Make it clear that inexperienced people are welcome
• Stickers, water bottle, travel mug—with a wellness ride logo
• Ride to lunch/breakfast
• Weekend rides

Similar reminder: I'm going to submit to Aetna and Blue Cross Blue Shield for BikeTexas KidsKup, but since those RFPs are currently closed and I can't access them, I'm writing the packet for class using the same format as the New Belgium Brewing grant, with the intent to adapt the data so gathered to the other RFPs as they open later in 2014. We have about 10 KidsKup rides in the spring and 3-4 in the fall-- this program is tied to the Texas Mountain Biking Racing Association series and they provide the venues, so our schedule varies with their schedule.

KidsKup 

(Everything here are things we'd like to add/change-- since I know this program better, I didn't have to ask as many questions as I did for the Wellness Rides and my notes reflect that.)

Rider packets thing to give away-- current ones have been the same for about 14 years:

• stickers
• safety books (will we still get those from TxDOT?)
• temporary tattoos
• different things so we can change it up
• coupon from a statewide business (HEB, Whataburger, Dairy Queen)
• Smaller kids seem to like bells; the fancy type would be great 
• Glow in the dark sticker
• KidsKup branded water bottles

Equipment:

• A twelve foot trailer (12x6x6 1/2) and/or small vehicle wrapped for KidsKup 
• Eight new tables, ice chest
• Online registration system - separate KidsKup Updates option for emails

More people to handle extra events while we are doing boothing events.

• Volunteers
• Staff

KidsKup-specific merchandise:

• Kids jersey
• t-shirts that they could wear to school
• Maybe a full kit for an end-of-year or season drawing among all participants
• Staff KidsKup t-shirts for us to wear during the event with the dates of the event printed on back

New medals or ribbons  

Some way to advertise at local schools before the event:

• Connect to SafeCyclist teachers?
• Provide materials, incl waiver/link
• Boys & Girls Clubs
• Parks & Rec dept

Some kind of a incentive for the kids to invite a new friend to come and ride. 

• How would we handle waivers?

Jersey (adult) giveaway as an incentive for parents to give us an email address 

• Register at each race they bring a kid to
• The more races they bring their kids to, the more chances at the giveaway

Other possible funding sources:

• Get sponsors for inner-city, low-income races in cities that don't have a TMBRA or similar race. 
• Also look for in-kind donations, esp. helmets
• Primal offered to make a KidsKup jersey-- can we see if it can be donated/discounted?
• What are we using that 15% from Primal for? Can it go to KidsKup?
• Increase our publicity for Dave Boyd Memorial Fund
• Look into funding from children's hospitals, Academy Sports, box stores, AMA (helmets)

Week 8: Meetings and Draft

I have meetings set up with many of my coworkers this week to talk about the two programs we're seeking funding for: KidsKup and Wellness Rides. When I mentioned it to different people in the office last week, they were all very excited to talk brainstorm and "dream big" about these projects. As a result of our meetings and looking over the grant application, I'll put together a list of questions for our ED and office manager for when we meet next week.

I'm also going to read over some of our previous grants in the next couple of days, just to get the feel for our tone and possibly come up with more questions for the ED.

In the meantime, I can write the "Description of the organization, including Mission and most recent accomplishments" section of the New Belgium grant pretty much on my own, so here's a draft of that.

***
BikeTexas is the statewide bicycle and pedestrian advocacy organization in Texas, based in Austin. Our mission is to advance bicycle and pedestrian access, safety, and education in Texas. We envision a future in which bicycling and walking are accepted as everyday, mainstream activities in Texas.

In its 22 years, BikeTexas has built relationships with other advocacy groups across Texas, with local leaders in major Texas cities, and with many of our state legislators and members of Congress. BikeTexas was instrumental in the Matthew Brown act becoming law in 2001, which launched a statewide Safe Routes to School (SRTS) program and was a model for the nationwide STRS, which Congress established in 2005. Through the SRTS education arm, BikeTexas has trained nearly 4000 Texas teachers and other youth workers to teach the SafeCyclist curriculum in their PE classes, community centers, Boys and Girls Clubs, and wherever children and bicycles gather. Since 1999, over two million Texas schoolchildren have learned bike and pedestrian safety from the SafeCyclist curriculum.

BikeTexas has lobbied for a statewide Safe Passing law for several legislative sessions, and while that law has yet to be enacted, fourteen Texas cities have instituted Safe Passing Ordinances using the language developed by BikeTexas. Four Texas cities have been recognized as Bike Friendly Communities by the League of American Bicycles, and in 2012, the League honored BikeTexas as the Advocacy Organization of the Year. Also in 2012, the NAACP recognized BikeTexas for its work to increase diversity in bicycling.
***

Gantt Charts

This exercise was unexpectedly helpful in doing some brainstorming. I'm probably missing some crucial steps still, but having it written down will also help with telling my boss, "I need to work on X for the grant this week."

Gantt chart for New Belgium: Wellness Rides program 

Gantt chart for Blue Cross Blue Shield: KidsKup program

My first steps for both of these next week will be meetings with my coworkers and our ED, plus writing the "mission and accomplishments" section of the grant, which I can easily do without much, if any, assistance from others.

Week 6: First Paragraph

Aetna's strong commitment to children's health in Texas, especially in underserved neighborhoods, is well demonstrated through programs such as 5-4-3-2-1-Go! Your commitment to physical activity as a key component of lifelong health is setting Texas children on a strong path early in life. BikeTexas shares this commitment; we've trained 4000 Texas teachers who have reached over two million children statewide with bicycle safety education. Part of BikeTexas' education component is a non-competitive bike race series for children up to age 12, which is free of charge to participants. BikeTexas would like to expand the series to include more races in Dallas, Austin, San Antonio, and Houston, and to increase our outreach to children in low-income and minority communities to engage more families and show underserved children in major Texas cities the joy of bike riding to start them on a lifelong habit of physical activity.

Week 5: Next steps

Did some brainstorming with my boss just now-- he's so thrilled that I'm taking this class. Really, he's thrilled with every class that I take. He loves my education complementing my job (and so do I!).

Anyway, here's where I am:

The two grants I'm planning to write for this class are 1) Aetna and 2) New Belgium Brewing.

My next steps are:

1. Research.

It's time to get very specific with what our answers are for some questions these grants seem to have in common: Description of program, strategy, our experience, expected results & how they're measured, etc. Some of these I can find on our website, and for others I need to schedule meetings with coworkers to get the info I need.

2. Compare grants.

I need to get deeper into the applications instead of the quick overview that I've given them so far to find out where I can duplicate text between them and where each one needs its own data.

3. Budget.

I'm a bit nervous about this part of the writing process, so I want to get on it as soon as possible (plus, some of my coworkers are hard to nail down, so I need to set meetings now for the next few weeks).

4. Spreadsheet.

I've started the spreadsheet that we've talked about in class, but it's not very full yet. One of my high-priority items needs to be getting that together. My boss wants me to look into grants (or at least be aware of them) from REI and Blue Cross in addition to the ones I'm working on for class, so I want to be sure to get those down. The Blue Cross grant will probably ask for similar things as the Aetna grant.

I'm sure I'm forgetting something really major, but these are the things at the front of my mind right now.