Philanthropy Awards Honors Booz Allen for its Great Impact on Local Nonprofits

The firm is recognized for its longstanding support of Neediest Kids and the Virginia Hospital Center’s Medical Brigade.

The 2008 Philanthropy Awards honored Booz Allen Hamilton’s commitment to making “The Greatest Impact on a Local Nonprofit” through its support of the Neediest Kids and the Virginia Hospital Center’s (VHC) Medical Brigade.

Vice president Natalie Givans accepted the award on behalf of the firm at the June event, attended by more than 450 representatives from the region’s business and nonprofit communities.

Sponsored by the Washington Business Journal and Greater DC Cares, the awards highlight outstanding community support by local companies, including their volunteerism, pro bono efforts, board membership, in-kind resources, and financial contributions.

Booz Allen Chairman and CEO Dr. Ralph Shrader chairs the board of the Neediest Kids, which serves disadvantaged children in Washington, D.C.-area school systems by providing an emergency fund the systems can use to purchase items students need to stay and thrive in school, including clothing, medical and dental care, transportation, eyeglasses, and school supplies. Executive advisor Lynne Filderman is “on loan” to Neediest Kids as its first executive director to help it implement a strategic plan and provide additional services to support its mission.

The VHC Medical Brigade has brought quality healthcare services to the poorest residents of Honduras during annual weeklong missions since 1998. In 2007, the Brigade provided almost 7,300 patients with health-related services and over 350 with physical therapy, and prescribed and dispensed 2,278 pairs of refurbished eyeglasses. Booz Allen has provided technical, strategic marketing, operational, communications, and fundraising expertise to the Medical Brigade project for over two years.

“All People Deserve Access to Quality Healthcare”

In addition to developing strategic business and grants management plans for the VHC Medical Brigade, the Booz Allen team helps support the Brigade's vision to be a model for sustainable health development in Honduras. 

The Brigade is comprised of 80 surgeons, doctors, nurses, ophthalmologists, optometrists, and support personnel. The team delivers surgery, medical, and other services—many of them life-changing—to residents of rural communities of Honduras, one of Central America’s most impoverished countries.

To support these efforts, the Booz Allen team created a state-of-the-art website and established a long-range fundraising strategy and grants application package that provides a new avenue of funding for the Brigade, which had formerly relied on individual donations. In addition, Booz Allen made a significant monetary donation to the Brigade.

Booz Allen contributed its knowledge of the Honduran water sector to help the Brigade support its Remote Village Project, a reproducible model of primary and preventive healthcare interventions staffed by volunteers and implemented in two villages. The firm also helped establish and participates in the megacommunity that supports the Project.

The firm is now providing project management for Phase 2 of the Medical Brigade project, which focuses on financial management, organizational and governance structure development, establishing metrics to measure progress towards goals, and continued support to grants and strategic communications.

The Booz Allen team visited Honduras for the second time in November 2008 to observe and apply what they’ve learned in support of the Brigade.
 
“Good for Business, the Community—and the Kids”

A corporate sponsor and partner of Neediest Kids, Booz Allen provides the organization with infrastructure support, including an office and computers at the firm’s McLean campus. But the firm has also helped the organization achieve numerous goals as well, including expanding its brand awareness, building strategic partnerships, initiating a mobile fundraising campaign, and targeting resource development.

“Booz Allen is committed to supporting the mission of Neediest Kids,” says principal Joe Suarez. “Over the years, hundreds of our staff members have generously volunteered and continue to volunteer for this organization.”

Teachers, social workers, counselors, and principals are often in the best position to know what their students need. So when a school administrator or professional at one of eight D.C.-area school systems identifies a student need, such as a child who does not have a winter coat, they make a request to their dedicated Neediest Kids coordinator to authorize the necessary purchase or service, which will be reimbursed from the Neediest Kids fund.

Filderman is working with the organization to stretch donor dollars by creating a pre-identified set of vendors from which schools can buy services or products at significantly reduced rates for students in need. To date, she has formalized several such partnerships with suppliers of services such as dental care, discounted prescriptions, eyeglasses, eye exams, and school uniforms. 

“Neediest Kids has a good business proposition: It’s good for business, good for the community, and good for the kids,” Filderman says.

She also helped Neediest Kids launch its Bridge to Success initiative, which retains the organization’s core goals while focusing on the students’ potential to succeed. In addition, she rebranded the annual “Race for the Kids” fundraising event to “Run with Alan Webb.” Webb is an Olympian who holds the American record for running the fastest mile in 3.46 minutes. By partnering with Webb, the race is getting more visibility and attracting a larger support base.

story posted November 10, 2008