LIVING ADVANTAGE INC

Our main goal is to be THE Foster Youth Provider of the nation. We link foster youth to resources and services that help them stay in school, graduate, obtain meaningful careers & find positive mentors in order to have a better quality of life.

Over the past 24 years, Living Advantage has decreased the “disconnect of services” to our youth and have accomplished being “the link” that provides a more efficient and effective conduit for foster youth through social media outreach, education to the community & by utilizing innovative technology. We identify foster youth, assess their needs and match them with resources, services and community activities they want ensuring continuous follow-up as they transition into adults and have a higher rate of success in becoming contributing citizens in the community.

Our strategy is having well established partnerships that allows us to reach youth that often fall through the cracks. For example, our strong partnership with USC permits us to leverage countless resources, services and support that brings a tremendous amount of opportunities to our youth. Another one of our partnerships is with Los Angeles Unified School District, (LAUSD). https://www.livingadvantageinc.org/programs We have a contract to provide year-round drop-out prevention services to over 700,000 students.

Another strategy is our request for matching funds to hire the personnel to carry this out:

• (2) Full-Time Fund Developer will allow us to pursue funding opportunities that have been presented to our organization. We currently
have over $20,000,000 million in potential funding at our disposal.
• (20) Full Time Sr. Case Managers, which will increase our reach to almost 3,000 additional youth a year.
• (20) Full Time Tutors, which will increase our reach to almost 3,000 additional youth a year.
• (6) Full Tine IT Techs, Handle the patent pending technology and network our computer systems nationwide
• (5 Outreach Coordinators, social media marketing to use technologies to recruit participants to studies
• (5) PR/Marketing Coordinator, managing reputation, to influence opinion and behavior of the community, funders, & clients
• (2) Administrative Assistants, Assist with general office duties and projects
• (1) Office Manager, Assist with daily operations. Plan schedules. Assist with special projects or events as assigned.
• (1) Advisor from the Casey Foundation, a well-known foundation dedicated to identifying best practices for foster children success.

Living Advantage has a niche for being the foster youth agency that applies never before used technology and is known for building alliances among our service providers to bring better quality service to our foster youth. Our current partnerships include USC, various departments, Los Angeles Unified School District, Department Children and Family Services, Los Angeles County of Probation, Employment Worksource center, Wells Fargo, and Verizon, just to name a few... https://www.livingadvantageinc.org/partners The Award winning US Government Technology Distributor that we choice to design our intellectual property, Visual Concept has many accolades but the most intriguing is that the US Navy Awarded them $29,000,000.00 for a contract for very similar services as VALE. These partnerships have giving Living Advantage surmountable leverage of resources that has branded our company to be seen and heard by thousands. We want to emerge our story to be seen and heard by millions.

There are no other organizations actually gathering and maintaining documents for foster youth to be able to access their own documents. A feasibility report was conducted by USC for VALE that indicated there are limited resources that deal with vital life documents. Primarily, a demand and market for obtaining and securing this information does exist. However, over the years various for-profit companies have charged individuals to obtain vital life documents however, they do not maintain vital life documents for people.

We are proud to say over the last 6 years of introducing technologies to the HUGE bureaucracy of agencies, we have numerous awards, letters of support & Certificates of Recognitions. Even our national advocate for foster youth, Congresswoman Bass has endorsed the need for our program...https://www.livingadvantageinc.org/history-more

We have an extremely innovative process to deliver services to a disadvantage population through technology and are expected to advance as THE non-profit organization that benefits foster youth nationally, just as Red Cross is known to be a benefit for people involved in disasters internationally... https://www.livingadvantageinc.org/elockbox

Currently as we measure by Pre And Post Assessments, this is what we have accomplished...
1.) 75% of foster youth serviced has remained in high school as compared to the current drop out rate of 56%.
2.) 10% of 12th grade foster youth served has enrolled in college as compared to the current rate of 3%
3.) 5% of foster youth that enrolled in secondary education we anticipate graduating as compared to 1%.
3.) 80% of foster youth served will have access to their vital life documents, such as birth certificates, social security cards and photo identification in order to receive services and benefits to a successful transition from foster care system
4.) 50% of foster youth served will demonstrate increase knowledge and utilization of community-based services and resources such as college, financial literacy, career, health and a sense of connectedness from at least one adult.

We put together a management Team that once we get funding they will work with us on the scaling plan. It consists of two USC social work professors, 1 USC Executive Director, one technology education professor and four USC students. Just to give you an example, Professor Stephanie Carter-USC Department Social Work, is also a coordinator for the USC Community, Organization, Planning, and Administration (COPA) concentration. She is providing consultation for several city and county departments pertinent to community development and youth services and for Children, Youth, & Family Collaborative, a nation-wide foster youth organization. Professor Cheryl Macon-Oliver, the owner of Epiphany Consulting Group. Her expertise is program management, budgeting, organizational, community development, and nonprofit management and has more than 35 years of management and consultation experience. Dr. Kathryn Edwards has expertise in curriculum, instruction, technology, assessment and grant proposal development and management. She has authored several grant proposals funded from federal, state and private sources and received the prestigious Golden Bell Award for being funded for innovative grant proposals.

Living Advantage has experience in receiving and managing state and county contracts and private foundation grants. We have managed $1-2 million annual budgets in the first 12 years of operations. When budget cuts came in 2008, operating budget declined. Over the last 4 years budget has been increasing. Living Advantage maintains all accounting, contract management, purchasing and recordkeeping functions in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles and with all relevant local, state, and federal regulations and guidelines. We work diligently with our Board of Directors and together we bring business, community, non-profit, education, evaluation, and children services expertise to the organization and promotes volunteerism among USC students, foster youth, young adults, and community members.