Covenant House

Who are the people you serve with your mission?

Covenant House serves young people facing homelessness and survivors of trafficking in over 30 cities in the U.S., Latin America, and Canada. Our youth are 16 to 22 years old in the U.S. and Canada, and 12 to 18 in Latin America. Their lived experiences include foster care, criminal justice history, mental health challenges, pregnancy, sexual abuse, and community violence. Nearly one in four identify as LGBTQ+, more than half are Black or African American, and 18% are Latino/a in the U.S. and Canada. In Latin America, 28% are from ethnic minorities. Half our youth identify as male, 47% as female, and 2% as transgender. All our young people have talent, courage, and dreams, and the least interesting thing about them is homelessness.

How is your organization collecting feedback from the people you serve?

Electronic surveys (by email, tablet, etc.), Paper surveys, Case management notes, Community meetings/Town halls, Constituent (client or resident, etc.) advisory committees,

How is your organization using feedback from the people you serve?

To identify and remedy poor client service experiences, To identify bright spots and enhance positive service experiences, To make fundamental changes to our programs and/or operations, To inform the development of new programs/projects, To identify where we are less inclusive or equitable across demographic groups, To strengthen relationships with the people we serve, To understand people's needs and how we can help them achieve their goals,

What significant change resulted from feedback?

While the COVID-19 pandemic wreaked havoc across the countries where Covenant House serves, the racial reckoning in the U.S. also had deep implications for our work. Nearly 90% of our youth are young people of color, and 58% are Black or African American. In listening sessions across our houses, we learned how deeply disturbed they were by the events we all witnessed. Covenant House felt obliged to do a deep dive into equity, inclusion, and diversity in our own spaces. We hired experts to evaluate our environment, hiring and promotion practices, and management of implicit and explicit bias. We created a DEI department with a C-suite-level leader. And we are in the process of building a strategic DEI plan, with goals and targets, to guide our implementation of DEI principles at every level.

With whom is the organization sharing feedback?

Our staff, Our board, Our funders, Our community partners,

How has asking for feedback from the people you serve changed your relationship?

Over the past year, our youth called on us to amplify their voices and revisit the ways in which we share their stories. With their input, we rewrote our youth engagement principles on the basis of ethical storytelling and trained our development staff across our federation in their use. Ethical storytelling recognizes the youth as protagonists and owners of their own story, with control over how and for how long their testimonies and experiences may be shared. While this can be challenging for various reasons, we recognize the singular value of heeding the voices of our youth. In this same period, we have been expanding and refreshing our facilities, and it is the input of our youth that has had the greatest impact in the design or redesign of spaces meant for them and their journeys.

Which of the following feedback practices does your organization routinely carry out?

We collect feedback from the people we serve at least annually, We take steps to get feedback from marginalized or under-represented people, We aim to collect feedback from as many people we serve as possible, We take steps to ensure people feel comfortable being honest with us, We look for patterns in feedback based on demographics (e.g., race, age, gender, etc.), We look for patterns in feedback based on people’s interactions with us (e.g., site, frequency of service, etc.), We engage the people who provide feedback in looking for ways we can improve in response, We act on the feedback we receive,

What challenges does the organization face when collecting feedback?

It is difficult to get the people we serve to respond to requests for feedback, It is difficult to find the ongoing funding to support feedback collection, Staff find it hard to prioritize feedback collection and review due to lack of time,