African American Community Service Agency

The African American Community Service Agency (AACSA), established in 1978, proudly serves as one of Silicon Valley’s few African American cultural hubs. Guided by our mission to deliver high-quality educational, cultural, social, and recreational programs, we aim to celebrate and preserve African American identity, culture, values, traditions, knowledge, and family life. AACSA welcomes members from all backgrounds, regardless of race, religion, age, or ability, fostering an inclusive environment.

AACSA’s overall goal is to address inequities and ease the financial burden on the low-income people it serves, preserving their quality of life so that Santa Clara County (SCC) can retain the rich culture that a diverse population offers. AACSA drives toward the following objectives:

• Address the racial/ethnic leadership gap by supporting educational opportunity and college access for high school and college students as well as opening doors for access, networking, scholarships, corporate tours, and fostering relationships with mentors
• Close the racial equity gap in education by offering STEAM-based educational programs for underserved, low-income youth, ages 6-14 to learn lego and robotics building
• Promote early literacy and kindergarten readiness through FIRST 5 FRC, National Child Development Institute, and related support services
• Respond to continuing resource inequities by addressing food scarcity, mental and physical health, unemployment and underemployment, and housing assistance
• Lead toward racial and economic justice by collaborating with other SCC community-based organizations toward policies that impact SCC’s disenfranchised target communities

Issue

How can the AACSA establish strong, sustainable practices for measuring and showcasing the impact of our programs and services?

Situation

AACSA is seeking support from ACT to strengthen how we measure the impact of our programs, services, and community outreach as we prepare for the development of the new African American Cultural Center. While we already conduct client surveys across all our programs and events, we believe there is room for improving both the survey questions and collection methodologies to more effectively use data and storytelling to demonstrate our impact to potential funders and the community at large.

Project

This ACT project will deliver:

1. Re-designed community surveys and survey collection methodologies for 3 or more key AACSA programs/events.  Surveys will be designed to best demonstrate AACSA’s impact to potential funders and the community at large 
2. Tools and/or processes for ongoing data tracking
3. Recommendations on how and when to use of storytelling to highlight our impact

Ultimately, we want to ensure our work drives real change and delivers equitable outcomes for underserved communities across Santa Clara County.