The Collaboration Journey, Panel Discussion

The challenges facing our community are best addressed by collaboration, working together to realize shared goals.  New Mexico has some dynamic examples of effective collaborations.

Come participate in a panel discussion with ABQ Heading Home, the New Mexico Collaboration to End Hunger and the Early Childhood Collaborative.  They will share their successes, insights and lessons learned about working collaboratively.

Learn about Share New Mexico, an easy-to-use and customizable statewide website with data on a wide range of issues which impact quality of life of New Mexicans.  Today's three presenters have been integral to the development of Share NM and are leading teams to add specific content on homelessness, hunger and early childhood education.  We will have an opportunity to view the Share NM website and explore some of the ways it can be used.

Thanks to U.S. Bank for supporting this training.

Learning Objectives
- Understand the benefits of collaboration (outcomes, increased capacity, creative synergy)
- Understand the challenges of collaboration (working with diverse organizational cultures, overcoming territoriality)
- Become familiar with Share NM

Audience
Introductory/Intermediate: for Executive Directors, Board Chairs and Program Directors who are interested in leveraging the power of collaboration.

Presenters
Dennis R. Plummer, C.Ht., is the Chief Executive Officer of Metropolitan Homelessness Project and currently leads the Albuquerque Heading Home initiative.  Albuquerque Heading Home aims to house the most medically vulnerable persons who are experiencing chronic homelessness.  The initiative, a system-wide collaboration built upon strengths of community partner agencies, leverages and coordinates limited resources for the strongest collective impact on making experiences of homelessness rare, short-lived and non-recurring.

Krista Kelley, is the former Executive Director of the New Mexico Collaboration to End Hunger.  The New Mexico Collaboration to End Hunger was a statewide organization of over 80 partner organizations, including public, private, and nonprofit entities, partnering to address food insecurity among families, children, and older adults. The Collaboration focuses on providing advocacy, capacity building, education, outreach, and systems change resources and technical assistance to organizations and communities across New Mexico to increase household access to food resources and healthy food options.

LaWanda Albright, New Mexico Early Childhood Community.  The New Mexico Early Childhood Community is a coalition of early childhood organizations, providers, civic organizations, and businesses that are interested in improving early childhood health, education, and well being for New Mexico's youngest citizens and their families.  This coalition is a lose network that grew from advocacy work by Teaching Solutions.  Various groups voiced a need for a communication tool that provides resources and information to those working with young children and their families.  nmecc.org was begun as a result of these community discussions.  The vision of NMECC is to "have a web of community support for families with young children."

All three presenters serve on the Advisory Council for Share New Mexico, a statewide project facilitated by PNM in which pertinent information regarding early childhood education, hunger and homelessness will be shared via web based technology.