Building Community

PSG is the Lead Organization for Circles Central Florida with locations in Winter Garden and Orlando and facilitates national learning modules Bridges Out of Poverty and Cost of Poverty Experience.

Circles Expansion

When St. Luke’s UMC in Orlando began the Community Transformation Initiative in 2013, the intent was to research and pilot best practices in community development and poverty reduction and if they worked to explore how to replicate the model. During the last 6 years working alongside residents in West Orange, Circles emerged as the foremost success in supporting families in overcoming poverty. Poverty Solutions Group launched in 2020 to create an infrastructure to expand Circles in more communities in Central Florida.

Now, in 2021, we are seeing this dream come to life. Even while addressing all the hardships brought on by the pandemic, we were able to partner with Family Promise of Greater Orlando to expand the Circles Initiative into Orlando! A life support for working families that is needed now, more than ever. Circles Orlando will begin training its first cohort this summer and will primarily serve families in Pine Hills who were previously homeless, or who were diverted from homelessness, to ensure that they are not at risk of becoming homeless in the future. To learn more about the Circles Initiative go here.

Family Promise of Greater Orlando is thrilled to collaborate with Poverty Solutions Group to bring Circles to Orlando. The Circles Program will empower our clients to eliminate generational poverty while helping them focus on long-term housing stability. By adding this program, we can provide the full spectrum to the families in our program who were once homeless but now have created a pathway of stability for themselves and their children.
~Carin Anderson, Development Manager, Family Promise of Greater Orlando

Over this past year, 8 million Americans slipped into poverty, making the need for effective prevention and stabilization services all the more important. That is why we are so excited to have begun a collaboration with Circles USA during the pandemic. Together, our organizations are helping families not just face the immediate economic impact of the pandemic, but also find a pathway towards long-term sustainable independence.
~Sandra Miniutti, COO, Family Promise (National Office)

Raise Your Poverty IQ

Often the solutions to poverty are focused solely on individuals and their behavior or choices. Financial literacy, parenting classes, and improving job soft skills are valuable to all of us and making these learning opportunities more accessible to those of low wealth is critical. It is equally important to understand the obstacles within the larger community that make ending generational poverty almost insurmountable for most families. One can learn budgeting and still not have enough income per paycheck to avoid costly bank fees. Your hourly job may prohibit you from taking advantage of improvement opportunities if they are only offered during business hours 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. A job promotion of a couple hundred dollars per month may trigger an end to your subsidized child care that will now cost your household over $600 per month.

PSG has a series of immersive learning modules aimed to help the community learn about the causes of poverty and the obstacles that keep people from ending the cycle of poverty for themselves and their children. PSG is offering these in three phases:

Raise Your Poverty IQ
Prepare for Cross-Community Relationships
Build a Thriving Community Together.

View this webpage to read full descriptions of each learning module. We are offering three of these modules in May. Once we understand the obstacles better, maybe we can make changes within our own organizations and institutions to reduce poverty in unprecedented ways.

Virtual COPE on May 5

Bridges Part 1 - May 3 OR May 10 OR May 12

Bridges Part 2 - a 4-hour session in two parts May 18 AND June 1

Moving Forward

During the Covid-19 pandemic season Circles Winter Garden started a new cohort with amazing, enthusiastic, and dedicated individuals. They not only showed up virtually for 12 weeks for themselves but also created a pathway of accountability to show up for each other. Cohort 8 was able to celebrate their completion of training to become official Circles Leaders in March. Their friends and family along with current Circle Leaders and Allies, all safely social distanced in person or on Zoom, joined them for this amazing accomplishment.

CONGRATULATIONS COHORT 8 GRADUATES ON MOVING FORWARD!

Donate

Poverty Solutions Group appreciates your donations and depends on them to keep Circles and our other initiatives going. Please click here to make a one time or recurring donation.

Our mailing address is:
1000 Lincoln Terrace, Winter Garden FL, 34787

Poverty Solutions Group is a registered 501c3 tax-exempt organization committed to sustainable poverty reduction in Central Florida.

EIN: 84-5151564

You are receiving this email because you attended Cost of Poverty Experience, a Bridges Out of Poverty workshop, participated in Circles Orange County, or were a volunteer with the EWG Community Initiative at St. Luke’s UMC. If you’ve received this message by mistake, please accept our apologies and unsubscribe using the link below.
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