UPDATE on Partners:
Chicago Office
In 2010, led by Senior Vice President Gianfranco Grande,
Partners piloted a new model of New Dollars/New Partners
training for Our Lady of Peace (OLP), tailored to its
specific challenges, opportunities, and goals. Together with
OLP’s pastor, Partners designed a training that combined
components from each of the four core New Dollars modules,
with new content that addressed the unique history and
context of the parish and its community. With the success of
the first custom New Dollars training, word spread, and more
congregations have retained Partners to conduct trainings
that focus on specific areas of interest to them.
This alternative model of New Dollars attracted the attention
of the Archdiocese of Chicago. A longtime supporter of
Partners’ work in Chicagoland, they had already sponsored
four New Dollars cohorts in the city and signed on to sponsor
custom trainings at five diverse parishes.
The variety of parishes and the neighborhoods they serve
has challenged Partners to tailor New Dollars/New Partners in
new ways. At St. Pius V, the New Dollars training, completed
in the spring of 2013, was not only customized in its content,
but was presented in Spanish for the first time in Partners’
history.
The training was a collaboration between Partners’ bilingual
staff in Chicago and Philadelphia, the leadership of St. Pius
V, and Dina Garcia, an interpreter and recent graduate of
New Dollars at her own parish, St. Stanislaus Kostka. Once
the parish’s goals were identified, Partners developed a
training that combined components of each module of New
Dollars in a new way.
Chicago Advisory Board
Rolf Achilles
Rabbi Michael Balinsky
Clark Baurer, AIA, SE
Joel D. Bookman
Aja Carr
Christopher Ellis
Suzanne Germann
Eleanor Gorski
T. Gunny Harboe, FAIA
Corlis Moody
The Reverend
James M. Moody
Suzanne Morgan
Michael P. Mosher, JD
Joan Pomaranc
Father John Sanaghan
John Watts
Interpreter Dina Garcia leads a session at the first ever Spanishlanguage New Dollars/New Partners training, held this past
spring at St. Pius V in Chicago, IL.
The agenda began to coalesce around the theme of language,
starting with an introduction to Asset-Based Community
Development – the language of abundance. Trainees split
into groups to brainstorm four different types of assets
available to St. Pius V. Within twenty minutes, there were
well over 200 identified.
After reflecting on the vast number and variety of these
assets, the conversation shifted to a different type of
language – the language of economy. After an introduction to
Partners’ Halo Effect research, trainees learned more about
the Halo value of St. Pius V: nearly $15 million annually.
Partners and parish leadership facilitated a conversation on
how to speak about the impact of their church in terms of
numbers and quantitative data.
And finally, the third type of language covered was the
language of heritage. Father Chuck Dahm provided an
overview of the history of St. Pius V, which has served Irish,
Sacred Places • Spring 2013 • 14