High-performing Human Service Professionals Honored by Superstar Foundation's Veronica Awards

BALTIMORE, Dec. 21, 2012 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The Superstar Foundation, an organization that seeks to pay great human services professionals great pay for great work, announced today the winners of the 2012 Veronica Awards. These awards are given to direct service professionals who demonstrate outstanding performance in promoting transformational relationships with the participants they serve. Staff members from Juma Ventures, Congreso de Latinos Unidos, Seattle Jobs Initiative, and West Sound Youth for Christ have received a total of $20,000 in Veronica Awards from the Superstar Foundation. The four winners are: McKenzie Stewart (Juma Ventures-San Francisco, Calif.), Andrea Dufour (Congreso de Latinos Unidos-Philadelphia, Pa.), Kristi O'Neill (Seattle Jobs Initiative-Seattle, Wash.), and Nancy Kihuski (West Sound Youth for Christ-Silverdale, Wash.).

Since 2008, the Superstar Foundation has used the Veronica Awards to recognize human services professionals who keep the transformational relationship with participants at the core of their work and who demonstrate the effectiveness of that approach through measured outcomes. Veronica Award recipients receive a check from the Superstar Foundation and have their stories memorialized at Social Solutions' office in Baltimore and in an online hall of fame. The awards themselves are named after the mother of entrepreneur Steve Butz, as his mother was committed to various social causes and laid the foundation of a strong social consciousness in her children.

This year's winners are characterized as having a similar sense of social consciousness, and have been described as client-focused, consistently supporting the individuals they work with to feel empowered, going above and beyond their duties to meet client needs, and being passionate and dedicated to seeing positive change in the lives of those they work with.  

McKenzie Stewart is a Youth Development Coordinator for Juma Ventures in San Francisco, Calif. She not only is highly successful in working with youth to achieve academic goals, she has also developed a strategic approach to be as impactful in her work as possible, and has inspired her colleagues to use data in more effective ways. As a result of McKenzie's work: 100% of her students are on track academically; 50% of students have improved their GPA since they began working with her; and more than two thirds of her students had exceeded college savings goals at the beginning of their senior years. McKenzie's work has been instrumental in helping Juma identify effective strategies to be more impactful and expand leadership programs for youth.

Andrea Dufour is a Primary Client Manager for Congreso's Exito afterschool program in Philadelphia, Pa. Andrea works with youth and their families to achieve outcomes in education, employment and reducing risk factors by providing services, building trusting relationships and providing continuous feedback on client progress. In a 15-month period, Andrea recorded 1,242 contacts with her clients, which her peers cite as a testament to Andrea's dedication to developing long-term relationships with her clients. The majority of her clients show measurable gains in their educational prospects and in reducing risk factors that lead to dropping out of high school.

Kristi O'Neill is a Career Navigator for the Seattle Jobs Initiative in Seattle, Wash. where she works to help clients overcome multiple barriers that prevent them from achieving success in their higher education and career pursuits—all of her clients are low-income, low-skill adults, 50% have less than a high school diploma, and many are homeless or have criminal records.  By building trust and strong relationships, Kristi is very successful in helping her clients achieve success, with her clients overcoming 100 barriers in 2012. Her positive enthusiasm for the success of each of her participants has earned her the title of "life cheerleader" by her clients. Her work has had a lifelong impact on her clients, as many develop the autonomy to enable them to overcome barriers without her support once they enter the workforce.

Nancy Khuski is a youth worker for West Sound Youth for Christ in Silverdale, Wash. working with foster youth preparing to age out of the system and teen parents without support networks. Nancy develops a deep relationship with each of her clients and creatively individualizes everything from the way she approaches a youth to how their goal plans are carried out. Nancy's approach has helped her clients remain above average on key outcomes compared to the general population—76% of her eligible youth have graduated or received their GED, compared to 32% - 44% average for foster youth in Washington state, and 100% of Nancy's eligible youth are currently enrolled and attending high school, compared to 45% of Washington foster youth.

The Superstar Foundation will be accepting applications in fall 2013 for next year's Veronica Awards; information will become available over the coming months at www.superstarfoundation.org.

About Social Solutions

Social Solutions is the leading provider of performance management software for human services, connecting efforts to outcomes, people to social services, and service providers and communities to funders. The company's Efforts to Outcomes (ETO™) software goes beyond case management, and enables public, private, and nonprofit organizations, such as Harlem Children's Zone®, Catholic Charities, Annie E. Casey Foundation, HUD, and cities such as Boston and Hartford to collaborate, save time, and improve service quality and effectiveness. Thousands of service providers, collaboratives, funders, evaluators, and government organizations use ETO software as they work with over 12 million participants each day

About Superstar Foundation

The Superstar Foundation is an organization committed to recognizing and rewarding great social service professionals for the invaluable work that they do. Dedicated to expanding the use of highly intentional, transformative relationships as the core of human services, the Superstar Foundation has administered the annual Veronica Awards since 2008. The Veronica Awards highlight and reward the efforts of the high-performing direct service professionals who embody this philosophy and have the data to demonstrate their performance.

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SOURCE Superstar Foundation