Focus on Community — A Million Stories of Change

Impact Partner Spotlight 

Focus on Community 

Dec. 15, 2020 

Focus on Community is a substance abuse prevention agency that has been serving Racine County for more than 40 years. Its work revolves around engaging youth of all ages, as well as their families, in developing important resiliency skills. These skills lead clients to better decision-making and increase the likelihood that they will avoid drugs and alcohol.

What makes Focus on Community stand out among other organizations?

Focus on Community is Racine's only substance abuse-prevention agency. Our is to inspire healthy life choices and unite our community in preventing substance abuse. We provide research-based, model programs proven effective at lowering the risks of substance abuse and increasing protective factors for youth. We take pride in our long-standing partnerships with agencies throughout the community and strive to collaborate with all who work towards a better Racine.

Can you tell me a story about a time when you realized your organization’s impact?

It is so hard to nail down just one story because we could tell a million. Many of the people who start as clients of Focus on Community become volunteers and later join our team as permanent staff. I've seen many families come to one F.A.S.T. program just to check it out, only to return time and time again because they were so positively impacted. And thanks to our passionate, dedicated team, our Advancing Family Assets clients are able to find employment, get out of debt, attain their GEDs, and more. 

That's just our impact on adults — we've also changed the lives of the youth we meet in our school-aged programs. In our lifetime as an agency, we've employed hundreds of teens who have gone on to high levels of success after graduation. We've had parents reach out to ask what we're doing right because their children's behavior and responsiveness have improved so much since they joined our programs. And we watch as many young adults who started as students in LifeSkills or Transition carry their important lessons beyond their program participation and into adulthood.

Every day, the staff and volunteers of Focus on Community are reminded how important and impactful this work is. Ask any team member—every one of them has a drawer full of thank-you cards because the care we extend has changed so many lives.

What do you think most people would be surprised to learn about Focus?

One of the most common things I have to explain is is that we're not a treatment facility, and we don't directly work with people experiencing addiction. Instead, we work to prevent substance abuse before it happens. Prevention is the core value that we understand and prioritize throughout all our work. Not only is it cost-effective for communities to invest in prevention, but it also saves lives and thwarts heartache for those whom substance abuse will never have to impact. 

We also have collaborated on many research initiatives over the years, such as by providing data for Search Institute's 40 Developmental Asset framework and and Four Core Measures. 

Is there anything else you think the community should know about your work?

While our mission is to unite our community specifically to prevent substance abuse, we take pride in uniting our community in so many other ways. We've created many programs and initiatives over the years to strengthen our community. Focus was actually one of the first nonprofits to have a presence at Party on the Pavement, and more recent endeavors include our Kindness Rocks and Book Fairy projects. We continuously strive to be innovative community leaders, and we seek equitable ways to engage as many people as possible. 

We're excited to have a new permanent home in uptown Racine with renovations underway, but we need your help to complete these changes. Keep an eye out for our upcoming capital campaign so that you can participate in making the new space as inviting and welcoming as possible for staff, clients and the community we serve. 

Sheila Simonsen is the director of development at Focus on Community.