With a new $2 million grant from The DICK’S Sporting Goods Foundation, LISC opens a second application round for Game On-Community Places to Play, an initiative that funds the renovation of indoor and outdoor athletic spaces for young athletes, particularly in under-resourced communities. The deadline to apply for a grant is September 5, 2024.

Foot Locker Foundation, Inc., and LISC invite youth-serving nonprofits in 13 cities to apply for grants through the Foot Locker Foundation Community Empowerment Program. Applications are due September 30.

LISC’s charter school finance team analyzed the full range of charter school bond issuance from 2015-2022, building on three prior reports that catalogued the history of the sector. “With public charter schools now educating more than 3.7 million students nationwide, and against the backdrop of unprecedented learning loss stemming from the pandemic, preserving dollars to invest in core academic programs is of heightened importance,” the report states.

Every community deserves safe, quality sports facilities where youth and their families can play and socialize. Thanks to the Game On-Community Places to Play Initiative, a partnership of LISC and The DICK’S Sporting Goods Foundation, under-resourced neighborhoods in 14 cities and towns now have funding to improve their local youth sports facilities.

By Holly Long, LISC Kansas City Commuity Development Officer

In the wake of the horrific shooting of Ralph Yarl, LISC's Holly Long asks readers of an opinion piece for The Kansas City Star to challenge the systemic issues that perpetuate violence that Black children and adults face every day. As a Black mother parenting children in the same city where the 16-year-old was shot, she poses the question: “When will a child’s innocent mistake no longer turn into a matter of life and death?”

With a $4.4 million LISC acquisition loan, The TransLatin@ Coalition closed on a larger space in Los Angeles to create a site for the future permanent location to expand services and create opportunities for the community to gather. Once complete, TLC’s Empowerment Center will offer holistic social supportive services specifically designed for Transitional Age Youth (TAY) who identify as Trans, Gender Nonconforming and Intersex. The project will home private spaces for behavioral health counseling and treatment, legal services, employment counseling, life-skills coaching, and systems navigation.