Walk A Mile

Project site: http://www.walkamile.org/

Digital Ventures often works with projects developing information assets other than software. One of these projects is Walk a Mile, an educational program that brings together politicians and welfare families one-on-one. The Walk a Mile project team has developed a standard format for their program that can be adopted by communities across the country. Digital Ventures helps the team manage the rights associated with the project.

Description

Walk a Mile is an educational program that connects policymakers with people living on public assistance. The purpose of Walk a Mile is to help both parties understand each other on a personal level so that meaningful solutions to poverty can be found.

Since the pilot test in 1994 at the University of Washington's School of Social Work, Walk a Mile has been refined into a standard format that grassroots organizations can implement in their own communities with training and technical support from Walk a Mile headquarters at the UW.

The heart of the program is the chance it gives a policymaker and a low-income family to share in each other's lives for one month. This includes regular phone calls and sharing activities like going to the welfare office or attending a legislative session. The policymaker is also asked to try to feed his or her family on a food stamp budget.

Program Benefits

Walk a Mile educates lawmakers about the reality of living on welfare. Other benefits of the program include the low-income participants' increased confidence in their own ability to contribute to the democratic process by voting or communicating their concerns with politicians. An anecdotal benefit is that politicians who have participated in Walk a Mile are inspired to implement both major initiatives and small changes, such as improved public transportation, that help low-income people.

Development Background

Natasha Grossman, a graduate student at the UW's School of Social Work, created the Walk a Mile program because many policymakers do not have first-hand experience with welfare recipients and may therefore make inaccurate assessments about their needs. Grossman had originally intended to center the program around policymakers trying to live on a food stamp budget. With input from colleagues at the School of Social Work and others, Walk a Mile has developed into its current format of actually introducing welfare recipients and lawmakers to each other, making the experience much more meaningful for the lawmakers while also involving welfare recipients who are usually left out of public discourse.

As a testimonial to the program's impact, a number of foundations have given gifts to Walk a Mile to help it grow throughout the United States.

Future Goals

To date, state-level Walk a Mile projects have been created in 23 states. Smaller, local projects have been created in two other states. Eventually, Walk a Mile would like to have a presence in every state in state-wide level projects and in small, regional projects. They envision growing into a widely acknowledged project that is involved in every level of welfare policy making. They also may diversify their activities with groups other than lawmakers, such as school boards or corporations with strong community roots.

Digital Ventures' Role

Digital Ventures has been working with Walk a Mile to help it grow into an enterprise. Digital Ventures has helped most by introducing people who can contribute to different facets of Walk a Mile's development as an organization. For example, Digital Ventures helped recruit a volunteer who will help Walk a Mile secure the rights to use footage from a professional TV show about Walk a Mile for their own video program.

Digital Ventures has also introduced to Walk a Mile the possibility of creating an affiliates program, where organizations committed to social welfare issues can work with Walk a Mile.

Contact

Natasha Grossman, Program Manager
Walk A Mile Program
Northwest Institute for Children & Families
4101 - 15th Avenue NE
Seattle, WA 98105-6299
Phone: 206.543.3027
Fax: 206.685.1330
E-mail: Natasha@walkamile.org

Published News

The following articles are available to the UW community through the National Newspapers database.

• A closer look at welfare reform. (1998, January 25). The Boston Globe, p. E6.
• Ivins, Molly. (1995, January 28). Other voices: Seeing past stereotypes of welfare. The Atlanta Constitution, p. A18.
• Nifong, Christina. (1995, June 21). Senator walks welfare mom's mile. The Christian Science Monitor, p. 3.
• Varner, Bill. (1996, November 12). Legislators to get taste of life on food stamps. USA Today, p. A4.
• Varner, Bill. (1996, December 3). Walking a mile on welfare: Lawmaker learns welfare isn't a windfall for poor. USA Today, p. 1A.
• Varner, Bill. (1996, December 26). Legislators "walk a mile" for a closer look at welfare. USA Today, p. 3A.