Roots of Success

Mission: To prepare youth and adults from communities with high rates of poverty and unemployment for environmental jobs and career pathways and to become activists and leaders who can address environmental challenges and injustices in their communities and society more broadly.

Who We Are: Roots of Success was created by Dr. Raquel Pinderhughes, Professor of Urban Studies & Planning at San Francisco State University and an internationally recognized expert on the green economy and green workforce training. The curriculum is informed by Dr. Pinderhughes’ decades of experience working with and teaching underserved populations, and in-depth research with employers in 21 sectors of the green economy, and in response to the growing momentum to promote sustainable development and provide good jobs for individuals with significant barriers to employment – fighting pollution and poverty simultaneously.

What We Do:

The Roots of Success Environmental Literacy and Job training Program strengthens academic and professional skills, increases environmental literacy, increases financial literacy and social entrepreneurship, prepares participants for 100+ jobs in environmental sectors and to improve environmental conditions in their communities and build resilience to climate change.
Programs use Roots of Success because our teaching approach and materials immediately engage and inspire individuals who have struggled in school and have barriers to employment and are directly relevant to people who come from low-income communities.

Project Summary:

Roots of Success has received a $1 million grant to expand their apprenticeship and pre-apprenticeship program throughout the state of California.

They want to partner with an FCF project team to develop an outreach and messaging strategy to help them double the number of partners and participants in their program.

The project will likely entail:

Conducting stakeholder interviews with staff to understand the program and the goals of the expansion.
Conduct stakeholder interviews with other apprenticeship programs to learn about best practices for scaling a program.
Conduct stakeholder interviews with current Roots of Success program to learn about their experiences.
Deliverable #1: Synthesis of best practices and feedback collected from stakeholder interviews.
Deliverable #2: Partnership development process that Roots of Success can use to scale their outreach efforts.
Deliverable #3: Updated collateral & pitch that Roots of Success can utilize in partnership development process.

The project will likely entail:

Professional Skills Needed:

See Our Other Fall 2023 Projects: