A Year in, and a Six-Year-Old Taught Me Everything

Reflections from my first year as Executive Director of Family Promise Rochester.

A few months into my tenure as Executive Director, I sat down at Promise House while a mom met with our case manager down the hall. Her six-year-old daughter appeared at my elbow with a plastic stethoscope and the unmistakable air of a medical professional who had things to do.

She listened to my heart. She checked my blood pressure. She peered, with great seriousness, into both of my ears. And then, with the confidence of someone who had seen a thing or two in her short life, she patted my arm and told me: "You're going to be alright now."

I smiled and said it right back to her. And I meant it.

That little girl with the stethoscope is the whole reason we do this work. We exist so a child experiencing homelessness can still be six years old — sassy, certain, full of the conviction that she has the power to make someone feel better.

What surprised me

Here's what I didn't expect about year one: I knew the work would be emotionally difficult, and it is. What I didn't anticipate was how much joy lives in the small, everyday moments you only get in a residential setting — the impromptu medical exams, the kitchen-table homework, the toddler showing me a rock she found in the parking lot like it was a diamond. The hard parts are real. So is the joy.

Family Promise Rochester is the only nonprofit dedicated to preventing and ending family homelessness in southern Minnesota. From our home base at Promise House, we shelter up to thirteen families at a time while they work toward stable housing. We also run prevention programs that keep families housed before a crisis tips them into homelessness in the first place.

What this year looked like

In the last twelve months:

• 38 families found stable shelter at Promise House

• 469 children kept their bedrooms, their schools, and their sense of safety because we kept their families housed through prevention work

• 87% of families exited Promise House to stable housing

Behind every one of those numbers is a kid with a stethoscope. A parent doing brave work. A staff member who stayed late. A neighbor who showed up.

The part I want you to know

Donations from supporters like you are the only reason these moments are possible. The kitchen-table homework. The plastic-stethoscope checkups. The 87% of families who walk out our doors into stable housing. None of it happens without a community that decides, over and over again, that families belong together and housing is how we protect them.

If you want to be part of what comes next, you can give here. Whatever you can offer — $25, $300 (a week of shelter for a family), $1,300 (the full cost of keeping a family housed), or a recurring monthly gift — goes directly to the work.

A year ago, a little girl told me I was going to be alright. A year in, I want to tell you the same. With you in our corner, we are going to be alright — and we'll keep showing up until every child in our community has a place to be six years old in peace.

— Carrie Moscho, Executive Director