01 / Research
Understanding the need
Our team researched the young people Bill Wilson Center serves, the support it provides, and its financial position. I organized those findings around the case we would need to make for funding.
Research, Strategy & Presentation
Bill Wilson Center
Bill Wilson Center is a Santa Clara County nonprofit serving youth, young adults, and families through housing, mental-health care, supportive services, and advocacy.
I led this project through a UC Berkeley class funding competition.
I led a five-person team that researched Bill Wilson Center and presented the case for a $2,500 grant.
- Role
- Team lead, research, and presentation design
- Organization
- Bill Wilson Center
- Timeline
- 2023
- Focus
- Research, Strategy & Presentation
- Tools & methods
- Nonprofit research · Grant strategy · Team leadership · Visual storytelling
- Collaboration
- Five-person project team
01 / The challenge
What needed
to be solved.
Our class had a $2,500 grant to award, and our team chose to make the case for Bill Wilson Center. Its programs address connected needs across housing, mental health, and youth support, so we had to decide which evidence would best explain our recommendation.
I needed to bring five people’s research into a presentation with a clear line of reasoning. We examined the organization’s programs, finances, and potential impact, focusing our argument on the mental, social, and academic barriers young survivors face and how Bill Wilson Center could help address them.
02 / My role
What I contributed.
I led our five-person team through the research and recommendation, organized each person’s contribution, and designed the final presentation. I was responsible for helping us turn what we had learned into a funding case the class could follow and evaluate.
03 / The approach
Decisions behind the work.
- 01
I divided the research among our five-person team and organized the findings around the funding decision we needed to make. That gave us a way to decide which information belonged in the final presentation.
- 02
I helped connect the barriers young survivors face with the organization’s services through a theory of change. The framework made us explain how the support we were recommending could address the needs we had researched.
- 03
I designed and presented the final case, bringing the program research, financial review, and recommendation into one sequence. The audience needed to understand why our team believed Bill Wilson Center was a strong use of the available grant.
04 / Execution
From research to a funding case.
02 / Framework
Explaining how support could help
I helped organize our research into a theory of change, connecting the mental, social, and academic barriers young survivors face with the services intended to address them.
- Research
- We connected the needs we identified with specific forms of support.
- Teamwork
- I used that structure to bring our separate findings into a recommendation we could explain together.
03 / Recommendation
Making the funding case
I built the final presentation around why we believed the organization could use the grant effectively. The recommendation followed our review of its programs, reach, and financial standing.
05 / Results & scope
What came from the work.
- $2.5K
- Grant secured for Bill Wilson Center
- 5
- Team members led through the project
06 / Reflection
What I learned.
My takeaway
Having our recommendation selected for the $2,500 grant made the research consequential. I had helped a team make a case that resulted in funding for the organization. The project taught me to take responsibility for how a group’s work fits together: deciding which findings matter, making the reasoning understandable, and giving each contributor a place in the final presentation. I would bring that same care to a client recommendation or campaign proposal, where the quality of the decision depends on how well the evidence is explained.