American Idea Foundation

Measuring Results, Expanding Opportunity, Improving Lives.

Press Release

In Kettering, OH, Ryan joins legislators & community leaders at Brigid’s Path

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By: AIF Staff

Kettering, OH – Earlier this week, former Speaker of the House and American Idea Foundation President Paul Ryan visited Brigid’s Path, the first in-patient, newborn recovery center in Ohio. Caring for newborns since 2017, Brigid’s Path provides around-the-clock care for babies who were born exposed to addictive substances.

Joining Ryan were Ohio Representatives Mike Turner (OH-10) and Brad Wenstrup (OH-2), Kettering Mayor Peggy Lehner, and community partners from around Dayton, all of whom are supportive of Brigid’s Path’s efforts to stem the rising tide of opioid addiction. The legislators toured the medical recovery facility, participated in a roundtable with mothers and their babies who received treatment at Brigid’s Path, and spoke with medical professionals about the organization’s approach to nursing newborns back to health.

Following the visit, Speaker Ryan shared the following reflections on Brigid’s Path:

“The work being done by Brigid’s Path is awesome, effective, and necessary. Every child in America should be given the chance to lead a healthy life, and that’s what Brigid’s Path is providing to these newborns. The opioid epidemic – and substance abuse generally – doesn’t discriminate based on age, geography, race, class, religion, or any other characteristic. It impacts every community in America and to effectively reduce the scourge of addiction, we are going to need innovative and committed groups like Brigid’s Path on the front-lines.

“Brigid’s Path meets these mothers and their babies where they are. Brigid’s Path is literally there for these babies on Day 1. They are treating these mothers and their babies, often at their most vulnerable moments, with compassion, love, and cutting-edge health care. The work they do in the first weeks of a baby’s life will help that child for years to come, so their impact is profound. I was so impressed to see the dedication of their staff and volunteers and the support for Brigid’s Path from local legislators and the wider Dayton community.

WHIO covered Speaker Ryan’s reactions to the visit and the Dayton Daily News reported on the event, saying in part:

“Legislators joined former U.S. House Speaker Paul Ryan at Brigid’s Path on Wednesday as Ryan’s American Idea Foundation donated $50,000 to the newborn recovery center and visitors learned more about the center’s work at a roundtable with staff members.

“Having Paul Ryan look nationally for models and to find one right here is certainly a credit to our community,” said U.S. Rep. Mike Turner, R-Dayton.

Ryan noted Turner’s support for the passing of the Caring Recovery for Infants and Babies Act, or CRIB Act. The act passed in 2018 and allowed Medicaid to cover certain health care services provided to infants in residential pediatric recovery facilities and hospitals. Centers like Brigid’s Path were previously not eligible to receive Medicaid reimbursement.

“I’m going across America looking for really successful poverty-fighting programs that can be measured and scaled and replicated across the country,” Ryan said. “So I’m here in Kettering to learn about Brigid’s Path, which is doing enormous work in making a difference in babies who are born with addictions….”

“What a beautiful thing to see people stepping up and doing this on their own and then working with government entities so that we have success,” said U.S. Rep. Brad Wenstrup, R-Cincinnati, on Wednesday.

The American Idea Foundation learned of Brigid’s Path through the Stand Together Foundation, a nonprofit that supports other entities that address poverty, Ryan said. The foundation also hopes to help replicate what Brigid’s Path is doing.

“We see here a program that has already proven to work, and what we want to do is do more measurement of what Brigid’s Path does and how it succeeds, so that we can track that progress and then tell the story so that we can replicate the success,” Ryan said.

Brigid’s Path is one of 7 non-profits from around the country that Ryan’s American Idea Foundation will be providing financial support and other assistance to in 2023. 

Ryan announces 2023 grants to poverty-fighting groups around the United States

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By: AIF Staff

JANESVILLE, WI – Today, AIF President and former Speaker of the House Paul Ryan announced 7 non-profit organizations across the United States will be receiving financial support and strategic assistance from the American Idea Foundation in 2023 as they continue expanding economic opportunities and reducing poverty in their communities.

In 2022, the American Idea Foundation issued a handful of grants to front-line organizations developing evidence-based solutions to address issues like recidivism, financial literacy and entrepreneurship in underserved communities, early childhood health, and family well-being. Throughout the year, Ryan and his Foundation visited these organizations, offered strategic advice, shared policy expertise, and elevated the groups’ efforts in a variety of ways. It will expand on those efforts in 2023 with a new round of grant recipients.

Each of the 2023 grant recipients are making enormous differences in people’s lives. The funds and support provided by the American Foundation will be used primarily to develop additional data and evidence around specific poverty-fighting strategies around the country.

In announcing the American Idea Foundation’s 2023 grant recipients, Paul Ryan said:  

“Working with these amazing organizations and supporting their evidence-based approaches to fighting poverty is one of the most rewarding parts of my post-Congressional career. These groups are simply amazing. Their work is inspiring.

Last year, I spent time with two of our grant recipients, Gatekeepers in Hagerstown and Corner to Corner in Nashville, and saw first-hand the profound impact these organizations have. Our grant recipients are transforming communities, building ecosystems of support, and lifting people up daily. These groups and their leaders are committed to developing evidence that validate their approaches and I truly believe this is how America moves the needle on poverty.

This isn’t about partisanship or politics. It is about solving problems, helping people, and making the American Dream more accessible. These groups are doing precisely that and it’s why I am so excited to partner with these organizations in the year ahead.”

Started by Ryan in October 2019, the American Idea Foundation believes by taking the politics out of poverty-fighting and focusing on outcomes and results, successful programs can be scaled, elevated, and replicated. The Foundation believes this approach – prioritizing what works and validating these interventions with evidence — will provide policymakers with a better blueprint to address the challenges facing individuals and communities across the United States.

The 2023 American Idea Foundation grant recipients are….

Bernie’s Book Bank

Located in Chicago, Illinois, Bernie’s Book Bank creates pathways to success through book ownership by providing children and families access to books and giving children books of their own. Founded in 2009, Bernie’s Book Bank has long believed reading is one of the most important skills a child can possess, which is why it gives free, quality books to children to build personal libraries.

Since its founding, Bernie’s Book bank has sourced, processed, and distributed over 25 million books and delivered them directly to the children they serve via the school districts and early childhood programs in the Chicagoland area. The story and growth of Bernie’s Book Bank is astonishing. They have helped countless children learn how to read and develop comprehension skills which lay the foundation for more educational opportunities and a pathway out of poverty.

Bottom Line

Originally located in Boston, MA before expanding nationally, Bottom Line partners with degree-aspiring students of color from under-resourced communities to help them get into college, through college, and out into the workforce.

Founded in 1997, Bottom Line does this by pairing mentors with first-generation college students from low-income backgrounds, shepherding students through the college application process, and sticking with them throughout college by offering one-on-one support through graduation. Bottom Line’s goal is to create a far-reaching ripple effect by using the transformative power of a college degree to mobilize careers that lift up individuals, families, and communities. The organization currently serves over 7,000 students and the early impact of their program, as evidenced in a 2021 randomized controlled trial, are promising.

Brigid’s Path

Operating in Kettering, Ohio,Brigid’s Path was founded in 2014 to care for babies and mothers in crisis with grace, love and hope. It was the first in-patient, newborn recovery center in Ohio.

The organization’ primary purpose is to care for infants who were born exposed to an addictive substance like opioids or other drugs. Brigid’s Path employs the latest therapeutic techniques to help babies be as comfortable as possible while they experience withdrawal. At a critical stage in a newborn’s development, the medical staff and volunteers of Brigid’s Path shower them with love and attention 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. The organization believes in the strength of families and that families can – and do – contribute to the successful treatment of these babies. As they help newborns, Brigid’s Path also works with community partners to provide resources for their moms to achieve the stability that will ultimately help them care for their children for both the near and long-term.

Friends of the Children

Friends of the Children is a national non-profit organization that selects and invites youth – all of whom have unique talents, interests and dreams, and face multiple systemic obstacles – to be paired with a paid, professional mentor called a Friend. The organization hires and trains Friends to support youth from as early as age 4 through high school graduation. Friends spend a minimum of 14 to 16 intentional hours per month with each child and the Friends’ full-time job is to empower and support youths and their caregivers.

Friends of the Children revolutionized the youth mentoring field by creating the first and only long-term professional mentoring program in the country. They focus on youth who are facing the greatest obstacles, such as those who facing trauma or dealing with adverse early-childhood experiences, and help them develop skills like trust, empathy, and healthy communication. Friends of the Children has long been a leader in the evidence-based policy space, participating in the longest-running youth mentoring randomized control trial in the country.

Per Scholas

A nationally recognized non-profit with campuses in 20 cities, Per Scholas believes a thriving workforce starts with equitable access to education. To accomplish this goal, they have created an evidence-based, professional development program that provides individuals with tuition-free technology training and skills for high-growth careers.

Aiming to educate 4,500 students in 2023, Per Scholas provides customized training and job placement services for low-income workers focusing primarily on the information technology sector. Its core mission is to advance economic equity through rigorous training for tech careers and to connect skilled talent to leading businesses. As their 2022 Annual Report showed, their approach is working as the program has an 8:1 economic return generated for every dollar invested in Per Scholas.

Wisconsin Inmate Education Association

The Wisconsin Inmate Education Association is focusing on helping men and women incarcerated in the Wisconsin prison system transform their lives through the completion of an in-prison college curriculum which provides them with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Biblical Studies.

By encouraging inmates to embrace an alternative identity centered around faith and education, WIEA believes their intervention will lower levels of misconduct, stimulate spiritual transformations, and improve families and communities by changing behaviors for the better. The Wisconsin Inmate Education Association’s approach is evidence-based and they measure success by looking at factors like personal transformation, violence reduction, the community and family impact, and recidivism.

Women’s Bean Project

Located in Denver, Colorado,the Women’s Bean Project is a transitional employment program serving those women who have struggled to obtain and maintain employment. The organization’s goal is to change women’s lives by providing them stepping stones to self-sufficiency through work.

Participants complete a 6-9 month vocational and educational program and upon graduation, receive a full-time job as a production assistant in the Women’s Bean Project’s food manufacturing business. The Women’s Bean Project helps women achieve independence by giving them the readiness skills, talents, and opportunities to break the cycle of poverty. Since its founding, the Women’s Bean Project has blossomed into a successful commercial enterprise and their products are now sold in 1,000 stores nationwide. They generated over $2 million in revenue last year and helped hundreds of women get back on track.

At Capitol portrait unveiling, Ryan reflects on achievements as Speaker of the House & time in Congress

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By: AIF Staff

Washington, DC – This afternoon at the United States Capitol, a portrait commemorating former Wisconsin Congressman Paul Ryan’s time as the 54th Speaker of the House was unveiled in a ceremony attended by a bipartisan group of Congressional leaders, current and former Members of Congress, and Ryan’s family, friends, and members of his staff.

The four Congressional leaders, Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA), Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY), Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY), and Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), spoke at the event recognizing Ryan’s contributions to the House of Representatives during his time as Speaker from October 2015 to January 2019. The event was also attended by former Speakers Boehner, Pelosi, and Gingrich.

Ryan’s portrait was painted by Leslie Bowman, an award-winning portrait artist from Minneapolis, Minnesota. Bowman was also commissioned to memorialize Ryan’s time leading the House Budget Committee and the House Ways and Means Committee.

The painting of Ryan will hang in the Capitol and is the latest addition to the historic Speaker’s Portrait Collection. 

Ryan, who served as Speaker of the House from October 2015 to January 2019, unveiled the portrait with his wife, Janna, and their children: Liza, Charlie, and Sam. Marking the occasion, Ryan said:

“Only in America is it possible to start a career in public service as an intern and end it as Speaker of the House.  Only in America could a 28-year-old kid from Janesville, Wisconsin be elected to Congress and go on to serve his hometown for two decades.

“Today is a tremendous honor. It’s an honor that I share with my family, friends, colleagues, and staff without whom none of this would have been possible. Helping my community and fighting for good public policies was the opportunity of a lifetime and I will forever be grateful for the opportunity to represent Wisconsin in the House and to lead the institution as Speaker.”

Reflecting on the three portraits she painted memorializing Ryan’s leadership positions in Congress, artist Leslie Bowman said:

“I believe a great portrait should be a fine painting as well as a physically accurate and emotionally evocative portrayal of the subject. This is accomplished not only by creating a good likeness but also through the ability of the artist to see and reflect the inner qualities of the person she is painting.

“Throughout our history, portraits have been commissioned to honor those who have earned great recognition for their achievements. As a portrait painter I have had the rare, and cherished opportunity to render three visual legacies of Speaker Ryan, a man who serves our nation from the heart.”

For a high-resolution photo of Ryan’s portrait, please click HERE.

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