During UNC-Chapel Hill's 2026 Engagement Week, the Carolina Across 100 (CX100) team participated in the UNC Rural event, "Serving NC Through Rural Partnerships" to share our experience as a Rural Research and Advancement Fund (RREAF) recipient. This grant was beneficial to capturing the data and stories of rural teams. 

What did the RREAF grant do?

In 2024, the CX100 program "Our State, Our Work" was one of six campus-community collaborations awarded a RREAF grant from UNC Rural to support the ongoing data collection of the OSOW team's local work and impact. The project, "Supporting Data Capture and Storytelling of Rural Our State, Our Work Team" delivered needed financial support for data submission and validation to rural OSOW teams across the state whose organizational and administrative capacities are often already strained. The funding also provided rural OSOW Program Managers and their teams with the capacity and incentive to continue to track, input, and report the number of Opportunity Youth (16-24-year-olds not working or in school) that they reached and provided education and/or employment services throughout 2024. 

The OSOW teams received a payment of $900 for each time they completed their input into the shared measurement system (SMS) Teams returned data on time during the two data collection cycles in 2024. The funding made available through the RREAF award could be used to: 

1. Compensate the time of the local program manager collecting and reporting data 
2. Support the ongoing work of the OSOW teams to engage Opportunity Youth in work and school 

While UNC Rural provided funding for 8 of the 13 teams who were home to rural counties, the CX100 team provided funding for the remaining 5 teams that were not considered rural. This ensured that all 13 teams received equal support for ongoing data collection and reporting. 

Why was this project important? 

Completing data collection activities was important to track progress towards this collective goal. When the CX100 team began the OSOW program in the summer of 2022, the 37 counties represented by the 13 OSOW teams accounted for nearly 40% of the Opportunity Youth population, as they were home to 57,900 Opportunity Youth. Twenty-five of the 37 counties were rural. In the spring of 2023, the OSOW teams set a collective goal of reducing the NC OY population by 6,400 by 2025.  

What did we learn through the grant? 

The "Data Capture and Storytelling" grant demonstrated the importance of investing in infrastructure and personnel capacity for data collection and tracking. While collecting data is important for evaluating, communicating, and sustaining progress, it can be difficult for organizations with limited resources and capacity to prioritize this work. This grant helped address the capacity challenge. 

1. By compensating the time and effort of rural program managers to collect and submit data, they were able to better prioritize the task. Rather than being added to an ever-growing list of general responsibilities, data capture was elevated as a task that could support the program manager's salary and/or the budget of their organization. This support was especially beneficial to rural counties with fewer resources available.  
2. The flexibility of the funding was a benefit for teams that opted to use their grant funds to support project acitvities. The funds had fewer restrictions than other sources they typically received to support their work. This allowed rural teams to pursue creative outreach methods to Opportunity Youth, such as social media ads and in-person promotion. The grants also provided employment for Opportunity Youth in rural counties through summer internships.
3. The incentives offered in the grant increased CX100 and the teams' ability to quantify outcomes and share success stories to be included in case studies, tools, and other informational resources about theprogram. These materials can be helpful for other rural communities looking to do similar work to support young adults. Having both quantitative and qualitative data to show the impact of the OSOW programs also helps the rural teams make compelling arguments about their impact as they seek funding and partnerships to further the work. 

The Impact 

The "Data Capture and Storytelling" grant allowed the CX100 team to measure the OSOW communities' achievements, including: 

• 15,848 Opportunity Youth served (exceeding the original goal of 6,400) 

• Nearly $1 million ($973,678.55) in financial assistance provided for education  

• 44,380 educational and employment services delivered  

• 1,439 partnerships formed 

To learn more about the state-wide impact of the "Our State, Our Work" program, view the report here.