ChildSavers is one of the partner organizations RMHF is proud to support via our General Operating Support (GOS) grants. They are also celebrating their 100-year anniversary this year, having dedicated a century to serving Richmond’s children and addressing the long-term health and well-being of our youngest residents.
As a part of this partner spotlight, our intern, Chelsea Brown sat down with ChildSavers’ CEO L. Robert Bolling to discuss the organization’s transformative work, this important anniversary, and his bold plans for the future through the ChildSavers100 project. What follows is an article based on their interview.
ChildSavers is an organization that has been dedicated to the well-being of Richmond’s children for 100 years. Its knowledge and understanding of early childhood education have provided the organization with a firm foundation that propels their mental health work. As they approach their centennial, CEO L. Robert Bolling reflects on the success of their strategic vision through ChildSavers100. This project, in Bolling’s words, refers back to their mission: “How can we continue to serve kids who have been truly traumatized such that they can thrive in life?” Their goals include increasing the number of children receiving mental health services, enrolling in quality early childcare, and growing their endowment and capital.
Though ChildSavers100 reflects on the organization’s growth and the progress they’ve made over the last century, the project also aims to inspire Richmonders to look toward the next 100 years. Bolling, the first Black CEO of the organization, leads this project, focused on the past, present and future, and guided by a drive to create new opportunities.
Having grown up in Church Hill just blocks away from the current site of ChildSavers and experiencing different socio-economic conditions, Bolling is highly familiar with the impact of opportunity. He commented on this unique history and the experiences of those who came before him: Black Richmonders and Virginians driven and motivated by their struggles while also acknowledging that, “No matter what has happened in the past, we have an opportunity to be great.”
This acknowledgment of our difficult history and ChildSavers’ role within it has driven Bolling to look deeply at diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging within the organization; more specifically, what they mean for an organization where 85% of the children served are children of color. With this fact in mind, Bolling has worked tirelessly to make ChildSavers an organization that better reflects the population it supports.
There’s no doubt that Bolling remains steadfastly committed to social progress, while also dedicated to constantly improving services based on new data and emerging research. He embraces, as he said, “Changing with the times and living in the moment.” Bolling’s future-thinking approach to leadership will help not only strengthen ChildSavers’ in the short-term, but will lay the foundation for ChildSavers’ over the next 100 years.
Ultimately, Robert Bolling envisions bold expansions, including planned gifts, statewide growth, more school-based and early education work, an established and influential policy office, and improved data collection and analysis, a legacy made possible by his and ChildSavers’ enduring dedication to the health and well-being of Richmond’s children.