Future Ready Bexar County: A Year of Partnership, Progress and Possibility
When Dr. Cathy Jones joined UP Partnership as Chief Executive Officer in July 2025, she stepped into an organization with a clear purpose: helping Bexar County transform a bold vision for young people into measurable, community-wide action.
Improving outcomes for young people requires more than great individual programs; it requires schools, nonprofits, employers, higher education, philanthropy, and government working together toward a common purpose. That’s the idea behind the Future Ready Bexar County Plan, a countywide initiative that brings together more than 100 partner organizations. Guided by four focus areas — Healing, Access, Voice, and Systems Support — Future Ready transforms a shared vision into a shared way of working, recognizing that every young person’s success is shaped by the relationships, opportunities, and systems around them.
Together, these organizations are working toward the Future Ready Bexar County North Star goal of increasing the percentage of Bexar County high school graduates who enroll in a postsecondary degree or credential program to 70% by 2030.
UP Partnership serves as the backbone organization for Future Ready Bexar County. Rather than replacing the important direct service work of schools or community organizations, it helps connect partners, coordinate efforts, measure progress, and strengthen accountability so that individual contributions lead to lasting, community-wide results.
Over the past year, that shared way of working produced measurable results across Bexar County. Regional outcomes also improved, with College, Career, and Military Readiness increasing to 71% and dual credit completion rising 3% over the previous year. Since the 2022–23 baseline year, TSI Reading has improved 6% and TSI Math has increased 11%.
Future Ready also expanded opportunities for young people to shape the systems that affect their lives, engaging 20 young leaders in leadership development, supporting 16 civic engagement opportunities, engaging in 12 policy advocacy actions, and helping register more than 100 young people to vote.
These milestones—alongside expanded college and career advising, stronger youth-serving organizations, new national investments, and better alignment of public resources—demonstrate how Future Ready is turning a shared way of working into measurable systems change that improves outcomes for young people.
Aligning an Ecosystem Around Shared Accountability
One of the most significant milestones of the past year wasn’t the launch of a new program; it was strengthening the framework that helps partners work together toward shared outcomes.
Designed to strengthen accountability across the Future Ready network, the Institutional Agreement process invited partners to identify the specific strategies within the Future Ready Bexar County Plan that their work advances, select shared Key Performance Indicators (KPIs), establish baseline data, and commit to measurable outcomes through 2028. By creating a common framework for measuring progress, the process helps partners see how their individual contributions connect to a larger, countywide effort to improve outcomes for young people.
Throughout the process, UP Partnership staff served as partner coaches, helping organizations align their priorities with the Future Ready Plan while identifying opportunities for deeper collaboration, shared learning, and coordinated action.
The Institutional Agreements also laid the foundation for the Future Ready Ecosystem Map, an interactive tool that illustrates how organizations across Bexar County are connected through shared strategies and action commitments. More than a directory of participating organizations, the map helps partners, funders, policymakers, and community members better understand who is contributing to Future Ready, how organizations are aligned around the plan, and where opportunities exist to strengthen collaboration and collective impact. By making those connections visible, the Ecosystem Map reinforces that improving outcomes for young people is a shared responsibility, one that depends on coordinated action across the entire community.
Building a Countywide Advising Ecosystem Through Advise Me 210
For a middle school student, preparing for life after high school can feel a long way off. Yet the decisions students make as early as sixth grade, from choosing courses and exploring career interests to preparing for college entrance requirements, can shape the opportunities available to them years later. Just as important, students and families need access to trusted guidance that helps them understand those decisions and navigate them with confidence.
That’s the vision behind Advise Me 210.
Over the past year, Future Ready Bexar County continued to strengthen a coordinated advising ecosystem designed to ensure students receive consistent, high-quality guidance no matter where they seek it. Rather than creating another standalone advising program, Advise Me 210 is helping transform advising into a countywide system of support.
Over the past year, that work included:
- Redesigning the Advise Me 210 Guide for middle school students in grades 6–8, giving schools and youth-serving organizations greater flexibility to deliver advising through classroom instruction, small-group discussions, or one-on-one conversations.
- Launching the 2026 Advising Pilots, which expanded personalized advising and family engagement across participating school districts and community organizations. Led by five institutions across Bexar County, the pilots reached nearly 1,900 students through locally designed advising strategies tailored to their communities’ needs. In East Central ISD alone, advisors conducted more than 860 advising sessions, and 98% of participating seniors completed a college application, demonstrating the impact coordinated advising can have on students’ postsecondary success.
- Beyond the Advising Pilots, Advise Me 210 and the region’s broader advising ecosystem facilitated more than 700 advising sessions through collaborative efforts among advising partners and communities of practice.
- Using lessons from the pilot to continue refining Advise Me 210 as a scalable, countywide advising ecosystem that can continue to grow with community needs.
Future Ready partners also collaborated through the Advise Me 210 Policy Taskforce, bringing together K–12, higher education, and community leaders to identify policy recommendations that strengthen postsecondary readiness across the region.
To further strengthen coordinated support, advising information from Advise Me 210 sessions was integrated into the Future Ready Alert System (FRAS) Individual Dashboard, a secure tool available to participating advising partners through the pilot. Supporting 11,254 students across 32 campuses and 9 youth development organizations, the dashboard brings together attendance, behavior, grades, and advising history in one place, helping partners identify student needs earlier, coordinate support more effectively, and ensure young people receive the guidance they need at the right time.
These efforts culminated in the launch of AdviseMe210.org, a centralized resource designed to help students, families, educators, and advisors navigate every stage of the postsecondary journey. The website brings together videos, planning tools, and community resources into one easy-to-access platform, making it easier for young people to explore college, career, and military pathways while connecting them with the support available throughout Bexar County.
This work has also been strengthened by philanthropy aligning its investments with the Future Ready Bexar County Plan. As an Anchor Partner, the San Antonio Area Foundation committed $25 million to advance Future Ready priorities, including advising, recognizing that lasting change requires coordinated investment—not just individual programs—to create greater impact for young people across Bexar County.
This work advances Future Ready Access Strategy 3a: Build a Community of College and Career Advising and Strategy 3b: Expand Best Practices in College Access. By creating a more coordinated approach to advising, Future Ready partners are helping ensure that students receive consistent information and support regardless of where they attend school or where they seek guidance.
By aligning partners, tools, data, and resources around a common approach to advising, Future Ready Bexar County is making it easier for students and families to navigate important decisions with confidence. More than a collection of advising resources, Advise Me 210 represents a coordinated ecosystem of support designed to help more young people successfully pursue the postsecondary pathway that best reflects their goals, strengths, and aspirations.
Connecting Education to Workforce Opportunity
Future Ready Bexar County recognizes that there is no single path to success after high school. While some students choose a four-year university, others pursue community college, technical education, industry-recognized credentials, apprenticeships, military service, or direct entry into the workforce. What matters is that every young person has access to a pathway that prepares them for long-term success.
Helping students navigate those pathways requires more than strong advising; it also requires a clear understanding of where future opportunities exist. That understanding inspired the launch of the Bexar County Workforce Needs Assessment, a collaborative effort designed to strengthen the connection between education and workforce development across the region.
Led by UP Partnership in collaboration with greater:SATX, Alamo Colleges District, school districts, employers, workforce leaders, and community partners, the assessment provides a shared understanding of the industries, occupations, and skills that will shape Bexar County’s future. Rather than asking education and workforce systems to operate independently, the initiative creates a common foundation for planning, helping partners better align education pathways with regional workforce demand.
The assessment is intended to serve as more than a snapshot of today’s labor market. It provides community leaders with the information needed to make more strategic decisions about where investments, partnerships, and educational opportunities can have the greatest impact. By identifying emerging workforce trends and aligning them with student pathways, the region is better positioned to prepare young people for success in high-demand, high-wage careers.
This work advances Future Ready Access Strategy 3b: Expand Best Practices in College Access by strengthening the connection between postsecondary pathways and career opportunities. Whether students pursue a college degree, an industry-recognized credential, technical training, military service, or another postsecondary pathway, the Workforce Needs Assessment helps ensure those options are informed by regional workforce demand and connected to meaningful career opportunities.
Accelerating Opportunity for Boys and Young Men of Color
Strong partnerships don’t just create local impact; they also create opportunities to attract new resources, strengthen collaboration, and accelerate change.
This year, Bexar County was selected by the Obama Foundation’s My Brother’s Keeper Alliance (MBK Alliance) as one of its newest Accelerator Communities, recognizing the region’s collaborative commitment to improving outcomes for Boys and Young Men of Color. The designation reflects years of work by school districts, higher education institutions, community organizations, employers, philanthropy, and youth leaders working together through Future Ready Bexar County to expand opportunity, foster belonging, and remove barriers to future success. That work has already produced measurable results, including training more than 120 educators across 12 campuses to strengthen restorative practices, increasing the use of relationship-centered and peer-led restorative approaches while contributing to declines in student suspensions.
As the backbone organization for My Brother’s Keeper San Antonio (MBKSA), UP Partnership works alongside partners including Edgewood ISD, Harlandale ISD, San Antonio ISD, Southwest ISD, Alamo Colleges District, greater:SATX, United Way of San Antonio and Bexar County, the San Antonio Area Foundation, and numerous community organizations to align strategies, share accountability, and improve outcomes for Boys and Young Men of Color. Together, these partners are strengthening advising, expanding postsecondary pathways, increasing access to work-based learning opportunities, and creating environments where young people are supported to thrive academically, personally, and professionally.
Selection as an Accelerator Community also brought a $200,000 implementation investment from the MBK Alliance to help advance locally identified priorities. Rather than prescribing a single solution, the investment builds the work already taking place across Bexar County, providing additional resources to deepen collaboration, strengthen regional capacity, and accelerate progress toward shared goals. Additional support from the Enterprise Mobility Foundation’s ROAD Forward initiative further reinforced national confidence in the collaborative work underway across the region.
This work advances both Future Ready Healing Strategy 2a and Access Strategy 3b by strengthening the relationships, opportunities, and systems that support Boys and Young Men of Color as they prepare for life after high school. At its core, the initiative is ensuring that every young person has access to the relationships, resources, and opportunities they need to reach their full potential.
Strengthening the Organizations and Investments Behind Student Success
Helping more young people succeed requires more than expanding opportunities, it requires strengthening the organizations, partnerships, and investments that make those opportunities possible. Over the past year, Future Ready Bexar County continued building a stronger support system for young people by investing in organizational capacity, aligning philanthropic resources, and coordinating public investments that support children and youth across Bexar County.
One of the year’s most significant investments in organizational capacity was the Catalyst Exchange Network Support Pilot (NSP), a national initiative that equips organizations across education and the social sector with the expertise, tools, and hands-on support needed to strengthen their long-term impact. Through a six-month co-investment, ten Future Ready Youth Development Organizations received $30,000 each from UP Partnership and Catalyst Exchange to pursue projects tailored to their unique needs. Together, participating organizations completed 12 organizational improvement projects focused on strategic planning, financial sustainability, technology, leadership development, and other critical areas that strengthen long-term effectiveness. Every participating organization achieved its project goals.
Future Ready’s commitment to organizational capacity extended beyond Catalyst Exchange investment. Through New Opportunities and Horizons, the San Antonio Area Foundation invested in organizational assessments, strategic coaching, implementation support, flexible funding, and leadership development for 16 organizations, strengthening the infrastructure needed to better serve young people and families. United Way of San Antonio and Bexar County further advanced Future Ready priorities by investing nearly $6 million in organizations supporting math, reading, absenteeism, TSIA readiness, and opportunity youth. Together, these investments demonstrate how Future Ready partners are aligning resources to strengthen the organizations that make student success possible.
Future Ready also invested in helping organizations strengthen how they use data to inform decisions and demonstrate impact. In partnership with UT San Antonio, Future Ready launched the UTSA Data Capacity Building Cohort, providing youth-serving organizations with hands-on learning, technical assistance, and peer collaboration to strengthen data collection, analysis, and evaluation practices. Beyond building technical skills, the cohort created a community of practice where organizations could share ideas, learn from one another, and improve how they measure and communicate their impact.
While these efforts strengthened the capacity of individual organizations, UP Partnership also developed a Public Investment Tracker, which provides a shared view of city, county, state, and federal investments supporting children and youth across Bexar County, helping partners identify funding gaps, strengthen accountability, and align future investments with the Future Ready Bexar County Plan. By combining shared data with coordinated advocacy, Future Ready is helping ensure public resources are invested where they can have the greatest impact on young people.
The Future Ready Public Investment Tracker found that partners helped unlock millions in public funding since 2023 toward Future Ready’s goal of aligning $333 million in investments that support young people, which is strategy 4a: Grow public investments in children and youth.
Through intentional advocacy by Future Ready partners, the collaborative effort has helped unlock $49.1 million in public funding from the City of San Antonio and state funds since 2023. Despite deficits in the City’s budget, those advocacy efforts also contributed to the Department of Human Services’ proposal to sustain delegate agency funding for FY2027—a decision that could preserve services provided by 55 nonprofit and youth-serving organizations, including 22 new agencies and 26 new programs.
Together, these efforts demonstrate that improving outcomes for young people requires more than investing in individual programs. It requires strengthening the organizations that serve them, aligning public and philanthropic resources around shared priorities, and equipping partners with the tools, data, and relationships needed to work together. By building organizational capacity, coordinating investments, and supporting collaborative decision-making, Future Ready Bexar County is creating a stronger, more sustainable ecosystem where every young person has greater opportunities to succeed.
Looking Ahead
The accomplishments of the past year represent more than individual initiatives or organizational milestones. Together, they reflect a continued commitment to strengthening the Future Ready Bexar County ecosystem—aligning partners, expanding opportunities, investing in organizations, improving transparency, and building the systems needed to support young people at every stage of their journey.
None of this work happens in isolation. It is made possible by school districts, higher education institutions, youth-serving organizations, employers, philanthropy, government agencies, and countless community partners who have chosen to work toward a shared vision for Bexar County’s future. Their collaboration demonstrates that lasting change is not the result of any one organization, but of a community willing to align around common goals and shared accountability.
The Future Ready Bexar County Plan set an ambitious North Star: increasing postsecondary enrollment among Bexar County high school graduates to 70 percent by 2030. Achieving that goal will require continued collaboration, innovation, and investment. More importantly, it will require a community that believes every young person deserves the opportunity to build a future that reflects their goals, strengths, and aspirations.
The first year of Dr. Jones’ leadership has been defined not by changing the direction of Future Ready Bexar County, but by building strategically on its momentum—strengthening the partnerships, systems, and shared accountability that make collective impact possible. As that momentum continues to grow, so does the opportunity to ensure that every child and young person in Bexar County is future ready.