The Importance of Looking Upstream

By: Matt Vessely | Regional President, 1st Source Bank

A few years ago I had the pleasure of working with a group of fellow board members at the Porter County Community Foundation (PCCF) in a series of workshops around assessing community needs that could eventually be addressed with the support from Lilly Endowment.

In one particularly memorable session, the facilitator shared a parable that conveyed the importance of looking “upstream” when solving problems.  There are several versions of the parable, but it goes something like this… 

You are walking down a path on the bank of a flowing stream with a friend, when you spot a person floating down the stream who is clearly struggling – so you jump in and save them.  Then a few minutes later, another struggling person floats by, and you jump in again to save them.  This keeps happening over and over and while you’re managing to save each person that floats by – and while you’re starting to tire of your efforts, you notice that instead of helping you frantically save those in trouble, your friend is running on the path upstream.  You call out – “where are you going – I need your help”; and the friend says “I’m going upstream to see what’s causing all of these people jump into the water”.

All too often, communities and organizations spend too much time, energy, and money dealing with the pressing issues of the day – rather than looking “upstream” and trying to fix the source of the downstream problems. 

This perspective helped our group focus on the critical formative years of and the early learning and development that take place in the first few years of a child’s life.  What could be more “upstream” than that?  And ultimately, with the support of the Lilly Endowment, PCCF embarked on a community leadership journey in this space, which began with the founding of First Things First Porter County – which is a community effort to support families, healthy beginnings, and quality early learning for EVERY Porter County Baby.

As a PCCF board member and interested community leader, I have remained involved in our community efforts in this area, and then last fall, I had the opportunity to join the 2021 cohort of the Strosacker Early Learning Fellowship (SELF).

Participating in SELF helped me to gain a deeper and broader understanding of the early learning “space”, which prepared me to be a more effective community influencer.

A couple things really stand out as I reflect on my experience in SELF.

-Brain Science – I found the sessions on brain science to be fascinating. Did you know that 85% of brain development occurs in the first 3 years of life? I didn’t. I also didn’t realize how much simple human interaction between infants and caregivers impacts brain development.  Learning more about brain science and understanding that there isn’t a way to “make it up” later in life really cemented the importance of Early Learning as a true upstream challenge.

-Business Case – Did you know that a $1- investment in children ages 0-5 years up to an $8- return to individual/community.  This is where the “upstream” concept resonates the most with me as a business and community leader.  I often look at the resources we deploy to solve various issues in our community and wonder what would happen if we would deploy resources more effectively “upstream”.

I have found my experiences in the early learning space over the past few years to be very fulfilling, both personally and professionally.  I’ve had the pleasure of getting to know some amazing people, and incredible organizations.  It’s wonderful to see the community rallying around early learning and taking pride in working together to ensure that all our babies have a great start in life.