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Who
We Help 2008 GRANTS AWARDED: WHO gives $208,250 to 11 recipients! The WHO (Women Helping Others®) Foundation recently awarded $208,250 to 11 not-for-profit organizations dedicated to serving the needs of women and children. The following organizations were this year’s deserving recipients. The smallest, most innocent in our society deserve protection and the best of care, which is why Angels Foster Family Network needs more foster families for their innovative parenting program. Their Infants in Crisis Project recruits, trains and provides support for new foster families to help care for the more than 7,000 children in San Diego County, CA. The WHO Foundation awarded $5,000 to enable Angels to meet its goal of making 50 new infant placements in stable, nurturing homes. Early detection is critical when diagnosing breast cancer and yet many female low-wage earners are not able to afford preventative health screenings. With a recently awarded $30,500 WHO grant, Creating Healthy Lives, Inc., an organization that currently screens for many high-risk health problems, will be able to expand their screening service to offer free mammography screenings and clinical breast exams. These screenings will be available to 150 at-risk, underserved or low-income women during breast cancer awareness months (October, November and December) each year, along with follow-up care, education and evaluation. With this new program, Creating Healthy Lives, Inc. will help create a better quality of life for the community of Indian Wells Valley, CA. Treatment for a child with cancer places an enormous burden on every member of the family, and the strain is amplified in families struggling to make ends meet. Improving the quality of life for children with cancer, and supporting their families in the challenges they face, is the mission of Jacob’s Heart Children’s Cancer Association, which serves those living in Santa Cruz, North Monterey and San Benito counties, CA. WHO’s $15,000 grant will go directly to families with children diagnosed with cancer in the form of pre-paid gas and grocery vouchers, household bill payments, phone cards and memorials. This financial support will give respite during this extremely stressful time in their lives and help provide ongoing support through all phases of the child’s treatment. Learning to read begins when parents read to their children at a young age and this influences their development throughout their school years. Parents in poverty are less likely to read to their children causing them to begin school with a learning deficit. The Chris Webber Foundation is answering the need to educate mothers on the importance of reading to their children by delivering Wee Reader kits to their homes. Through the Wee Readers program, book kits are delivered to pregnant mothers by social workers who explain the importance of reading to their children. The social worker follows up with the mother and also gives books to other children in the household. The $10,000 grant awarded by WHO will be used to purchase children’s books for 600 pregnant women on Medicaid and to educate them on the importance of giving the gift of reading to their children. Seton Center Family & Health Services provides dental care for low-income children, ages 2-19, through their Wee Smile program. When left untreated, dental decay can lead to sleeping, eating, speaking, hearing and learning problems in youngsters. Seton is committed to identifying and treating children with tooth decay in order to prevent dental disease which can be detrimental to overall health in adulthood. The $30,000 grant awarded by WHO will be used to treat any indigent child in the Greater Kansas City area who would otherwise go without dental care and will also help to implement their “Adopt-a-Site” program which gives dental care to disadvantaged children in early learning sites. Breaking the cycle of intergenerational incarceration is a challenge. Children of incarcerated parents frequently come from single-parent homes and are faced with tremendous disruptions when that parent goes to jail. Frequently, the children perform poorly in school and adopt aggressive behaviors. Motherly Intercession seeks to provide academic development to children of incarcerated parents in order to promote school success, encourage life skills training and reduce the risk for aggressive and violent behavior. The vision of Motherly Intercession is to help these children realize their parents’ destiny does not have to be theirs. The WHO Foundation granted $16,000 for educational material and software, transportation, meals and equipment to help these children academically and keep them on a track to success. Since 1996, the New Opportunity School for Women has provided job skills counseling, personal counseling and interviewing training for low-income, middle-aged women, ages 30-55, living in Kentucky and south central Appalachia. Twice a year, fourteen women participate in a three-week program that provides education options, identifies job skills and interests and promotes mental health. Each woman also receives a physical exam, pap test and mammogram. The $10,000 grant will be used for participant room and board, instructor and classroom expenses, books and supplies. It is the mission of New Opportunity School for Women to improve the circumstances of low-income, middle-aged women and thereby positively influence their children and grandchildren for a better future. WV Health Right is a free clinic where volunteer health professionals provide patient care, screenings, diagnosis and treatment for low-income women who are not insured and lack the means to pay for health care. The WHO Foundation granted $21,250 to their Vaginal Health Care program which will provide pap screenings for 1,500-2,000 women. Women with abnormal screenings will be referred to a volunteer provider for on-site biopsies, colposcopies, surgery or other treatment as needed. This program also provides for on-site aftercare and follow-up. On the Utah and Arizona Navajo reservations, impoverished Navajo Elder women weave rugs to supplement their limited incomes to buy food, firewood, household supplies and gasoline. Adopt-a-Native Elder Program (ANE) provides these women with quality wool yarn and a market to sell their rugs at full value. In spring and fall, ANE volunteers make food runs to deliver food, supplies and yarn. With a $40 bundle of yarn, Elders can weave a $300 rug which ANE volunteers collect from the weavers to sell at the ANE Annual Deer Valley Rug Show and Sale and through ANE’s on-line rug catalogue. Elders set the price and receive the entire sale. ANE requested $5,600 for yarn but was awarded $30,000 to purchase wool bundles and to also provide medical, food, firewood and supplies for five Elder women. In the Detroit area, many children go to bed with very little to keep them warm and comfortable because parents living in poverty are not able to afford luxuries such as blankets. Because sleep is such a vital component of healthy development, Sweet Dreamzzz, Inc. is committed to helping low-income children through their R.E.M. (Rest, Educate, Motivate) program. R.E.M. educates children on the importance of sleep and each child receives a “sleep kit” which includes an adult-size sleeping bag, nightshirt, stuffed animal, socks, toothbrush, toothpaste, tote bag, crayons and activity book. Sweet Dreamzzz requested $14,125 to serve 500 children but the WHO Foundation generously awarded $30,000 so that 1,000 children can receive sleep kits and stay warm this winter. For years, Recording for the Blind and Dyslexic (RFB&D) has served people who cannot effectively read standard print because of visual impairment, dyslexia or other physical disabilities. RFB&D has expanded its services to address low literacy rates in 10 Denver, CO elementary schools through its Learning Through Listening program. These targeted schools have high poverty rates and many students are learning English as a second language. A WHO grant of $16,500 to the Learning Through Listening program will provide audio textbooks and specialized playback equipment to special-needs students in order to help them succeed in school. |
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