Project Rescue Vision

Cory (age13), Brock (11) and Makenzie (7) Snyder started project Rescue Vision in March 1996 to raise money in order to provide the local fire department with better equipment.

When the Snyder children saw a story on NBC’s “Dateline” about 3 children who were killed in a fire because the firefighters could not see them, they wondered if Bowie’s fire department had the necessary equipment to avoid this type of catastrophe. They did not, so the Snyder children set out to do something about it. The main piece of equipment needed was an Infrared Imaging System (IRIS). An IRIS allows firefighters to see through smoke, fog and darkness. The IRIS costs $25,000 and the Bowie fire department did not have the money for that or other vital pieces of equipment.

During the children’s spring break and summer vacation, they worked tirelessly to get their fire department an IRIS. They got their own post-office box, trademarked their name and acquired a tax-exempt number. They received help from family, friends and kids of all ages to help get the word out. They went door to door, visited businesses and handed out fliers to get any donations.

The whole community was behind the Snyders as well as some big businesses. Prudential gave Cory a volunteerism award and donated a defibrillator to the Bowie fire department. When Project Rescue Vision raised $9,000, Wal-Mart matched that and doubled their money. Brock won second place in an essay contest, sponsored by Mattel, giving them $2,500 toward the project.

The town of Bowie has benefited tremendously from Cory, Brock and Makenzie’s work. Through their efforts they raised $37,500 and bought an IRIS for the fire department. They also had enough money to purchase two self-contained breathing apparatus (SCBA’s) as well as three gas monitors.

The Snyder’s work didn’t stop there. Project Rescue Vision has $3,000 in donations toward their future endeavors. They are currently working toward getting the fire department and first aid squad much needed equipment like a jaws of life and a defibrillator for each firetruck and ambulance.

Audrey Nations

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Public Housing Drug Elimination Tutoring Program

The Housing Authority of the County of Salt Lake (HASCL) sponsors a tutoring program under their Drug Elimination Program (DEP) which addresses the educational needs of children residing in public housing units. Over 200 children, from kindergarten to ninth grade, participate. Many of these children have learning difficulties and have experienced repeated failures in the classroom.

The DEP Tutoring Program began with 15 students in November, 1992, in two public housing complexes. By February 8, 1994, there were 120 children enrolled in tutoring from seven public housing complexes. They range in age from 5 to 15. When their parents enrolled them in the program, they ranged from a few months to two years behind their grade levels. The DEP Education Coordinator recruits and trains new volunteer tutors who are paired with children based on their learning problem.

Each child is evaluated prior to their first tutoring session and quarterly thereafter. The tutoring sessions are provided weekly for each grade level with small groups of children working together with a volunteer. Reading, math and comprehension are taught via individual lesson plans. Each child’s completed work is graded and filed weekly. The DEP Education Coordinator meets with individual public school classroom teachers as needed yearly to share information and get specific feedback about learning problems and class work recommendations.

The DEP Tutoring Program is administered by the HACSL Resident Services Program. The University of Utah, Salt Lake Community College and other community groups assist by providing volunteers. The Salt Lake, Granite and Jordan School Districts provide books, supplies and lunches during the summer months. In addition, the Salt Lake County Library contributes books for an on-site library. The volunteer tutors donate 111 hours each week, the food bank donates bread, candy, cookies and fruit each month, the local school district provides classroom space, supplies and materials each year.

All children attending the tutoring program have made academic improvements. As the children improved at school, their parents often noted accompanying gains at home. They learning how to share and take turns in tutoring and how to complete their assignments with care and accuracy. The DEP law enforcement officers reported fewer problems with children who attend DEP tutoring classes.

The local schools report fewer failing grades and better attendance by children in tutoring. This, the program believes, will translate into more high school graduates, fewer gang members and a break in the cycle of generations of families who remain in public housing because of lack of education and job skills.

Diana French

Diana French created Brother to Brother International in 1982 to address the needs of charities internationally. Brother to Brother locates American businesses willing to donate humanitarian products such as medicine, food and clothing and matches them with charities around the world. Unlike other gift-in-kind programs, Brother to Brother provides its services at no cost to non-profit organizations.

Ms. French serves as the liaison between American businesses and the charities they wish to help. Brother to Brother uses a sophisticated database that matches the needs of charities throughout the nation and around the world to businesses with resources to donate. Under Ms. French, Brother to Brother has been able to connect more than $300 million dollars’ worth of items to more than 1,000 charities since its inception.

Ms. French has transformed Brother to Brother from a local organization, exclusively serving the Tempe area, to an international organization. Brother to Brother is currently ranked as the eighth largest gift-in-kind program.

Brother to Brother’s more than 250 part time and 30 full time volunteers range from former welfare recipients to retirees. These volunteers work together with Ms. French to ensure that the needs of various groups are met.

Ms. French has overseen the establishment of the Brother to Brother Book Project. The administrative and staff costs are underwritten by World Vision. The largest expense for Brother to Brother is transporting the donated items, a cost that is usually absorbed by the donor.

St. Bernard School

The Saint Bernard School Student-To-Student Buddy Program matches middle school students with younger homeless children. The program’s goal is to foster leadership and community skills in the Study Buddies, while providing a needed service to homeless children.

In 1996, St. Bernard donated more than 400 books to the Volunteers of America Family Emergency Shelter (FES). Then, students from Saint Bernard visited the shelter to read to other children living in the shelter. Within a short period, some parents in the shelter expressed that they desired to learn how to read.

Twice each month, students with chaperones visit the shelter on a rotating basis to read with the children and parents. Study Buddies has grown from 45 to 65 students. In addition, adults affiliated with the program discuss books or share literacy issues with adults at the shelter.

Before the formation of the program, homeless individuals were not allowed to check out library books since they could not provide a permanent address. St. Bernard worked with the Louisville Public Library to eliminate this provision.

During the summer, students take children from the shelter to baseball games and arrange car washes as fund-raisers. Furthermore, the eighth grade class at St. Bernard established a student council that visits other schools to recruit more volunteers for the program and to share their experiences from the shelter.

The Volunteer Program at Rush Hospice

The Volunteer Program of Rush Hospice Partners (RHP) was started in April of 1995, when several community-based programs combined to provide awareness and access to compassionate hospice care. The program is dedicated to excellence in patient care by providing diversified services, education and research.

RHP provides end of life care to terminally ill patients, as well as support for their families. They also unite patients with their families in their homes, which makes them more comfortable than being alienated in a hospital. They offer companionship to the families and assistance during periods of bereavement. RHP looks at both the patient and the family as the unit of care. They want to extend hospice care to whoever needs it and educate people to help meet the needs of everyone.

Volunteers are members of the community who come from all walks of life. There are attorneys who offer legal services, public relations specialists who assist with grant and newsletter writing and religious leaders from all denominations who provide spiritual guidance for both patient and family. RHP volunteers also assist in filing and administrative duties. There are also many children and teenagers from the communities who offer their help whenever possible.

Funding comes from a variety of ways. RHP receives insurance reimbursements and assistance from Medicare and Medicaid. RHP also applies for grants and holds fund-raisers.

RHP services the Chicago metropolitan area and since its inception has expanded over a seven county area, known as the collar counties. There are approximately 100 volunteers and nurses who are on call 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Ingleside Middle School Students

In 1990, students at Ingleside Middle School began a 3-year volunteer program to develop civic responsibility among its students. During the spring of 1993, the school and the Phoenix Children’s Hospital entered into a community service partnership in which Ingleside students volunteer to help the hospital’s patients.

In response to a continuous need at the local Phoenix Children’s Hospital, Ingleside Middle School developed a year round partnership with the hospital which allows students to volunteer without leaving their campus. To overcome difficulties faced by younger volunteers such as hospital age restrictions, transportation and scheduling, the middle school integrated hospital needs with classroom curriculum.

Various classes addressed appropriate projects identified by the hospital, including collecting Christmas toys, making quilts for babies, collecting books for outpatient clinics and making neonatal nests. For those patients that do not speak English the students created bilingual holiday cards and alphabet books. Another part of the curriculum is collecting videos and music tapes for educational displays.

By incorporating volunteerism into the daily lives of the students, the originators of the project have encouraged a lifelong commitment to community service. For instance, students have approached teachers about branching off into other types of volunteer work.

Ingleside Middle School is setting an example for other middle schools by creating a program that uses volunteer hours from more than 200 students and incorporates community service projects into their daily curriculum.

Franklin County Volunteer Guardian Program

The Franklin County Volunteer Guardian Program was created in January 1994 to match volunteers with mentally disabled adults. The program involves people who volunteer as guardians to clients who have no money, family or support system to help them make medical and legal decisions.

Because the volunteer guardians legally adopt their wards, they must go through an extensive and vigorous process of interviews and attend a basic guardian training. In addition, they receive assistance from program staff and volunteer attorneys from the Columbus Bar Association. Since its inception in 1994, there have been more than 86 volunteer guardians in the program.

Volunteers visit wards to make sure that a good quality of life is maintained. Since volunteers legally adopt these disabled adults, some volunteers make the decisions involving major health issues. Currently, there are 50 active guardians, with some handling more than one case.

The impact of the guardian volunteers can be measured in a variety of ways. Many disabled adults have increased their mobility and activity because of the support and encouragement they receive from volunteers. Their quality of life is raised because people who were once without family or friends now have a guardian who can be a little of both.

The program is funded by a coalition of agencies including the county court system and local county administration.

Patricia Wetterling

In 1989, Ms. Wetterling’s son Jacob was abducted near their home in St. Joseph. This prompted her and her husband to start the Jacob Wetterling Foundation. The foundation is dedicated to educating parents and children so that children are not molested or exploited and to continue the search for Jacob as well as other abducted children throughout the country.

Children and their parents in the St. Joseph area as well as the rest of the country are the recipients of an educational program that promotes the safety of children in their own hometowns. Ms. Wetterling has a long and impressive list of accomplishments. In 1992, she convinced the Minnesota Legislature to require convicted sex offenders to register their place of residence with local law enforcement after their release from parole. In addition, she was appointed to the Governor’s Task Force on Missing Children in 1990. Ms. Wetterling also serves as a trustee and member of the Board of Directors for the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children and as a charter member of the Board of Directors for the Association of Missing and Exploited Children’s Organizations.

Ms. Wetterling also trains law enforcement on behalf of the U.S. Department of Justice’s Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention. Through the efforts of the Jacob Wetterling Foundation in 1997, three abducted children were returned home, eight were located, but found deceased. The foundation is currently working with 40 families to locate their abducted children.

Funding for the foundation comes from contributions, grants and fund-raisers. The foundation has 120 active volunteers from the community; many are college students. The Jacob Wetterling Foundation is based in St. Joseph, Minnesota. It has not physically expanded, but through Ms. Wetterling’s speeches she has raised awareness in communities all over the country.

Stop Abusive Family Environments, Inc.

In 1981, to fight domestic abuse in rural West Virginia, Stop Abusive Family Environment Inc. (SAFE) was created. The organization was created to provide intervention assistance, agency referrals and court advocacy to abuse victims, while trying to create public awareness of domestic problems. SAFE provides services to three counties, McDowell, Wyoming, and Mercer.

From 1990 to 1995, there was a dramatic increase, from 417 to 1,008, in cases of domestic abuse reported to SAFE. Unfortunately, the closest domestic shelter in the area was 60 miles away in Raleigh. SAFE wanted to create a place in the local area that would not only provide shelter to victims but also teach them the skills they would need to make adjustments to their situation.

In 1996, the McDowell County Board of Education donated a closed school building to SAFE. SAFE used $2 million in grants and loans from the West Virginia Development office, the U.S. Department of Housing, the Kellogg Foundation and local agencies to renovate the building into a domestic abuse SAFE HOUSE. Volunteers renovated the building, producing 31 housing units, childcare facilities, a thrift store, an educational center, a playground and a gymnasium. Local community groups and individuals adopted each of the housing units, furnishing the units with furniture and household goods.

The SAFE HOUSE opened in January of 1997. People can stay at the SAFE HOUSE for up to two years. In that time they can attend educational classes on parenting and job preparation skills such as basic computer and literacy. Therapy for both adults and children is provided through counseling and support groups from AmeriCorps volunteers.

Since July, more than 700 shelter night hours and 100 people have already used the facilities. The SAFE HOUSE has approximately 40 volunteers who provide cooking, budgeting, reading and basic computer lessons.

The impact on the community can be seen in by the large amount of support the SAFE HOUSE has received. SAFE had no problem getting local groups to adopt houses or teach classes. Many other cities in West Virginia have asked to tour the SAFE HOUSE to get ideas on creating similar houses.