Education Highlight: Helping kids achieve their potential

Because we’re dedicated to making your community investment achieve lasting results, United Way of Elgin approaches community issues using “Community Impact.” By bringing everyone around a set of collective issues and priorities, the United Way can better serve the long-term health and welfare of our community.

We’ve identified and formed impact councils around the following issues:

• Education: Helping children and youth achieve their full potential
• Income: Promoting financial stability and independence
• Health: Improving people’s health

Because all of our programs are focused on these three issues, we thought we’d highlight for you some of the work we’re doing in these areas. This week, we’ll focus on Education.

Our Education initiative ensures that the families in our community have the capacity to act as primary caregivers, with particular focus on creating home and school environments where children and youth have every opportunity to become literate, secure, and prepared for productive adulthood. Our programs in this area focus on everything from day care for low income families to tutoring to promoting family engagement with their children’s education. Some of our programming focuses on programs offered by individual agencies, and some are collaborative between agencies or even driven by our own impact council. A few to highlight:

• Parental Engagement Program at Highland Elementary. This program encourages parents to be actively involved with their children’s education. It encourages parents to attend conferences, volunteer in their child’s classroom, and educates parents on important opportunities for their child to learn and grow.
• Getting Ready for Kindergarten Calendar. Children are far more successful and more likely to stay in school in their older years if they enter kindergarten ready to learn. So our Education Impact Council developed a “Getting Ready for Kindergarten Calendar” to help parents of 4 and 5 year olds prepare their children to enter school. The calendar is available to download online in English and Spanish, and contains ideas for fun activities that develop a variety of skills, kindergarten registration and other school information, recommended books, local resources and useful websites.
• Dolly Parton Imagination Library. Reading to children from a young age is another way to prepare them to enter Kindergarten ready to learn. So we brought this program to the Elgin area so every child has their own library of books. The program sends free books monthly to children from birth to age five in Elgin, South Elgin, Hampshire, Burlington, Pingree Grove, and La Fox. Parents can find out how to sign up here.

You can see the rest of our current education impact initiatives on our education impact page. We are currently in the process of evaluating new programs for 2010 and 2011.

Dolly Parton Imagination Library celebrates 1 year anniversary in Elgin!

We launched the Dolly Parton Imagination Library in Elgin in February 2009, and since then have exceeded the goal of signing up 20% of eligible children with almost 2,500 kids receiving free books. So far, over 19,000 books have been mailed to local families, thanks to our inaugural sponsor, Provena Saint Joseph Hospital, Elgin Township, and current sponsor, JPMorgan Chase Foundation.

United Way of Elgin’s Dolly Parton Imagination Library has been nominated for an Elgin Image Award for Outstanding Project. The winner will be announced at a public reception Thursday, March 11. [UPDATE: We won! Read the Courier News article about the awards.]

If you’re unfamiliar with the program, free books are mailed monthly to children from birth to age 5 who live in Elgin, South Elgin, Hampshire, Burlington, Pingree Grove and La Fox. There are no income requirements and no costs to the families. Families just have to sign up their eligible children! Read more about the Dolly Parton Imagination Library at our website, or sign up your child on the Dolly Parton site.

You can sponsor a year’s worth of books for a child in the Imagination Library by making a $30 donation.

Also, become a fan of the Dolly Parton Imagination Library on Facebook and follow them on Twitter. And if you’re not a fan of United Way of Elgin on Facebook yet, fan us now, and follow us on Twitter!

Scholarships available to publicly active students

We at United Way of Elgin are big fans of people who take an active role advocating for their community. And we especially love to see those who take a strong role at a young age. We’re happy to see that Senator Michael Noland is able to award college scholarships to students who have been active in civic and public affairs, demonstrate academic achievement and who need scholarship assistance.

This Illinois General Assembly Scholarship provides a one-year tuition waver to a student that is a resident of the 22nd Legislative District. To be eligible, you must be either:

• A high school student applying to or accepted at Chicago State University; Northern Illinois University; Eastern Illinois University; Southern Illinois University – Carbondale or Edwardsville;
  Governors State University; University of Illinois – Urbana, Chicago or Springfield; Illinois State University; Western Illinois University; and Northeastern Illinois University.
• An undergraduate student attending or transferring to the schools listed above.

Eight scholarships will be awarded. If you’re interested in applying, complete the following 3 steps by April 30, 2010:

1. Submit a completed application with requested documentation and a one-page essay.
2. Submit official high school transcripts and, if applicable, official college or university transcripts.
3. Submit three (3) letters of recommendation.

Application forms are available at the 22nd Legislative District Office.  Call Rich Jacobs at 847-214-8864.

All materials should be submitted to:

Senator Michael Noland
Scholarship Committee
22nd Legislative District Office
The Tower Building
100 East Chicago Street, Suite #302
Elgin, IL 60120

Advocate for Human Services in Illinois

Human services are the heart of what United Way of Elgin stands for. We advocate and work for education–helping children and youth achieve their full potential; income–promoting financial stability and independence; and health–improving access to healthcare and overall health. However, across Illinois, human services have been struggling to stay afloat. A new group, Illinois Partners for Human Service, has been formed as a statewide network of organizations that advocate for high quality, responsible and sustainable approaches to providing human service in Illinois.

You might wonder, why does it matter to me? You probably will be surprised to find out that 1 in 3 Elgin residents has used one of the services that United Way of Elgin partners provide. You probably know people who seek care and help for their elderly parents, send their children to after school programs, have sought skills training for getting a job or managing their finances, have found help for mental illness, or have used shelter because of a loss of income or domestic violence.

The Illinois Partners engage nonprofit, government, faith-based, business and education leaders who agree that our communities are healthier and safer when residents have access to bedrock public services such as early childhood learning, after school programs, family support, assistance to the disabled, workforce training, violence prevention, and home care for the elderly.

So how can you help? In January and February, Illinois Partners for Human Service will hold a series of meetings around the state to ensure human services and the people they serve are represented during the 2010 legislative session. You can find out about these meetings at the Illinois Partners Website.

The goal for the Illinois Partners is:

• No More Cuts to Human Services
• Prompt Payment for Services
• No Unilateral Contract Changes

Advocate for Illinois Human Services today!

Update: Bruce Johnson’s Run Across the US for the Crisis Center

Bruce Johnson run for Crisis Center

Bruce Johnson is one month into his run across the country for the Crisis Center of Elgin, from Florida to California. He’s made it through Florida, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, and is currently in Arkansas. In a few days he’ll hit Texas. He averages around 26 miles a day (a marathon every day!) and today will reach his 800th mile.

The incredible distance aside, he’s endured a lot on his adventure, from nearly being run over by a semi on day 12 to a twisted ankle and shin splints to being attacked by dogs. However, he’s had some incredible moments as well, like on Day 18 when a homeless man saw he was running across the US, and without knowing the cause donated $5. You can follow his daily journals on his website.

Most importantly, though, his run is raising money for Elgin’s Community Crisis Center, and he’s up to $7,001 raised as of today. He is regularly visited by local media in towns he runs through, and so it’s possible that is helping to drum up support for his run. And as usual, Elginites are pulling through with donations for this great cause. The donation site is asking for $12 donations, to cover the cost of 1 foot of the run. You can donate here.

You can also keep up with Bruce on his Twitter and Facebook, where he currently has over 1,700 fans.

And if his effort doesn’t inspire you to donate, his reason for running should be motivation enough: “I run for the Crisis Center because I know how it feels to have no place to go; to be abused by the people who are supposed to love you; and, to try to make a new and better life for yourself.”

A Brush with Kindness Offers Exterior Maintenance to Homeowners in Need

The Habitat for Humanity of Northern Fox Valley has recently launched a new program – A Brush with Kindness – that partners with low-income homeowners to perform exterior maintenance to their homes. The program is aiming to complete ten maintenance projects in 2010 without any cost to the homeowners.

Volunteers within the Brush with Kindness program will complete painting, landscaping and yard cleanup to qualified homeowners in need. The program will also use donated materials to complete the projects when possible.

The homeowners are chosen based on several qualifications, including financial situation, feasibility of the project and the homeowner’s willingness to partner with Habitat for Humanity. The program aligns with Habitat’s mission of ensuring that affordable and decent housing is available to low-income families.

The program is underwritten by a grant from Valspar, Habitat’s National Paint Partner. Potential applicants for the Brush with Kindness Program can contact Justin Lucas at 847-836-1432 or visit their website for more information.

Habitat for Humanity of Northern Fox Valley is an affiliate of Habitat for Humanity International. As all affiliates, its mission is to build homes for qualifying families in our area, selling them at cost and using volunteer labor to control these costs.

If you’re looking to volunteer with Habitat Restore or any other Elgin opportunity, check our list of volunteer opportunities.