130 Art Kits for Kids | Mary Stargel and C-Grimey

Before COVID, 20-30 kids met every Wednesday at the Westside YFD Center for an Arts and Culture workshop led by C-Grimey. Students explored and expressed themselves through the medium of art and walked through this weekly journey with excitement and purpose. In an attempt to reconnect and inspire kids in the Westside neighborhood (and a few others), C-Grimey and Mary Stargel requested $3,000 to create 130 art kits that include things like a waterproof watercolor paint set, crayons, paper, and scissors all in a drawstring backpack.

Having these art kits will allow students to continue exploring what mediums they are interested in and expressing themselves through art. In late 2020, a small amount of funds were raised to hand out 30 art kits for the holidays. It was a great way to learn what was needed and how much it cost per kit. Now, with needs assessed and costs in line, our $3,000 will distribute 130 art kits to students at the Westside, Alton Park, and Wheeler House in the spring.

Let's Get Warm | The Winter Joy Project

Nobody should be cold in the winter. Especially children. $1,600 buys a lot of socks. And scarves and hats. The Winter Joy Project is a nonprofit organization that creates packages of winter scarves, hats, and gloves to gift to children in need. Why? For Toni. Their mission is to honor Toni Parkes, a woman who believed in giving whenever she could, and left our world midway through 2020. Toni would have scarves and gloves on hand to give to any child in her neighborhood if she saw they were without.

During this pandemic the stress of contracting the coronavirus, let alone the flu, can be made just a little easier by having access to the tools we need to stay healthy. As the packages are created and distributed by volunteers through community organizations, rec centers, and churches, we create unity by being an active member of a community. Our Chattanooga community.

The Hughes Project | Net Resource Foundation

$1,400 is going to The Net Resource Foundation, thanks to Executive Director Raquetta Dotley. For what? Trees. In partnership with the Westside Community Baptist Church, The Hughes Project will beautify the area between 3996 Hughes Avenue (you picking up on why its called The Hughes Project?) and the Westside Community Garden located at 4023 Hughes Avenue. This beautification aims to cool the area from the Urban Heat Island Effect with cooling from strategically placed trees, provide recreational green space, and an open food source with the community garden.

In a partnership with the city, we’ll be buying 20 bare root Apple Serviceberry and American Redbud trees and getting most of them planted. We’re looking forward to having an ice cold lemonade with under one of them real soon.

More Bunk Beds | Sleep in Heavenly Peace CHA

Sleep in Heavenly Peace (SHP) is a volunteer 501(c)3 charitable organization who builds bunk beds for local children who are are sleeping on floors, couches, and other uncomfortable situations without beds. In the Summer of 2019, The UNFoundation funded SHP and they have won again! Not only do they deliver these beds, equipped with mattresses, sheets, pillows and a blanket to kiddos in need, but they partner with organizations, churches, businesses, and individuals to build them at events called Build Days! Follow them on Facebook to keep up with the next build day.

How do we know the beds are going to the kids that really need them? All applicants are qualified through the national selection committee. They have an online application here. Our $3,000 funded even more beds so fewer Chattanooga kids are sleeping on the floor or a couch. The goal? No kid sleeps on the floor in our town.

Growing More Food on Main St | Taking Root Community Garden

Being able to feed our working class families right now is more crucial than ever. Back in September 2018 we funded Taking Root Community Garden to build garden beds for refugees and Highland Park residents at St. Paul's Episcopal Church on Main St. Consider this months grant phase 2, two years later. Our $3,000 went to build out more beds and add a rainwater cistern that are already being used for Fall planting. Growing familiar foods as well as the non judgmental, social interaction in a garden cannot be reproduced anywhere else. Making sure refugees who are new to our area can make a successful transition and become contributing members of the community will benefit Chattanooga as a whole.

Fall Flu Shot Clinic | Chambliss Center for Children

In these uncertain times, many of us are hyper focused on helping those negatively impacted by COVID. One way we can do that is through supporting the health of our neighbors. More than ever before, front-line workers are on our minds. These families are working so hard but unable to make a living wage and might not have health coverage for the flu shot, or transportation to access the flu shot. Our grant this month went to 120 free flu shots to those served by Chambliss Center for Children.

Not familiar with Chambliss Center for Children? They provide early childhood education and childcare for primarily low-income and single-parent families, foster care for children who have been removed from their homes because of abuse and neglect, and transitional living for teens aging out of foster care. The request for funds to do a free flu shot clinic request delivered on three things that are important to the UNFoundation. It made an immediate impact, it supported a vulnerable part of our community that had a big need, and it could be achieved with just $3,000. 120 shots x $25 = $3,000.

Let's Get Digital | The Enterprise Center

As a program of The Enterprise Center, Tech Goes Home runs digital literacy programs throughout Hamilton County, partnering with schools, churches, and other organizations. They are focused on getting the residents of Hamilton County connected to the internet, at a time when being connected is more crucial than ever. For instance, Hamilton County Schools have switched to distance learning, but thousands of students can’t get online at home. Their work to get them online has involved close coordination with EPB and the school district to make sure each neighborhood has free Wi-Fi locations and that students have computers at home.

Another $1,250 went to 5 Chromebooks for students at Chattanooga Room In The Inn, a non profit who assists women and children who are experiencing homelessness. These Chromebooks will be used in a learning space to make sure that the children are able to continue their remote schoolwork. But it’s not just students who are affected by social distancing and the digital divide. $1,000 went to distribute 10 tablets to the AIM Center for members to access the services they need.

Mindful Innovation at Howard, Battle and Brown | Center for Mindful Living

You may have heard of mindfulness and how it helps people, and you may even be familiar with the Center for Mindful Living, but do you know what the Office of Innovation and School Choice at Hamilton County Schools is? Well, think teaching to kids the way they want to learn vs the way things have historically been done from the top down. This is important for many reasons, but most importantly teachers and students are back in school in the midst of a pandemic.

Everyone is struggling to make sense of this new life. Teachers are stressed, students are stressed, you’re stressed. That extra stress adds to the daily stress that students in these schools typically face, calling for them to be even more resilient than they already are. Mindfulness will help to mitigate some of the extra stress by providing an atmosphere that acknowledges the stressful parts of life, as well as, a helpful solution to soothe the emotions that go along with coping in chronic stress…not to mention elementary and middle school.

Our $1,700 grant will kick off a partnership between the Center for Mindful Living and the Office of Innovation and Choice for Hamilton County Schools.  Teachers running innovation classes at Howard Connect (middle school), Battle Academy and Brown Academy (elementary schools) will get training on how to use mindfulness to be more successful in the classroom at bringing calm and focus to them and their students.