The MENTOR Network Charitable Foundation Announces FY18 Community Partners Grant Recipients
SEPTEMBER 26, 2018
The MENTOR Network Charitable Foundation is pleased to announce the organizations that were awarded grants through the Foundation’s Community Partners program for fiscal year 2018. Community Partners are change agents within human services that are either delivering innovative care or developing new ideas and models for doing so. They are results oriented, leverage resources and knowledge to positively impact individuals and communities, and have the power to transform society’s vision of and approach to its most vulnerable members.
Boys and Girls Club of Dorchester (Boston, MA)
Project BIND
The Boys & Girls Club of Dorchester, Massachusetts, provides a safe place for children to learn, grow, develop ongoing relationships with adult professionals, and receive positive developmental experiences. Its Project BIND (Boston Inclusion Network for Disabilities) is an initiative designed to encourage the educational and social enrichment and advancement of children with intellectual and developmental disabilities. Along with a network of partners, the Boys & Girls Club of Dorchester provides access to afterschool programs and activities while nurturing an inclusive environment for all children. The MENTOR Network Charitable Foundation supports Project BIND and its programming for youth.
Community Rowing, Inc. (Boston, MA)
Youth Para Rowing
Community Rowing (CRI) is a rowing club on the Charles River in Massachusetts. CRI’s Youth Para Rowing program offers safe and supportive coaching for youth with physical and intellectual disabilities. CRI spreads awareness for further inclusion within the sport of rowing and the program has drastically increased participation from youth with disabilities and serves more than 400 athletes. Funding from The MENTOR Network Charitable Foundation will support an expansion of the coaching team, equipment upgrades for the program, and CRI’s new six-week teen para rowing program.
Doc Wayne Youth Services (Boston, MA)
Chalk Talk Therapy Group
The Doc Wayne Youth Services’ mission is to fuse sport and therapy to support and strengthen youth at risk. Based in Boston, MA, it provides sport-based group therapy to youth at risk and victims of trauma. The program challenges traditional talk therapy by using sport as a delivery vehicle and by altering the perception of clinicians by turning them into coaches. A grant from The MENTOR Network Charitable Foundation will support the organization to accept more participants off their waitlist.
Mental Illness & Neurological Disorders (MINDS) Foundation (Boston, MA)
Integrating Mental Health into Primary School Curriculum
The Mental Illness & Neurological Disorders (MINDS) Foundation provides high-quality, cost-effective mental healthcare to rural India. There are barriers to mental healthcare, including stigma and economic burden, and The MINDS Foundation works to break down these barriers.. The program is delivered to adolescent youth, and the teacher education program is delivered accordingly to educators. In addition, funding is used for proper data collection in order to validate the program’s effectiveness as well as improvement of their evidence-backed program.
Roca (Springfield, MA)
Roca’s Model of Intervention
Roca is an outcomes-driven organization dedicated to transforming the lives of young people ages 17-24 at risk. Roca’s Intervention Model is a cognitive-restructuring and skills development intervention that was developed and implemented to address this underserved population. Using the Intervention Model, Roca helps young people move out of violence and poverty over two years with two additional years of supportive follow-up. The project includes intensive outreach to reengage young people and to build relationships that support change, offers programming to meet young people where they are, operates basic and advanced transitional employment, and works with the city of Springfield, several criminal justice partners, and other organizations. A grant from The MENTOR Network Charitable Foundation supports Roca’s intervention services to 280 young men at high risk from Springfield, MA.
About the Community Partners Program
For more information, visit the Community Partners section of our Charitable Foundation website.