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Whether you were of the generation that was sent out on bikes after breakfast and told not to come home until the street lights came on, or walked miles up hill in the snow to get to school, or a latchkey kid who cooked your own dinner, we all have our own “back in my day” stories.
Whatever your story is, there is no arguing times have changed for children and their families.
Preschool is becoming a normal part of a child’s time in school, kindergarten is mainly full day, and older youth are taking classes that weren’t even available just a decade ago. We live in a world of air tags on kids backpacks, Life 360 on phones, texts, snaps, and access to information at our fingertips. Yet, many people will tell you they are struggling daily with feeling overwhelmed and anxious. It is no secret that when parents are struggling, the children in their care are also struggling.
The Community Foundation of Grundy County (CFGC) has committed to working with non-profits serving Grundy County to tackle the larger issue of mental health especially that of children and their families. Children roughly spend 1,100 hours in school each year and 4,700 non-sleeping hours outside of school. This statistic is just one of the many reasons why CFGC has been partnering with non-profits to provide activities and mental health support for families and children during those non-school hours.
Thus far in 2024, CFGC has provided $11,000 in grants to local backpack programs providing shelf stable food to students in need when they are not in school. Local backpack programs give students a grocery bag of kid friendly food such as: mac-n-cheese cups, granola bars, apple sauce etc. each week.
Although I cannot tell you the total number of children served by these programs, I can tell you the need has increased over the last few years. CFGC has granted $8,228 to local libraries to provide safe, fun, and educational programs and activities for children and families. Organizations such as Boy Scouts and the Morris YMCA have benefited from grants totally more than $36,000 for youth focused activities promoting physical health, mental health, and leadership.
As said earlier, mental health is another target area for CFGC’s grant making. Anyone who has attempted to get mental health services for their child can tell you there are barriers including: insurance, cost, availability of providers, transportation, and work schedules of parents.
The Grundy County Health Department has worked out a partnership with Morris Community High School and Morris Elementary where youth and adolescent counselors make themselves available to see students during the school day. This has been meeting a great need in the community, eliminating barriers for students to receive services. Through two funds at CFGC, the Sanford Teen Fund and the Abel Fund, $11,400 has been granted toward this program.
CFGC is able to provide grants to non-profits serving Grundy County through our competitive grant fund, applications are reviewed monthly by our Grants and Programs Committee. We also have field of interest and designated funds that provide grants to non-profits within specific geographic areas of the county, or serving specific populations, or for specific topic area such as the Sanford and Abel Funds mentioned above.
Grundy County may not be overflowing with non-profits serving children and families, but the ones we do have work cooperatively to provide the best options they can for their clients. The Community Foundation of Grundy County is humbled to play a role in meeting the needs of our children and their families. No matter what your “back in the day” looked like, times have changed and CFGC is happy to align our grantmaking with the ever-changing needs of Grundy County.