9 minute read
Special Feature
GIVE FROM THE HEART
The River Valley is home to many amazing non-profit organizations doing the most good to serve our community and we know you place great priority on giving back, be it of your time, your service, or your finances.
It is our hope that our Do South® Guide to Local Non-Profits will serve to further each of their missions and allow you to discover just how you and your family can get involved and pledge your support to the organizations that are near and dear to your heart. They need us now, more than ever!
Aspsf.org 479.927.1402
Arkansas Single Parent Scholarship Fund (ASPSF) creates life-changing opportunities for impoverished single-parent families. By providing financial assistance and personal/ professional development opportunities, ASPSF helps single parents complete a career-focused degree or skilled trade certification and secure employment at family-supporting wages so that they can proudly support their family on their own. Their achievement shapes the educational and career aspirations of the next generation. With access to education, the entire family begins to see opportunities where none seemed to exist before. ASPSF is helping to break the cycle of poverty, one family at a time. You can help ASPSF provide life-changing scholarships to thousands of single parents. Learn more at aspsf.org.
By shopping at your local ReStore, you are helping to build homes in your community for your neighbors in need. Habitat for Humanity has placed over one hundred families in new homes in the River Valley and money spent in our ReStore will help us to continue that mission. You can also support our affiliate by donating used appliances, building supplies, etc. to the ReStore. During December each year, we offer our fundraising Gift Wrap Center to the public. Wrapping gifts raises funds to build more homes. Your support helps us help others!
The Center for Art and Education is a nonprofit organization located at 104 North 13th in Van Buren, Arkansas. Our mission is to provide art experiences to the community. We believe arts education is an essential component of everyday life for all ages. The arts enhance student performance introducing skills that are essential for success: creativity, critical thinking, and communication. For adults, arts can be a relief, an opportunity to re-activate, strengthen and increase an existential joy. Currently, our biggest need is for donations to maintain programming and develop programs for our new state-of-the-art facility opening in 2022. Please consider supporting our mission by making a donation online or call CAE at 479-474-7767.
In 1997, the Fort Smith Children’s Shelter welcomed its first five children. Twenty-three years later, the FSCS has provided a safe haven to over 4,300 abused and neglected children and young adults in foster care. Our mission is to be a safe and stable home that provides long-term, evidence-based, trauma-informed, resident-centered and family-focused care to youth in foster care who exhibit emotional and behavioral challenges due to neglect and/or abuse. Their needs for food, clothing, shelter, transportation, tutoring, life skills, and social opportunities are provided. In addition, they receive therapy and emotional support to grow, heal, and transition into a traditional home environment. Please support our children by making a financial donation to the Children’s Shelter.
GetREAL24 is the Fort Smith Children’s Shelter’s independent living program for youth in foster care ages 18 and older. We aim to give youth “aging out” of care a place to live independently among their peers while obtaining life skills necessary to break the cycle of dysfunction and become successful, contributing members of society. GR24 seeks support from the community through volunteers who serve as sponsor families or mentors—helping create positive relationships and a social safety net of support. Help is also needed from volunteers that have a special skill or talent that could be taught in a life skills class. In addition, internships, shadowing, job training and career opportunities from the community are also needed.
Our mission is to improve the health in our region by providing access to compassionate, quality healthcare and we have proudly served the uninsured and underinsured in the River Valley area for over seventeen years. We provide medical and vision care, limited dental care and counseling services for adult patients, and children by appointment (the clinic is closed on Fridays). Walk-in patients are seen for basic medical care and we offer extended hours every Tuesday until 8pm. Visit us online or call 479.783.0233. As a 501c3 charitable clinic, one hundred percent of our funds stay local. You may not need us, but we are certain you know someone who does. Call us today! #iamgoodsam Are you?
The Gregory Kistler Treatment Center began in 1978 as a place of hope and caring assistance, a place for children to reach high, and for families to reach out and find peace of mind. The Kistler Center began as an out-patient facility providing occupational, physical, and speech therapies for children. Today, we also provide Community Employment Support waiver services for both children and adults. This program gives individuals choice and opportunity to live, play, and work in the home and community. In addition, we are now a provider of autism waiver services. This is a statewide intensive program for young children with a confirmed diagnosis of autism. The Kistler Center ― we’re here for you just like family!
P.O. Box 11828, Fort Smith, Arkansas ManesAndMiracles.org 479.970.8351
Manes & Miracles offers equine-assisted therapy to children with special needs. Our vision is to serve adults and Veterans as well. With the help of a horse, this unique tool provides a treatment for Physical, Occupational, Speech, and Psychological therapy. Lawanda reports "Angel (age 11) couldn't even hold her head up when she started and after six months of equine-assisted therapy, she was walking forty steps in a gait trainer." As a nonprofit organization we rely heavily on the generosity of caring individuals. Volunteer opportunities are available and if you feel led, your financial gift of any amount is appreciated. Thank you for your kind heart and helping others achieve a brighter future.
Project Compassion, Inc. is a Fort Smith based nonprofit founded in 1972 by the late Gloria White. Her mission to bring joy, companionship, and enhanced quality of life to nursing home residents remains the heartbeat of the organization today. Volunteers visit one-on-one with residents, accompany them to activities, and encourage them to maintain interest in people and events. We offer music, pet therapy, fidget blankets, calls and cards. Our Hearts of Gold program provides Christmas gifts of warm clothing to residents without friends and family. We are a United Way agency serving twenty-six nursing homes. We partner with businesses, schools, churches, and civic organizations. Visit our website to volunteer, donate, be a friend, and get connected!
The CALL works with local churches to recruit, train and support foster and adoptive parents to provide homes for the over six hundred thirty children and youth in foster care in Crawford and Sebastian Counties. Since our founding in 2007, over 7,500 families attended our Informational Meetings and our families have cared for 18,000 children and youth statewide. Check out our Facebook page or website for more details, and to see dates and locations of upcoming events. We are completely funded through donations of time, money and in-kind items. If you’d like to help us serve the children and youth in our area, email Emily Treadaway, County Coordinator at etreadaway@thecallinarkansas.org.
The Salvation Army provides housing & homeless services as well as hunger relief through food boxes and our Red Shield Diner. We also provide Christmas assistance including the Angel Tree, youth camps, disaster relief services, elderly services, utility assistance and much more. But this year, due to Covid, the need is even greater while restrictions are preventing us from placing as many Red Kettles, our number one fundraiser, in the community. To sustain operations in the River Valley, we’re relying on virtual donations and we’re kicking it off with a Virtual Red Kettle Ball on Nov. 5. Learn more at SalvationArmyFS.org and please consider giving this Christmas season.
Nearly every aspect of operations for United Way and its Community Partner Agencies has been shaken. Organizations have had to find new ways to provide their services following Covid-19 restrictions. Revenues shrank, but expenses did not go away. We need your donations now more than ever. Fundraising event cancellations have cost our agencies over half a million dollars in 2020. You can make a difference by donating to United Way of Fort Smith Area. Making a donation is as easy as texting “unitedway20” to 41444 or online at unitedwayfortsmith. org. One hundred percent of your donations will stay local. You can also view our Holiday Giving Guide for additional ways to help our agencies this holiday season.
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