And the Winners Are...!

We finally made it through class deliberations to the final awards ceremony! After making phone calls to the selected recipients, we held a little reception for everyone. Representatives of each of the non-profits, Youth Homes, Red Willow, and Court Appointed Special Advocates came to receive checks. The funded projects fit under the designated class topics of Mental Health and Youth issues.

Youth Homes was looking to fund a program to provide staff training by a trauma psychologist, who will help those that work with Youth Home kids to recognize and better adapt to the trauma kids may be facing as they enter out of crisis situations. Ana Crites spoke of her visit to Youth Homes, “When we arrived at the site, the staff stressed to us, ‘we don’t expect the kids to be grateful to be here. They’ve just come from a bad situation and our goal is to make them feel safe and that they have people they can connect and depend on’ this is what impressed me the most.

Red Willow, an organization also centering on trauma, healing and resilience is using the grant of under $3,000 to fully fund a veteran’s meditation class for the community for the year. This course in helping to retrain the minds of PTSD veterans, also targets a population of high risk of suicide within our community. In speaking of the Red Willow’s vet program Dominque Cuellar said, “It feels great to be able to give back to those that served the country”.

Finally, CASA or Court Appointed Special Advocates received a $3,000 grant to expand and train new needed volunteers to be paired up with a child going through the court system to advocate on their behalf during an injuring family crisis.

The ceremony died down with people leaving to finish out other finals of the semester, and as we go into the holiday season it was a nice reminder of how we can be empowered to connect and do good for others. It was a pleasure to get to see what they do to serve us here in Missoula.

Bring on the Heat!

Everyone has differing opinions, that much is true. However, whether one decides to respect others' opinion; therein lies the rub. Today's class was probably the most heated and interesting discussion that we have had all semester, in my opinion.


Students were expressing how they felt about certain organizations and their motives, and I was thoroughly shocked, to be frank. We are just not a lively group 8 out of 10 times, and I enjoyed listening to what everyone had to say. For example, some really enjoyed CASA, while others thought that Youth Homes would be a better fit, and I thought it was cool to have the input and to observe those were and were not speaking.


However, as class proceeded, I could see that people were starting to become agitated. Some students' points were being misconstrued, others were not able to push their point across, and I thought an actual argument was going to erupt. But Greg was able to mediate and keep the tension at a tolerable level.


Next, as we debated, I noticed that there were only a few select that actually spoke their minds; I realized that it was the people who usually talk during class. I am not saying that's a bad thing, it was just an observation. Lastly, during the debate, when students tried to defend their organizations, I noticed that they were not really explaining what the group actually does. For example, when we were talking about CASA it was hard to discuss it because I did not really know what they wanted the money for, or how the organization runs. All I knew about CASA was that they are an organization for children who don't have a voice in court. I did not know how they went about helping a child in need, or how they help the kid in the court case, or anything along those lines, which was quite interesting. Now, with Red Willow, the students who did a site visit explained what Red Willow is using the money for, how they are addressing and helping the community need, what they are doing to benefit the veterans and their families, along with police officers and firefighters, and how they make the atmosphere for veterans more comfortable.


All in all I felt like it was a very productive class, those who spoke were able to put their opinions out there, while those who just observed were able to take all those opinions into consideration. It was a great discussion, and I was glad to be a part of it.


- Catherine Roland, student

Garden City Harvest

Learning about Philanthropy has been a very eye opening experience. This class has not only opened my eyes to non profits, but I have been more exposed to tough life decisions. We were split into different groups with the responsibility of conducting an interview with each non profit. My group chose to look deeper into Garden City Harvest, a local non profit in Missoula.     

    

 

 

The day we arrived for the interview, I had no idea what to expect. I was instantly blown away by their professionalism, welcoming atmosphere, passion, and drive for helping the community of Missoula, which clearly has an immense amount of respect for Garden City Harvest. Talking to one of the women who worked at the non profit, we could see that the Garden City Harvest employees love their job. This non profit has the goal to impact people’s lives, which is absolutely beautiful. We were quickly educated on their message, their non profit is meant for so much more than growing food. They have impacted many lives in Missoula. They have educated, inspired, and sparked that desired connection between the earth and people. Something that people thought was long gone, the beauty and respect for the earth.

My group and I were thoroughly impressed by Garden City Harvest. As we departed, they gave us a map of all their community gardens and farms. With a spare hour, we decided to check out one of these gardens.

The garden was wonderful and had the same vibe that Garden City Harvest expressed. We took a walk around and found evidence of hard work, love, and compassion for the earth. The garden wasn’t closed off; it was completely open demonstrating that Garden City Harvest isn’t a shut off non profit. They want people to see what they are accomplishing and share the connection to the earth.

Overall, my group members and I were blown away by Garden City Harvest. We found we were slightly bias in class discussions, because we already had been deeply impacted by a non profit. Nonetheless, I learned very quickly that this project wasn’t going to be happy and cheerful. We were going to have to make difficult decisions that would ultimately impact who was getting the money from this grant. The most important aspect in the end is the impact and reform that this will start in Missoula. That’s the constant thought I have had throughout this process and I learned that from this program.