Operating support from The Bunbury Company has enabled the Boys & Girls Club of Trenton & Mercer County to triple its after-school, summer camp, and youth development programs in just a few short years. With more than 2,000 members overall and 850 children attending after-school activities daily at eight sites, the Boys & Girls Club is a leader in providing programs for city youth. Early support for our Career Launch Program produced dramatic increases in the number of Club members graduating from high school. This June (2009), the Club guided 55 senior class members into college or trade school. In the fall, we plan to roll out our services to additional program sites to serve more youths. Sustaining donor support and volunteerism make our success possible.
Dave Anderson,
Executive Director
A $10,000 grant from the Bunbury Company supported the opening of a new wing for homeless veterans at Community Hope and helped save another 25 former service men and women from another winter spent on the streets or in shelters. With its expanded facility, the Hope for Veterans Transitional Housing Program can now serve 95 homeless veterans a day and has helped 300 former veterans overcome homelessness and rebuild their lives since opening in September 2004. The program is the largest and offers the most comprehensive services in New Jersey for homeless veterans, including employment and computer training, medical and behavioral healthcare and recovery services from post-traumatic stress and other issues affecting veterans. Hope for veterans has won national and state awards as a model for addressing the widespread issue of homelessness among veterans throughout the U.S.
Julia Ahmet,
Executive Director
The Bunbury Company has generously granted funding to Family Guidance Center/Family and Children’s Service for our Children’s Day Treatment Program. This outstanding program serves children, 6- 15, who have emotional and behavioral problems. A staff of counselors, medical staff, and mental health staff provide the recreational and therapeutic services that the program offers.
Located at the historic William Lanning School in Ewing, our Day Treatment program has an average enrollment of 70 children; from September through June we operate as an afterschool program, during the hours of 2:00 to 6:30; in summer, our program transforms into a day camp.
Providing close supervision and therapeutic activities to children in afternoons during the school year and in long, often-unstructured summer days, addresses the problem of potential delinquency or harm to our children, and promotes their healthy development. We create a service plan for each child and measure their progress, striving to attain every positive change possible. We work closely with the parents and guardians of our clients, regarding them as the experts on their own children and as our fundamental allies in the effort to create therapeutic and behavioral improvement.
Mark Lamar,
Executive Director
HiTops LHEEP program provided risk reduction education to help decrease rates of teen pregnancy and STIs among Latina youth by increasing awareness about HIV, STIs and pregnancy prevention, and impacted 300 Trenton- and 150 Princeton-area Latinas by engaging students in a weekly, school-based group that 1) provided culturally-relevant, science-based HIV/pregnancy prevention education; 2) encouraged participants to voice their own HIV- and pregnancy prevention-related needs and concerns; 3) empowered participants and reinforced the HIV/pregnancy prevention education they received by enabling them to create an HIV and/or pregnancy prevention-related campaign for a target audience they determined would reap the greatest benefit from the information.
Elizabeth Casparian,
Executive Director
In 2008-2009, Passage Theatre’s State Street Project completed its fifth year providing after-school programs at four different Trenton middle schools. These classes included Creative Dramatics, Song Writing and Playmaking. The students at Kilmer Middle School attended a performance of their plays at the Mill Hill Playhouse in June, 2009. The State Street Project also presented an evening of one-act plays entitled TALES OF TRENTON, which featured high school students working side-by-side with professional actors, as well as a number of workshops between Passage Theatre guest-artists and students from Trenton Central High school.
David White,
Executive Director
Childhood Intervention Initiative
A grant of $30,000 was awarded to Trinity Counseling Service’s Childhood Intervention Initiative (CII) to be shared in collaboration between Trinity Counseling Service and Princeton Nursery School.
The mission of the Childhood Intervention Initiative is to help children reach their fullest potential in a safe and nurturing environment. The Childhood Intervention Initiative helps underserved, low-income working families of Princeton Nursery School by providing early identification and intervention in behavioral, emotional, social and academic problems. CII is based on the belief that to help each child, the child’s family must also be helped. CII provides psychological support to Princeton Nursery School children and their families to increase the child’s emotional, social and academic readiness for school and beyond.
The Central Jersey Invasive Species Strike Team (CJISST) was initiated in 2008 by the Upper Raritan Watershed Association (URWA) and the Friends of Hopewell Valley Open Space (FoHVOS). Our goal was to create New Jersey’s first private/public partnership based upon a cooperative approach to prevent the spread of newly emerging invasive plants though early detection & rapid response (ED/RR). The CJISST project area covers 1.3 million acres across 8 counties (Essex, Hudson, Hunterdon, Mercer, Middlesex, Morris, Somerset and Union).
The Bunbury Company supports Young Scholar’s Institutes comprehensive college preparatory program. This four-pronged initiative includes semi-annual college tours, SAT Preparation, Princeton Model Congress and the college admissions, financial aid and career-planning workshop. The overarching goal is to help urban students achieve their dream of continuing their education beyond high school and attending the college or university of their choice.
The YWCA Trenton and Girl Scouts of Central and Southern NJ collaborated to provide the “Ready, Set, Grow” program to girls ages 8 through 15 in the Trenton area. Approximately 65 girls from three locations, YWCA, Sam Naples Center and Trenton Capital Charter Schools participated in the program. Activities included arts & crafts, group discussions and leadership training. The older girls in the program were instructed on how to assist the younger girls as a means of developing their leadership and mentoring skills. Group discussions centered around positive character traits, respect and social skills.
Jose Hernandez,
Executive Director