The Appleton A Better Chance (ABC) program's mission is to provide academically talented students of color with opportunity, education, guidance and personal development to help them achieve their goals and become leaders within their communities. Established in 1968, over the past 50 years, we have made a lasting difference in the lives of 170+ young people who left their at-risk neighborhoods and spent their formative years in Appleton. Our program in Appleton is the only one in Wisconsin and the second oldest of the 25 programs across the country. Students and families apply to the program when the student is in the eighth grade. After a very detailed application process, the selected scholars move to Appleton a few days before starting ninth grade and will attend Appleton North, East, or West. Through a partnership with Lawrence University, housing and tutoring are made available to the scholars. Our scholars live at the residence house during the academic year, along with our Residence Director. School scholarships to attend our local high schools are provided by a partnership with the Appleton Area School District. Although we’re affiliated with the national program, we do not receive any funding from the national office, nor federal, state or local governments. We are supported 100% through voluntary, charitable contributions. Over 99% of our graduates of have gone on to college with overwhelming success. Our current scholars are from the San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Atlanta areas.
Appleton Community Music is a 501(c)3 formed in 2021 to help ensure the future sustainability of Mile of Music and other original music events. With an artist-focused and community-forward approach, ACM treats musicians with respect. We go beyond paying them fairly, by providing free lodging, meals, and Artist Care services during the Festival. That is why artists consider this Festival, and the Fox Valley, exceptional. Shared community investment is necessary to sustain these efforts long term. Find out how we can come together to promote the arts and music, foster emerging singer-songwriters, enhance artists’ quality of life, and make the Fox Valley a sought-after place to live, work, and visit.
Did you know that 13.4 MILLION CHILDREN are experiencing food insecurity? That’s one in five American children who may be struggling with access to food. Every kid should be able to enjoy their weekend. This is difficult when they could potentially go 65-hours without access to food. The Blessings in a Backpack program in Appleton anonymously delivers weekend bags of nutritious food to elementary school students in Appleton every Friday to fill this gap.
Breath of Life Foundation was founded with the intent to assist families in Wisconsin in fighting their battler with Cystic Fibrosis. Inspired by the life of Lauren Arkens. Her direct involvement from the very beginning of our Foundation in 2016, we began to thrive in and around the Cystic Fibrosis communities in Milwaukee, Madison, and Green Bay. Lauren’s personal experience with CF provided insight into what patients and families needed to really begin to live a life while living with CF. The Foundation continues to make an impact by filling in the gaps patients and families need, in an effort to promote a higher quality of life. We continue to support financial assistance for medications, additional treatments, nutritional supplements, medical equipment, utilities, travel, lodging, and other common ancillary costs that make daily life even harder to live.
The Center for Suicide Awareness, headquartered in Kaukauna, is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization providing support, education, and resources to individuals, families, veterans, schools, businesses, community agencies, and more. All efforts support the Center’s mission of suicide prevention for anyone, or any organization, touched by the tragedy of suicide. The Center provides barrier free, no-cost services including drop-in support groups for veterans, military members and their families, youth and adult Survivors of Suicide, educational and informational presentations on suicide prevention, mental health stigma reduction, QPR training, and more. All efforts play a vital role in preventing the tragedy of suicide in our communities. After recognizing the high number of youth communicating distress over text messaging prior to a suicide attempt, The Center immediately put together a plan to bring a text based emotional support line serving all of Wisconsin. HOPELINE-741741 is the state’s only no-cost, barrier-free emotional support text-based service providing immediate emotional support, resources, and crisis trained responders 24/7, via the most popular form of communication: texting. HOPELINE receives thousands of texts from residents across the state who are seeking support and resources when they need it most. HOPELINE also expanded its service by offering the Spanish version called APOYO.
The Day by Day Warming Shelter has been serving Oshkosh and Winnebago County for over 10 years. The shelter is dedicated to serving the most vulnerable population in our community, successfully providing them shelter, basic needs, programs, and services with the goal of self-sustainability. We have been a critical provider of services, keeping our homeless off the streets, and moving them towards a better life. Each year over 200 people use our shelter and resources. In the early years, the shelter’s primary focus was simply providing shelter and a hot meal in the coldest months of the year. Today, in partnership with many local organizations, we provide programs for our guests primarily focused on life skills, to help them achieve an independent lifestyle, with the ability to care for themselves. Day by Day serves an adult population (18 and over). We turn away no one (other than due to capacity) offering services and support to those who are veterans, have been incarcerated, battling addiction, have been abused, or suffering mental illness. Over the next year, our goal is to raise over 4.5 million dollars in order to secure a new location. With your contribution to our capital campaign, Day by Day will be empowered to help more people out of homelessness.
Feed the Body, Feed the Soul, is a 501(c)3 that started seven years ago to help meet food insecurities in our local community. With one in eight people not having enough to eat and one in five children going to bed hungry every night, we saw the importance of supporting those facing food insecurities. Feed the Body, Feed the Soul annually brings together over 1,000 hard working volunteers to package staple food product for those in need while feeding the souls of our volunteers with energizing music. With over one million pounds of staple food products packed in the last 6 years this annual event symbolizes the collective power of our community coming together to make a tangible difference for those who need it most.
Celebrating more than 20 years, the Center’s future shines bright as we continue to present world-class live performing arts experiences, empower lifelong learning through community engagement and education programs, and impact our local economy through critical connections between local businesses and tourism. You can play a vital role in ensuring the Center continues serving all ages and abilities through the arts. The mission of the Fox Cities Performing Arts Center is to serve as a multicultural gathering place for the community to engage in educational opportunities and enhance understanding and enjoyment of life through the creation and presentation of the arts. We will do this by providing a premier venue for performing arts attractions and a dynamic environment for our arts organizations.
We support families impacted by Alzheimer's and dementia by providing caregiver education, resource navigation, respite, social events, and therapeutic recreation. We support 350+ families. Since there is still no cure, the need increases each week.
Beyond our weekly food distribution to our clients, the pantry has special projects to help uplift the quality of life for our clients. These special programs are: Back to School, Family Coat Drive, Children's Christmas Wish, and partnering with community business and organizations in food drives. Below you will find the results of these projects. First, our Back-to-School project provided 125 backpacks filled with school supplies to the children of our clients in grades 1 to 12. Each backpack is customized by grade for the needed supplies. We have had this program on going for many years, our biggest challenge is the cost and securing the backpacks. We are planning for an increase in the number provided for 2023. Second, our Coat Drive is conducted with the help of numerous churches in the area. The new or used coats, in all youth and adult sizes are inspected, sorted, and cleaned if necessary. On a fall Wednesday, with the help of the town of Dale allowing us to use the town hall, the coats are hung on racks by size. This past year we collected 481 coats with and dispersed 301 at no cost to our clients. Next is our Children Christmas Wish project. With help of sponsors and devoted volunteers each year the children of our clients are signed up to receive Christmas gifts from Santa. Over the last few years, we have averaged 60 families and 179 children. The clients are interviewed at sign up and are asked to provide the specific gifts of each child's wishes. Finally, our partnering up with businesses and organizations for special events to prevent hunger is critical. We have the Hortonville Police department, Boy Scouts, USPS, Wolf River Community Bank, AFS, Whistlers Knoll and many others to thank for our continuing operations.
Our mission at Inspire Sports, we believe that every child is infinitely valuable. In response to this belief, we create opportunities for children with special needs to get in on the action and for athletes to develop leadership skills through 75-minute clinics and
in-school programs.
Jake’s Network of Hope is an organization that believes in a world where every human feels worthy. This empowers individuals to live their best lives, creating full and active communities. Our programs provide resources that fulfill various human needs: basic, social, emotional and educational. Jake’s Network of Hope, formerly known as Jake's Diapers, was established in 2011 after two local and passionate women went on a mission trip and witnessed an orphanage reusing disposable diapers as they had to choose between diapers and food. Upon return to the United States, they gathered their well-loved cloth diapers from their then young children and donated them to that very orphanage - helping 15 children in need. From there, Jake’s grew and now provides disposable diapers, period products, adult incontinence products and cloth diapers to families in need. As needs have increased from our partners, Jake's established the My Neighbor Wisconsin program, which operates the Hope Hub within Jake's facility providing other basic living items such as office/school supplies, home goods, toys, new baby/mom items and small appliances to partner agencies, who then pass the quality goods to individuals and families in need. All of Jake’s programs are partnerships with qualified nonprofit partners, which include schools, 501(c)3 nonprofits and faith-based organizations located throughout 11 counties in Wisconsin. We distribute quality goods to these partners, and they redistribute to people in need, students who are underserved, families in crisis all with the goal of eliminating poverty in our neighborhoods.
Just Jess Foundation was formed in 2022 by Steve Haag. Amidst the second year of navigating his wife's critical cancer diagnosis, 2019 was the best year of Steve's life. How could that be? Because that critical cancer diagnosis pushed his family into seizing every moment and chasing memories all over the United States. First, they were blessed to go on a vacation with family members to Florida. They got to take the kids to Disney World and they spent time at their favorite place—the ocean. Over the Fourth of July, they went on a spontaneous trip to St. Louis. Jess woke up one morning and told Steve, “We need an adventure.” So, they hopped in the car for a 48 hour door to door trip, packed with a kid’s museum, fireworks and fun. Later that summer, they spent time at a cottage on a lake with Jess's family hanging out together. Finally, with support from family and friends, they got to go on their most memorable RV trip to Durango, CO with memory making at the Mile High Stadium and Mt. Rushmore, among many other places. Yes, they dealt with cancer on the daily, but their family vacations were cancer free. Sure, their kids were very little and let’s be honest, they may not remember the details, but Steve does—AND, he has those cancer free details to give his kids. The pictures. The videos. The stories. Their mom in her best form. While Steve have known since August 13, 2020 that he wanted to do something in Jess’s memory, it has taken him two years to figure it out—a foundation that funds family vacations for parents experiencing a critical cancer diagnoses. He wants other families going through this to have the same memory making, life-changing opportunities his family did.
Lundgaard Love is a 501(c)3 formed in 2021 to honor the life and spirit of fallen firefighter Mitch Lundgaard by raising funds to support the Mitch Lundgaard Memorial Scholarship Fund at Fox Valley Technical College along with other activities in his honor that benefit the community and families in need. Mitch was a 14-year veteran of the Appleton Fire Department when in 2019, he tragically lost his life in the line of duty. It started as a routine medical call at the city’s transit center, when a man who had been revived after a drug overdose opened fire on police officers and firefighters who had just saved his life. Mitch died of a gunshot wound to the chest. The Lundgaard Family was overwhelmed and extremely blessed by the outpouring of love and support from the community after Mitch’s death. They recognized that not everyone that goes through a tragedy receives this same amount of support and encouragement. The Lundgaard Love foundation uses their funds raised to continue to spread and share that love and support throughout the community while honoring the life and legacy of Mitch. Lundgaard Love has committed almost $100,000 to those in our community including $80,000+ toward the endowment scholarship, which already has been awarded to 29 firefighter students! The foundation has also used funds to help numerous families after or during tragedies along with other community support projects. We look forward to continuing to spread our “Lundgaard Love” throughout the local area.
Make-A-Wish Wisconsin creates life-changing wishes for local children battling critical illnesses. A wish come true replaces fear with hope, anxiety with strength and sadness with joy. For many, their wish marks a turning point in the fight against their illness! Kids who are fighting critical illnesses experience extreme mental & emotional challenges every day. Hospital stays, harsh treatments & scary surgeries are not only exhausting – they are traumatic. The instant a child's hope is realized through their special wish, they experience a powerful, life-changing joy that nurtures their emotional well-being. Within the Make-A-Wish organization, we are a local chapter based in Appleton that specifically works to raise funds to grant local wishes within our area. All of our fundraising efforts are based in the area while keeping the funds local to help all local children battling critical illnesses receive their greatest wish come true. With more than 500 life-affirming wishes currently pending, and hundreds of kids excitedly counting the days until their greatest wish is granted, your support will go a long way in ensuring that we can grant a life-changing wish for every local child who is facing a heartbreaking critical illness!
The Miracle League of the Fox Valley gives every child the chance to play baseball. Since 2010, the Miracle League of the Fox Valley, a program of Goodwill NCW, has given children ages 4-19 with cognitive and/or physical disabilities the opportunity to play organized baseball in a noncompetitive league on a safe, fully accessible field located at Memorial Park in Appleton. The league has continued to grow since its first season in 2010. 2023 was the league’s 13th season and consisted of 227 players, 16 teams and over 330 community volunteers. The league not only gives children with disabilities a place to grow, learn, and be celebrated, it also allows our community volunteers (ages 12+) the opportunity to build relationships and become advocates for individuals with disabilities.
Old Glory Honor Flight was founded in 2009 by a small group of dedicated volunteers based in Appleton, WI. Our mission is to fly our local heroes of World War ll, Korean and Vietnam wars to our Nation’s Capital to see the war memorials built in their honor as a meaningful way to say ‘Thank You’ for their service and sacrifice. Every detail has the vets’ best interest in mind to ensure they have a safe and memorable trip. On each flight, we travel with trained volunteers, a medical team, professional photographers and a host of others like the DC Park Police who provides a motorcade escort in Washington, DC. The best part is the Honor Flight mission is completely free of charge for our veterans! Over the years, we’ve grown and expanded our mission to also include special projects like: Yellow Ribbon Honor Flight, Return to Nam, Return to Pearl, Operation at Ease and others to highlight the men and women who served our country admirably and to provide meaningful recognition, healing and camaraderie.
Peaceful Purpose, Inc. is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization that provides no charge or low-cost wigs, hats, head coverings, head shavings and haircuts to anyone who may need help with medical hair loss. Peaceful Purpose also offers beauty and skin care clinics and recommendations. The team provides these services, along with overall confidence building and emotional support for the individuals who allow Peaceful Purpose to join them on their journey. We build lasting relationships with our clients by spending extra time to understand the unique support each client needs. If a client wants to talk, cry, or laugh, the Peaceful Purpose team will be there by their side. If they’d like help styling the wig after a few weeks of wearing it, Peaceful Purpose will be there to answer questions and assist. The scope of support provided by Peaceful Purpose extends past the traditional audience of people battling cancer. Additionally, Peaceful Purpose will assist people afflicted by Cancer, Alopecia, Tricotillomania, Hormonal and Autoimmune-related disorders, as well as surgical or trauma-related hair loss. Peaceful Purpose strives to provide low to no cost beauty solutions to all people in need without relying on a sliding scale payment plan. By keeping administrative costs minimal, building a strong, volunteer-based Board of Directors, and leveraging a ‘pay it forward’ model with clients who desire to donate to expand the charitable footprint, Peaceful Purpose intends to balance supporting the community in an intimate one-on-one basis while expanding the reach to others in need.
Photo Opp is a new and unique organization to the Fox Cities. From an old school film darkroom to a full white sweep studio, programming to assist local schools and events like photo walks to build a diverse community around photography and videography. Our primary goals are: building community, education of photography and videography, creating a pipeline for artistic jobs here in the Fox Valley, and advancing the arts specific to photo and video. Photo Opp’s mission is to develop a welcoming community and inspire lifelong learning through the lens of a camera. Our programs and offers work toward our vision to elevate the appreciation of visual expression and nurture passion for life beyond the camera. Collaboration is at the core of Photo Opp, which will partner with school districts, other non-profits, local businesses, and others in the community to offer educational services in the art of photography and videography, while also helping to support the content needs of our community. Through collaboration, we hope to strengthen our local economy by investing in the stories of our community. We plan to prepare youth and young adults for career opportunities in the crafts of photography, videography, and other visual arts, while giving them a positive outlet for their innate and learned creativity. We will also offer opportunities for adult learners, especially those who may have had barriers to other employment. Additionally, Photo Opp looks to work alongside other nonprofits and businesses to help amplify their stories using our program’s content capabilities.
The mission of Safe Families for Children Northeast Wisconsin is to keep children safe and families together. Safe Families has three core values which lay the foundation for their work within the community: radical hospitality, disruptive generosity and intentional compassion. These core values serve as guiding principles for the organization as they actively engage community members to build networks of caring and compassionate support around families facing social isolation. With these efforts, Safe Families hopes to accomplish three specific goals: prevent child abuse and neglect, reduce the number of children entering the child welfare system and to support and stabilize families. These goals are what establish the vision of Safe Families for Children; to create a world in which children are safe and families are transformed through radically compassionate local communities.
Samaritan Counseling Center of the Fox Valley has been innovating to meet mental health needs for 48years. In 2018 we will serve 550 kids and 850 adults with life-changing counseling that connects mind and spirit. More than 500 of them come to us in financial need. We also work to prevent teen suicide and school violence by giving more than 13,000 K-12 students access to a free mental health check-up right at school each year. The Wellness Screen program meets kids where they are every day, gives them a safe place to be heard, then connects more than 400 students per year with vital -- even life-saving -- mental health care and support. Together with our eleven partner school systems, we care for the Kids in Crisis covered by USATODAY NETWORK-Wisconsin for the past three years. Samaritan Counseling Center equips faith leaders as"first responders" in mental health. The Mental Health Ministry Initiative gives professional and volunteer faith leaders tools to identify mental health concerns, refer those in pain for care, and give them ongoing support in their faith community. The access to mental health care and education that we provide is not possible without philanthropic investment.
Sleep In Heavenly Peace is a nationwide non-profit organization that is designed around building beds for children in OUR community that sleep on the floor or don’t have a bed. Our motto is "No kid sleeps on the floor in our town.” Appleton is now proud to be part of this very important mission and we are on our way to have 100 beds delivered soon. Children sleeping on dog beds or blankets on the floor is a real problem in our area! We provide an opportunity for the community to come together and embrace these children in need. The beds are built by many wonderful volunteers that are willing to share their precious time. These hand built beds are then delivered to the local children who are between the ages of 3-17 that don’t have a bed of their own. Any parent, foster parent, guardian or a representative that knows of a bedless child can go to the website SHPbeds.org/apply and fill out the form. Our teams of volunteers go directly to the location and put the beds together for the kids. Along with the twin size bed, they receive a mattress, mattress pad, sheets, comforter and pillow and it is all free of charge. It’s extremely exciting to see the faces of the young individuals after they see their very own bed! Most kids can’t wait for bedtime! Bedlessness is not their fault.
Special Spaces is a 501(c)3 nonprofit that creates dream bedroom makeovers for children with life threatening illnesses; focusing on those children with cancer. Our local Fox Valley Chapter, led by Director Holly DeLong, serves children in Outagamie, Calumet, and Winnebago counties. Holly has plans to complete six dream bedroom makeovers this year and looks forward to growing the Chapter. With the child as the main designer, the goal of Special Spaces is to create a dream bedroom that only the child can imagine…a place to sleep, play and spend time away from the challenges of their illness. Providing new furniture, bedding, custom murals, medical storage and closets, no two “special spaces” are alike! From princesses, superheros, unicorns, fairies, and sports themes, we make dreams come true! All of this “magic” is done in just two short days. Utilizing volunteers for 95% of our workforce, our room build experience is “hands on”. We involve the community directly in the needs of the child and family. Our team approach allows for many individuals to be touched by the child. Funding and volunteer support is equally important in the implementation of a Special Spaces bedroom makeover. Since our founding in 2004, Special Spaces has continued to grow our volunteer teams, community support, corporate sponsorship and most importantly, families served each year. With your support, we look forward to helping more children in the Fox Valley area. Thank you for helping us...Change Children’s Lives One Bedroom at a Time! For more information about Special Spaces visit www.SpecialSpaces.org.
In October 2016, founder of Vets & Friends of Wisconsin, Inc, Jack Voight realized that the Fox Valley did not have a place that veterans could meet in a social setting. Jack knew that simple comradeship has a therapeutic effect on veterans and it was his vision to provide a social center for area veterans. The social center would include a no charge coffeehouse and emergency Food Pantry to service Fox Valley veterans, family and friends. Vets & Friends of Wisconsin, Inc. was granted nonprofit federal status on February 24, 2017. The Board of Directors serves veterans and their families, while being accountable to the people we serve. On March 1, 2023, we moved to 100 W. Capitol Drive in Appleton. We needed to expand to a much larger space to accommodate our growing needs, and to safely serve veterans in a welcoming, open, fun manner. Vets & Friends has developed a strong partnership with St. Joe’s Food Pantry that provides over half of the food served at its weekly meals and food pantry. Vets & Friends now serves a full buffet style lunch each Wednesday; and breakfast each Friday.