Working with the Ansonia Schools

 Wednesday night I had the pleasure of attending a meeting of the Ansonia Board of Education. Prior to the start of the business part of the meeting, the Board had a short, three part ceremony. During the first part, Mead School's enthusiastic principal Terri Goldson, recognized the achievements of  students who had achieved outstanding scores in the CT Mastery Tests as their proud parents snapped dozens of pictures of shy, but very proud students who represent all that is great in the Ansonia School system.

During the second part of the ceremony, they recognized four outstanding teachers in the system for the outstanding results achieved by students under their tutelage as Board Chairman John Lawler commended them for their dedication and service to the children of Ansonia.

And then they used the third part of the program to recognize three community groups for their support of the schools including Valley United Way. I believe that he Certificate of Appreciation in our case was mainly for the recent success of the Back to School Clothes for Kids program at Mead School, but it got me thinking about several of the ways that we interact with the schools and students in Ansonia - and there are many. To start with tow of our Board members have special ties to the schools. Carol Merlone is the Superintendent of Schools in Ansonia, and she is also serving as the Education Chairman of this year's Community Fund-raising Campaign. Bill Nimons is a board member at United Way, and he is also a member of the Board of Education.

Valley United Way also serves as the community partner for Ansonia's Discovery early childhood effort as well as for the regional effort in which Ansonia is also engaged. Ansonia High School is also an active member of our High School Volunteer Council. And finally, down through the years many Ansonia High School students and Ansonia residents attending other area high schools have been members of our Youth Leadership Program.

All in all, we have had a lengthy and mutually rewarding relationship with the Ansonia school system and I think it is a good example of how working together helps to make for a better school system and a better community for all of us. Thank you Ansonia Schools!

For more information about Valley United Way, visit our website at www.valleyunitedway.org.

Give - and Give Away

It's the busiest and most exciting time of year at Valley United Way as we are in the midst of the annual Community Fundraising campaign as you can see from the posters of some of those doing campaigns above. We will be out talking to people all over the Valley soliciting their support for the annual campaign. We'll have lots of stories and pictures and an occassional video on the campaign seciton of our website.

At the same time, we are also giving some of the money away. Our normal allocation process takes place in the spring, but at this time of year, we have a small grants program that we have called our Special Needs Program, and we began taking applications today through our on-line system. The total pool of money is approximately $45,000 this year, and the funds are from donors who specifically earmarked their funds for a special area such as the elderly, youth and recreation, substance abuse, child care, etc. These are dollars allocated separately from and in addition to the regular spring allocation process. The funds can be used to meet special needs of an agency beyond their normal budget. One grant of $10,000 to Valley Regional Adult Education to help boost high school graduation rates has already been made.

We made this a formal grant program starting in 2003 when the pool of funds was $13,000. It has grown quite a bit since then, and during the last two years we had grants of  approximately $50,000 and $47,000 respectively.

For more information about the campaign and the grant program, visit our website.


For more information about Valley United Way, visit our website at http://www.valleyunitedway.org/.