It appears our lives will most likely still be in suspension for our April meeting. With that in mind our Steering Committee understands there is an even greater need in our community.  If you are able, we think this is a wonderful opportunity to help out someone in need, be it a family member, a friend or a neighbor.

Many prayers and thoughts of a much brighter future to all.

Cheers,
Teresa, Karen, Michelle, Linnea, Amber, Nancy, Sara and Kathy-Sue

Tim Allard, Director of Calhoun Community High School, shared these amazing notes at our April 2015 meeting.

On behalf of the staff and students at Calhoun Community High School I want to say thank you for your generous donation. I’m grateful that my chemistry teacher, Lisa Ryan, had the courage to share about our school and that you all had the generosity to help us help kids.

Calhoun Community High School is by definition an “alternative high school.” Sometimes the term “alternative” can have a negative connotation.   It is understandable. Nonetheless, our kids are much like any other kids. They want to fit in, they want to be successful, and they want to be independent.

Nonetheless, when they come to us, they have typically become disenfranchised with the “traditional” school system. Often times our students lack a stable home life and many of them come from homes of poverty and dysfunction. It can be a challenge to engage them in learning and because they’ve experienced a great deal of failure in school, it is almost expected.

Service learning helps us give our kids a purpose, it helps them to connect to their community, and it most certainly helps our kids have a sense of achievement.

I’ve always said, and I firmly believe, that success breeds success. Therefore, the more service learning we can do, the more success our kids tend to have.

Here is the current list of service learning activities that your dollars are helping to fund.

1. Students have gone to Charitable Union to help with a coat drive, they’ve helped fold clothes, they’ve hung clothes, and they’ve labeled clothes. Lisa Ryan has been instrumental in this connection and has worked with Tammy the Charitable Union Volunteer.
2. Another project that Lisa has done is taking her consumers science class to the Salvation Army Soup Kitchen. There our students worked with Jane and helped to prepare and serve food.
3. Our social studies Teacher, Mr. Doster has worked closely with Kellogg Community College where we have begun a partnership. Students in the service learning class at KCC have started volunteering in our school. One student in particular along with Mr. Doster conducted a food drive and a clothing drive for the Food Bank.
4. Another science Teacher, Mrs. Egnatuk, works with her environmental science class and they have partnered in service learning with Jeremy from Sprout Urban Farms. This partnership has led to a hoop house behind our school where we are growing fresh vegetables. Furthermore, our kids travel to sprout sites where they plant, weed, and harvest vegetables. They also learn the business of farming and connect other curricular areas such as math and marketing to the learning.
5. Another project done by Mrs. Ryan was to have her class knit Baby Hats for the Child Abuse Prevention program. Your donation helped to purchase the materials for that project.
6. We have conducted two blood drives with the Red Cross.
7. Our English Teacher, Mr. Heuerman has connected with Calhoun Christian Elementary where our students went and read alongside elementary students. We are gathering titles of their favorite books and plan to make a donation to their library.
8. The Algebra Teacher, Mrs. Nowak, takes her students to Northpointe Woods where our kids play games and spend time in conversation with the residents. Our students have even helped some of the residents with learning how to use technology like Ipads and did some online biographies with the residents.

Most of the money we use to help transport students from school to the places where they are doing service learning. We do not have transportation at our school which can be a reason we do not take our kids away from the building. Now, with your donation, we have been able to all of these projects and we plan to do even more.

Again we thank you and I hope you have a blessed day.

— as presented at our Women of Impact meeting on April 14, 2015.  We cannot thank Tim enough for this amazing presentation on our impact.  We love hearing about how our contributions affect our chosen organizations.  Thank you!

We had a fantastic meeting on Tuesday, Dec. 10 at the Cricket Club, in downtown Battle Creek. We had over 11 women who wanted to share with us information about organizations that are improving the life conditions of women, girls, children and families here in Battle Creek. We heard about 3 wonderful presentations last Tuesday – Girls on the Run, Community Healthcare Connections and Boys & Girls Club of Battle Creek.  All were wonderful presentations followed by great questions. We selected the Boys & Girls Club of Battle Creek as our next organization for our collective giving. Please make your checks out to Boys & Girls Club of Battle Creek and mail to Donna Lartigue.

For those members who have not been able to come to a meeting, I encourage you to do so when you have an opportunity. We have had an amazing year and have had the opportunity and privilege to give to wonderful organizations who are changing lives in our community!

I truly believe that we enrich our lives when we give to others. I believe that Women of Impact can be a call for action to women in our community to get involved, to join hands and hearts in collaboration with each other and to share and give what we can to help strengthen and improve lives in our community.

Many thanks to you all and have a wonderful and joyous Christmas season!

— WOI Founder Donna Lartigue

Would you like to stay engaged with our funding recipients?  Here is a note from March recipient Freedom School.

The CDF Freedom Schools program provides summer and after-school enrichment that helps children fall in
love with reading, increases their self-esteem, and generates more positive attitudes toward learning.

We would like to invite you to be a part of this Wonderful summer enrichment program as a guest reader. We are asking you to spare just 30 minutes from 8:30am to 9:00am with us out of your day. You may bring your own book to share or we can provide you with a book from our Freedom Schools library.

If you are willing to share your time, please contact Ms. Mariama or Ms. Amber to see if any dates are still available. Their contact information and more details are available in this information sheet:

Freedom School Volunteer Information

We wanted to share a letter from one of the founding members of Women of Impact of Greater Battle Creek.  Donna Lartigue sent this to the group following the March meeting.  We think it is a great progress report and history for the group.  Enjoy!

As I shared with members last night, Women of Impact’s total membership  for 2012 was 65 members.  Our total giving for 2012 was $21,800!!!! We had approximately 7 members who have left the area or who felt they could no longer participate,  bringing our  total to 58 members. However, we had 11 women join Women of Impact last night, which brings our total membership to 69 women!!  This is awesome!

As I reflect about the creation of Women of Impact, I remember when the thought of creating a giving circle was just that, a thought – an idea.  I remember feeling DEEPLY compelled to take on the project. Why? Because I felt the need to give back and wanted to make Battle Creek a better place to live for everyone.   I moved to Battle Creek 10 years ago with my husband, Carlton and son, Ethan to accept a Program Director position with the WK Kellogg Foundation. I had the privilege to serve on its Hometown programming team and manage a grant portfolio that supported the needs of Battle Creek. During the 7 years I worked at WKKF, I came to learn about how special the people in Battle Creek are and  how my family and I have come to call Battle Creek our home. I also learned and saw first- hand the impact of the health, educational, economic and racial disparities that exist in our community and the impact these disparities have on the overall financial health, sustainability and well-being of our community.

I am so thankful to my friends who answered my invitation to explore the creation of a giving circle – Stephanie Stewart, Chris Kwak, Kathy Sue Dunn, Grace Cowens, Teresa Durham, Denise Brooks-Williams, Patricia Adams, Katie Moskalik, Mishca Smith, Lynn Van Pelt, and Paula Ware. It is because of the hard work of these incredible women that Women of Impact was born.

I am equally grateful to the many women who have joined Women of Impact.  It is my deepest hope that this journey will allow us to continue to explore a range of experiences and perspectives in Battle Creek.  It is also my hope, that as a diverse group of women,  we come together, to celebrate our commonalities and appreciate our differences.

We can do so much more together than we can as individuals.  As we continue to grow, the importance and power of our giving will also grow and our leveraged giving will continue to create greater impact.

Many thanks to you all,

Donna