The United Way of Southwestern Indiana releases these funds twice per year as part of their Pathways to Potential Initiative. This round is focusing on mental health.
The recipients for this round are Catholic Charities, United Methodist Youth Home, Success Through Mentoring and Youth First.
The Largest single grantee was United Methodist Youth Home for at-risk youths, with $177,631.
United Methodist Youth Home Director of Development Shelby Harder, said this grant will help transportation to their aftercare program.
She said it will also help them to expand in other areas. Currently, they only serve residents who live on-campus, but they’ll soon be expanding to their education, truancy students, and eventually community and aftercare students and alumni.
“So we did an analysis, seeing where that need was,” she said. “And we really need some wraparound care through all services no matter where they go. So we are very excited.”
Overall organizations provide direct or preventative services to improve access to mental health services or skill-building opportunities for low-income individuals.
This is also the first time a Spencer County organization has received a grant through the local United Way. Success Through Mentoring is receiving nearly $89,000.
Success Through Mentoring Executive Director Kevin Mayor said these funds will help them focus on northern Spencer County.
“Success Through Mentoring offers adult mentors to our youth in our community who are struggling. A lot of the times they're at risk youth, and they're involved in the juvenile justice system, or low income youth who don't have access to a lot of the resources that are available to most of our community.”
The next grant period will be open in August. It will be a larger amount and focused exclusively on the youth.
More on grant recipients
Catholic Charities is awarded $152,440 to support a part-time, bilingual licensed social worker (LSW) for the outpatient counseling program and underwrite community language interpretation training for three staff members.
These additions will increase the organization’s ability to serve Spanish-speaking clients of any age. A portion of this grant award will also offset the costs incurred from Catholic Charities’ sliding scale fee model.
United Methodist Youth Home is awarded $177,631 to expand their therapy program for at-risk youth to include those recently discharged from UMYH inpatient programs and youth in need of outpatient services to prevent court intervention.
Success Through Mentoring is awarded $88,924 to underwrite one full-time position and expand mentoring opportunities further into Spencer County. The organization connects adult mentors to kids from lower-income, underserved communities.
Youth First is awarded $150,000 to support evidence-based youth mental health prevention programs in five EVSC schools with larger low-income populations. This work addresses critical, underlying challenges that improve mental health and break cycles of poverty.
United Way of Southwestern Indiana’s Pathway Grants are intended to address root causes of poverty and are made possible through the generous donations of individuals and businesses in our community. Source: United Way