Well, today is the day our class decides which grant request(s) to fund. Our class of fourteen students has worked extremely hard researching and exploring many nonprofits in the Portland area that serve a community faced with housing insecurity or homelessness. We have narrowed the decision down to these five outstanding nonprofit organizations: Portland Homeless Family Solutions, Candlelighters for Children with Cancer, Right to Dream Too, REACH, and Community Transitional School. I encourage you to do your own research into each of these fantastic organizations and see if you would like to support them in some way, either financially or with your time.

We have looked at each organization’s financials, their mission, the business structure, been on site visits, and asked many questions. Some of us have had the opportunity to talk personally with those being served by the nonprofit.  We each have come away with a new understanding of the community that is being served. I must say that none of us take this decision lightly. We are making sure that the decision we make is an informed one.

Even though we have narrowed it down to five nonprofit organizations, only funding a portion is a heavy task. I believe that we have each connected with a specific nonprofit for different reasons. Some of us have personally experienced the difficult obstacles the nonprofit is trying to alleviate or know someone who has, which gives a deeper more personal connection. Which organization is the best investment? We will keep you updated.

Here is my summary of one of my site visits:

On Tuesday, May 30th at 1:30 p.m. I had the privilege attending my second site visit, Candlelighters for Children with Cancer. I am beyond impressed with Jackie Groah, the Executive Director and this nonprofit as a whole. They do so much with so little resources. The community they reach is anyone who is touched by childhood cancer. Cancer does not discriminate.

When a family is stricken with cancer in Oregon and SW Washington they receive treatment at either Randall Hospital or Dornbecher. Each family is given a social worker and bereavement specialist for support. This social worker is the person who helps the family apply for the emergency fund through candlelighters. Every application that is received at the office is approved. No one is ever denied. They set their budget knowing that the statistics show that 200 families will be faced with cancer each year. There is only a seven-day turnaround from the time the family applies and when the funds are disbursed. All other resources available to cancer families have a very long and difficult application process which requires that the families show they have exhausted all other resources. When a family is facing the mortality of their child, this is the last thing they have energy for.

Even though the two employees we met were hired on in the last year and a half, turnover has been low. Candlelighters has had 3 Executive Directors in the last 17 years. Jackie shared with us that the largest difficulty they have had was this organization being volunteer led and that it was not ran as a business so funds were VERY tight. Now they have focused more on networking, collaboration, and fundraising. They currently have a board of 12 members who serve for 3 years with a limit of 3 terms.

We had the pleasure of hearing first hand a testimony of a parent who received funds and support from Candlelighters. She explained how receiving the funds allowed her to concentrate on her children and not on the bills. Her son was diagnosed with a form of leukemia at age 5 while she also cared for a newborn baby and her son’s twin brother. She told us how these unexpected funds from Candlelighters kept a roof over their head and provided support to them as a family not to just the child as other nonprofits in the cancer world do. She is still active in Candlelighters as a participant and as a volunteer.