President's Message

Check out the video below from the PPS Foundation President, Cindy Morris!

Thank you to our event sponsors and supporters! Our annual golf outing is less than a week away, and we are so excited! This event is our largest fundraiser and always a lot of fun to participate in. Last year, the funds raised through this golf outing supported classroom grants, our Horizons Career Exploration Program, basic needs assistance and so much more. We are so grateful for the generous support of our sponsors, participants, and supporters. Thank you all so much!

Title Sponsors: Gallagher OrganicLife Eagle Sponsors: Commerce Bank Consociate Health IDG Architects Muir Omni Graphics Birdie Sponsors: CliftonLarsonAllen Delta Dental Hodges Loizzi Eisenhammer Rodick & Kohn Oberlander Electric Stephen P Kelley ViMedicus Best in Class Sponsor: Elger Wealth Management Group of Wells Fargo Advisors Drink Sponsor: Baumgarten Distributing Golf Ball Sponsor: Johnson Mechanical Golf Tee Sign Sponsor: Muir Omni Graphics Sub Sandwich Sponsor: CORE Construction

A+ Sponsor: K2 Benefits Tee-Green Sponsors: Anytime Fitness Busey Bank CDS Office Technologies Everside Health Heartland Bank & Trust Just Kidz Dentistry Kay McCord Keith Engineering Design PNC Ray LaHood The Standard Raffle/Swag Donors: BLDD Architects Casey's Corn Stock Theatre Darlene Violet Fired Up Friar Tuck Hy-Vee Joe Couri Photos Liberty Mutual Karen Gast & Family Kartville Par-A-Dice Hotel Peoria Park District Peoria Riverfront Museum Pottstown Meat & Deli RC Outfitters Wildlife Prairie Park

Additional Golf Foursome Participants: Bard Optical, BLDD Architects, Carle Health, CEFCU, CORE Construction, e2 Companies, Heartland Bank & Trust, Johnson Mechanical/Midwestern Insurance Associates, Keith Engineering Design, Illinois Mutual, Mesirow Financial, Midwest Engineering, OSF Foundation, PCM+ Design Architects, Peoria ROE, PNC, Ray LaHood, and Robert Williams

Thank you so much to our supporters!

Adopt-A-School End of the Year Update Check out the amazing things happening in this program!

Hello Summer! We are so grateful for our long-term supporters and all the organizations who joined us in our Adopt-A-School program to support our students. Below is a little update on our work this past school year. Here's to a wonderful summer and looking forward to next school year!   Little Free Pantries: We are so grateful to all our LFP supporters. Five new partners joined the work to adopt pantries that were in need of support. We appreciate help in this vital area of the Foundation's mission. Snack Packs: This program aligns community partners with specific schools to provide a weekend meal option for students. Joining our longtime program partners, six additional sponsors had the capacity to expand their support of some of our schools, allowing us to provide a weekend option for an additional 800 students across the district.

School Garden Support: An emerging area of school community volunteer programing, we have been able to help expand the implementation and maintenance of school gardens across the district. Equally exciting, more than $2,000 of in-kind donations have been provided for our school gardens. Thank you to all who have helped make this new avenue of impact a reality for our students.

Fine Arts: We are so grateful to the Peoria Symphony Orchestra for their support this year. We were so fortunate to have two visiting artists (Janice Martin and Christine Lamprea) perform and educate many of our students.  Making the Grade Conferences: Making the Grade Conferences is an idea spearheaded by Dr. Kherat, providing one on one mentoring and goal setting support for identified students by community volunteers. Thank you to our community partners the Peoria Riverfront Museum, Bradley University’s Interactive Media Department and Sun Foundation members for working this year with 6th grade students at Sterling Middle School and Lincoln K-8. We are excited to expand this program in the next school year. If you would like to volunteer to work with a student, look for more information in future editions of this newsletter on how to get involved.

WE TAKE ONLINE DONATIONS! Click the picture below to donate.

Thank You to our Community Partners!

We'd like to give an especially big shout out this month to Starbucks, Hy-Vee in Sheridan Village and K2 Benefits for going above and beyond to further our mission to improve the quality of education in Peoria Public Schools!

PPS Foundation's Board of Directors: Dan Adler, Andre Allen, Beth Crider, Solivian Dismuke, Maarten de Haas, Alex Elger, Kim McGhee, Cheryl Sanfilip, and Doug Shaw Ex Officio Board Members: Dr. Sharon Desmoulin-Kherat (PPS Superintendent) and Mike Murphy (PPS Board of Education) PPS Foundation's Staff: Cindy Morris - President Trish O'Shaughnessy - Director of Programming & Community Engagement Jen Adler - Administrative Director Janet Ham - Adopt-A-School Coordinator Matt Violet - Data and Programming Logistics Coordinator Jaleesha Allen - Career Program Coordinator Annalee Anderson - Career Tech Advocate Ellie de Buhr - Career Tech Advocate Catherine Murray - Career Tech Advocate Olivia Smith - Career Tech Advocate

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