This month’s gratification post is to our volunteer grant writer, Francoise Elise! Each month we thank an individual, business and/or organization who supports our efforts! Francoise reached out just about one year ago to see if she could help the Center by volunteering her time to help us with grants! Francoise is a retired grant writer with over 20 years of experience in many sectors and with much success, so it was a no brainer for us to welcome her aboard! After multiple meetings with the Director to learn more about the Center and how we are responsible for raising funds for all of our programs, materials and part-time staff, Francoise got to work! With her help our capacity to submit more grants has increased so much over the last year. Already, she has helped us with securing grants for STEAM programming, to purchase a new AED machine, to create a social emotional learning curriculum and hire a consultant and finally for summer camp scholarships, amounting to over $15,000 worth of funding so far! We would like to extend a HUGE thank YOU to Francoise for donating over 50 hours of her time to work on these grants and help the Center to continue to grow!