The leadership of the Gibney Family Foundation enabled ReCycle North to develop a new dimension of service in support of its reuse, training and poverty relief mission. ReCycle North now gives away more than a dozen refurbished computers each year that are outfitted with accessability software and offers job skill training to blind or visually impaired youth and adults who need to obtain new skills to become employed.
Tom Longstreth
From our Grantees
Support from The Gibney Family Foundation helps Outdoors for All improve the quality of life through year round outdoor recreation and education for many individuals who are blind or visually impaired here in Washington state. Grant funding makes it possible for us to do a more focused job of outreach to individuals who are blind or partially sighted as well as offer more activities tailored to their needs.
Ed Bronsdon
I just wanted to pass along to you that although we have only worked with the foundation for a short period of time, the relationship has been a uniquely positive one. I have found the Gibney Family Foundation to be much more than a funder, but a genuine partner in our work. It’s refreshing to have active participation (not in controlling manner) in project planning and implementation as well as recognition of our organization’s capacity building needs for sustaining good work. Thank you to Frank Gibney and the foundation for your support to date.
Rich Tulikangas
With a grant from The Gibney Family Foundation, Perkins professionals are using multimedia technology to develop a training module suited for school personnel and parents teaching a child who is blind or visually impaired. The multimedia package will be filled with user friendly information that lays the foundation for understanding the impact a visual impairment has on a child’s development and ability to build social relationships
Steven Rothstein
The matching challenge grant the Valley Foundation has received from the The Gibney Family Foundation have provided the much needed funding necessary to allow children with Autism to attend the Carmen B. Pingree School for Children with Autism, a program of Valley Mental Health. Current scholarships from our endowment fund are inadequate to provide this critical opportunity for these children to learn and grow and give them a chance at a normal life. Many studies have shown that Autism is most likely to be impacted and the severity lessened through early intervention programs, such as the Pingree School provides. Thank you to TGFF for allowing us to provide much needed services to a significant number of children and their families.
Laurel Ingham
The Gibney Family Foundation, by its grant to the Theater Audio Description Project of The Vermont Council of the Blind, has enabled the training of volunteer audio describers. These trained describers are committed to make accessible, to the blind and visually impaired, one performance of each production of the theater for which they have agreed to be a volunteer. Presently, St. Michael’s Playhouse, The Lyric Theater, Champlain College Theater, and The Depot Theatre are participants in this self sustaining project.
Michael Richman
Using challenge grants from TGFF, the Emil Fries School of Piano Tuning and Technology has created and begun implementing a strategic plan for development and public relations to increase community awareness and financial support for our mission. For example, all Lions Clubs in the States of Washington and Oregon responded to our direct mail campaign and speaking engagements with increased financial support, which has enabled exploration of similar efforts aimed at blind and visually impaired students, their counselors and teachers to increase awareness of the career potential in the piano tuning and technology field.
Len Leger
Kids on the Block Vermont (KOBVT) has enjoyed a wonderful relationship with the Gibney Family Foundation (TGFF) over the past two years. KOBVT, an educational puppet troupe, is dedicated to teaching children in Vermont how to keep themselves safe and healthy and to appreciate each other’s physical and cultural differences. The generosity of TGFF has supported our program on blindness/visual impairment and allowed us to:
• Train a puppeteer who is visually impaired to perform with our puppet, Renaldo, who is blind
• Educate 852 students and 152 adults through the power of puppetry as well as provide a special hands-on workshop in classrooms where there was a blind/visually impaired student
• Network with families and the Vermont Association for the Blind and Visually Impaired (VABVI) to improve our program and make it available to schools
• Generate an additional $17,500 in funding to meet TGFF’s matching grant challenge
We have received two grants from the Gibney Family Foundation four our Homeless Youth Outreach Program. These gifts have enabled us to be more mobile, more responsive and more able to meet the complex needs of Greater Manchester homeless and at risk youth. The grants have expanded our reach throughout the community resulting in our being able to serve more youth and provide additional supports and services to them.
The Gibney Family Foundation has helped Lilac Blind to accomplish its
mission by investing in the lives of blind individuals and their families
through Independent Living Week. The support of TGFF has improved our
development program and increased our opportunities for successful expansion
of programs in the future.