Our LifeChanger of the Year program is in the midst of its annual holiday campaign. And this year, for every new nomination, LifeChanger and the National Life Group Foundation are donating $25 to one of five nonprofits created by a previous LifeChanger. We’ve decided to profile all five so everyone knows the kind of work we’re honoring and supporting.
SKY – Brian Copes’ vision for his students and the good they can do is as big as the world.
A pre-engineering teacher in Alabama, Brian wants to give his students hands-on experience in real-world skills while giving them an appreciation for how to improve the world around them. So he created SKY, Skilled Knowledgeable Youth, which exposes students to science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) through projects that make an impact for communities around the world.
In 2017, Brian took his SKY students to Belfate, Honduras, to convert used shipping containers to classrooms and skilled trades laboratories for welding, woodworking, and auto mechanics.
Through this and other hands-on projects, SKY strives to prepare students for a rapidly changing future.
Green Hope Project – Candie Printz is an assistant fine arts director in El Paso, Texas, with a passion for the environment as well as art.
Candie decided to bring those passions together with education to create what she calls the Green Hope Project.
Green Hope aims to use those three disciplines to make a difference and take better care of our planet.
The organization began after Candie came up with the idea to have students pick up littered trash and turn it into art.
That seed of an idea has now expanded to community workshops teaching recycled art, environmental curriculum for teachers, Adopt-A-Highway desert cleanups, and much more.
Food for Thought – The National Life Group Foundation has adopted as its cause helping to end childhood hunger. LifeChanger Jennifer Lemoine, a 2018-19 LifeChanger, shares our commitment to the cause.
At a time when three out four public elementary school teachers say they see students regularly come to school hungry, Jennifer is doing something about it. And has been for a while.
More than 10 years ago, Jennifer, a gifted and talented teacher in Colorado, saw this urgent need in her students and worked with a local community organization to co-found Food for Thought.
That’s a program that delivers weekly food bags for the highest-risk children and their families.
The organization currently partners with 34 schools across three counties. A $25 donation like the ones that the Foundation is sponsoring could feed two families for a week.
B.I.O.N.I.C – Sandy Austin was a school counselor at Pomona High School in Colorado in 2004 when four of the students in her district committed suicide.
So she created B.I.O.N.I.C., Believe It Or Not, I Care.
She wanted to make sure others did not fall through the cracks and set out on a mission to create more supportive schools and communities.
Seventeen years later, B.I.O.N.I.C has expanded worldwide to more than 2,300 schools.
Through simple outreach, teams of young people are empowered to reach out to those going through tough times to let them know they are seen, valued, and cared for in hopes of preventing them from spiraling down into more serious issues including suicide.
Sandy was a LifeChanger winner in the 2018-19 school year, recognized for her compassionate and dedicated work in supporting students not only in her school, but everywhere.
Do Kind, Inc. – Timothy Fauth describes it a little bit differently than we do, but he is a great believer in a cause very similar to ours: to Do good in the world.
Tim started a nonprofit he calls Do Kind, Inc. with a simple commitment: to make the world a better place today than it was yesterday. And he wants that commitment to extend from the real world we inhabit to the social media world where we spend so much time.
Do Kind challenges students to complete acts of kindness in exchange for funds for curriculum support, school supplies, and more.
Schools send in a request for funds and are given acts of kindness to finish in 24 hours. Once the challenge is complete, the funds are transferred the very next day!
Tim is an assistant principal in Grafton, Mass., and was a LifeChanger in the 2019-20 school year.
You must know a LifeChanger yourself. Nominate him or her before Dec. 31 to be part of this year’s campaign. And then choose Tim’s nonprofit or one of four others to win a $25 donation.