Nu2U, the town-owned thrift store, has distributed another $20,850 in grants to various community groups.
Grants distributed Sept. 12 went to the Mountain View Emergency Shelter ($10,000); Olds & District Hospice Society ($5,000); École Olds Elementary School ($1,000); and Padnoma Support Services ($500).
In addition, Olds Minor Baseball is receiving $3,950 for baseball equipment as part of those grants but representatives of that organization were not on hand when the cheques were handed out.
And the Olds Community Chorus received its portion ($400) earlier, to help fund summer choral activities.
Mary Hatcher of the Olds & District Hospice Society said they'll be using their money to support services such as counselling for those diagnosed with a terminal disease, as well as bereavement counselling.
Padnoma Support Services provides residential and day programs for special needs clients.
"We do an awful lot of things. We keep very busy with the clients day and night — literally. We have many homes around Olds where we have them in residence as well," said Barbie Schaeffer, who, along with Ron Rosehill of that organization, was present to receive their cheque.
She said the money could help train staff, as they are constantly upgrading programs.
However, Schaeffer said they have one need in particular.
"We want a television set, as silly as that is," she said with a laugh. "But that's what we need, because when we do everything from CPR, first aid, (training about) FASD (fetal alcohol spectrum disorders)."
Mountain View Emergency Shelter Society board member Roberta Hammer said their grant will be used primarily to help cover costs for the society's group programs, "but we may have to shuffle some into our one-on-one counselling."
École Olds Elementary School (EOES) principal Margo Nygard said their grant will be used to help cover the cost for a breakfast program in the school that was the brainchild of École Olds High School (EOHS) Grade 12 student Noah Martens.
"My mom is a teacher at EOES so I often hear stories about students that she has. They come to school and they don't have any food and we all know that if you're not providing your body and your brain with nutrients you're just not going to learn," he said.
"When kids go to school and they're not getting what they need it just kind of sets them up for failure in life. So in January I started a breakfast program at the school. So three days a week — Monday, Wednesday and Friday — I run breakfast in the morning from 8 a.m. to 8:45.
"That obviously led to increases in student performance, student attention span, all of that."
Martens said initially about 20 kids came to the breakfasts, but now he estimates a bit less than 20 per cent of the school's approximately 540 students utilize the program.
"The money that we get will be used to really just pay for food. It's all volunteer-run. We have volunteers who do everything," he said.
He told the Albertan that volunteers running the program include members of the Grizzlys, various Olds Broncos teams, and fellow students from his EOHS leadership class
"What I think is a great thing that Noah has done though is his volunteers are all different community organizations and members, so it's not Olds Elementary parents that are being relied on to do it," Nygard said.
"He's gone out into the community and brought them in so we've had a lot more exposure that way to our needs, but also the kids knowing what is out there beyond what they might have seen before, so that's a huge benefit."
Spokespeople for all the groups present expressed their appreciation for the grants.
