Local nonprofit Special Kids announced Tuesday that the organization won a $25,000 grant through the State Farm Neighborhood Assist Facebook campaign for the second consecutive year. The organization received over 52,000 votes to secure the number six spot amongst the top 40 national finalists who received the grant.

“Special Kids is overjoyed to win the State Farm grant again this year,” said Ginger Warf, Special Kids Director of Marketing. “We have been incredibly blessed to see the response from the online community to rally behind our children.”

The nonprofit will use the funds to expand its Family Services Department. This department focuses on serving and educating families who have children with special needs in order to help them better function in the community. The grant will go to further educate the staff, hire additional staff, and implement an intensive case management process.

“We are so thankful for State Farm and this unique opportunity to expand our services to better care for our families,” said Warf.

Special Kids secured the same grant in 2012 by grabbing the number 14 spot out of 200 contestants. The grant funds received in 2012 went towards providing Special Kids’ summer day camp, Camp Ability, which serves children with special needs ages 6-25.

State Farm Neighborhood Assist program is a crowd-sourced philanthropic initiative that lets communities determine where grant funding is awarded, exclusively through Facebook. The initiative utilizes the State Farm Youth Advisory Board to vet submissions for causes and allows Facebook users who download the free State Farm Neighborhood Assist application to vote for the final 40 grant winners. The program has been inspired by the incredible number of neighborhoods that are coming together to solve a problem or improve their community.

Special Kids is a Christian, nonprofit organization located in Murfreesboro, TN, that provides therapeutic rehabilitation and professional nursing services to children with special needs.  Since 1998, Special Kids has served over 2,300 families from 11 counties in middle Tennessee. For more information on Special Kids, please visit specialkidstn.com or call 615.893.4892.

Special Kids, Inc. from Special Kids, Inc. on Vimeo.

Source: 

Special Kids, Murfreesboro, TN