Atrium Health Floyd-Polk Foundation grants totaling more than $585,000 benefit children

The Atrium Health Floyd-Polk Foundation is making a difference in our community.

Earlier this month, the foundation awarded 33 grants worth $1.3 million to area nonprofits that are already making a positive difference in northwest Georgia and northeast Alabama. A third of those grants, totaling more than $585,000, were awarded to agencies that focus on children.

There are sobering reasons for this.

Today, around 650,000 children live in poverty in Georgia. Nearly 400,000 Georgia children suffer from hunger and more than 11,000 Georgia children are in foster care. Almost 7,100 children were born to mothers under 20. About 18.5% of high school students have seriously considered suicide in the past 12 months.

The foundation board recognized the need and responded with the opportunity to invest in the next generation.

These grants would not have been possible without the vision of the men and women who recognized that the future of Floyd Medical Center depended on a partnership with a larger healthcare provider.

Despite excellent financials and years of effective process improvements and waste reduction, these leaders recognized that even successful community hospitals faced an uncertain future.

They looked for partners and ultimately chose Atrium Health. As part of the strategic combination, the cash would be invested and the Atrium Health Floyd-Polk Foundation would be created to distribute dividends to organizations that would improve health, inspire hope and advance healing.

This was an opportunity to make real change. These funds, totaling nearly $200 million, could be used to eliminate disparities in care and address the social determinants of health here in northwest Georgia and northeast Alabama.

Twelve agencies that specifically focus on the next generation now receive support from the foundation to achieve their goals. This is good work.

A teenager’s choice helps high school graduates navigate college applications and financial aid, develops leadership skills, and leads mental wellness groups.

Bloom our youth focuses on the unique needs of foster children and helps them reach, in her words, “their God-given potential.”

Boys and Girls Clubs have implemented Project Learn to create high-impact learning activities that develop young people’s cognitive skills. The project also emphasizes parental involvement and collaboration between club and school professionals.

The Child and Senior Advocacy Foundation ensures that children’s basic needs are met throughout the year.

The Children’s Advocacy Center of Cherokee County is committed to providing a safe, child-friendly facility where victims of child abuse can receive specialized services.

The Exchange Club Family Resource Center provides education and support to families at home, helping them create a safe, stable and caring home in which children can grow and thrive.

The family crisis center provides families in crisis with a peaceful and safe haven so they can begin healing from their trauma.

The Youth Mental Health Initiative will provide affirmative action curriculum packages in elementary and middle schools for 1,800 students. The curriculum teaches students essential life skills and covers topics such as self-understanding and responsible decision-making.

The Tar Wars The Georgia Healthy Family Alliance offers students an early tobacco and e-cigarette prevention education and prevention program available at no cost to Georgia schools. The program educates elementary school students about the dangerous health effects of tobacco and e-cigarette use, the costs associated with using tobacco products, and the effective advertising and messaging techniques the tobacco/e-cigarette industry uses to promote their Marketing products to young people.

The open housewhich provides emergency and extended care to youth who may be experiencing neglect, abandonment, sexual abuse, physical abuse, lack of supervision, truancy, lack of adequate housing, or parental absence. The organization plans to use its grant to specifically make it easier for these children and young people to access high-quality health care.

The Rebecca Blaylock Child Development Center offers a cost-effective, safe and private learning environment with individualized instruction.

Restoration Rome plans to use his grant to provide trust-based relational interventions for children who have experienced adversity, early injury, toxic stress, and/or trauma.

There is an African proverb made famous by Hilary Clinton: “It takes a village to raise a child.” The Atrium Health Floyd-Polk Foundation is part of that village. At the heart of our mission is investing in children and young people. These young people could well be the healthcare providers of tomorrow. They will be the workforce, the parents, the educators and the patient population that leads us into the second half of the 21st century^st Century.

Atrium Health Floyd Medical Center has been making a positive impact on the communities we serve for 82 years. The work of the Atrium Health Floyd-Polk Foundation expands this legacy into one that will impact future generations in ways that may never have been possible otherwise.