Beneficiaries
We are always in search of new programs and deserving groups in need of funds. To find out how your organization can become a beneficiary of Building Block Foundation Fund, please contact us at bbff.info@gmail.com.
Project Access
Project Access’ mission is to assist low-income residents of affordable housing developments to increase their self-sufficiency through onsite access to education, health, and social services.
Project Access helps children, families and seniors face critical challenges by bringing together affordable housing providers and community service agencies to create onsite resource centers that offer convenient access to education, information and training. By providing programs free of charge in residents’ “backyards,” Project Access helps people of all ages overcome challenges posed by language and culture, or by a lack of information, transportation or financial resources. Project Access currently serves residents in 14 Southern California affordable housing communities, which benefit more than 2,500 low-income families and seniors annually.
Each year, Project Access and Building Block identify an underfunded community within Orange County where we can help augment public assistance. By making direct investments in these local communities, Building Block can monitor the fund’s donation and allow Project Access provide full-service onsite support for low-income families.
Boys Hope Girls Hope
Founded in 1977, Boys Hope Girls Hope is a nonprofit children’s services agency dedicated to helping children-in-need realize their full potential through education.
The organization provides “arms-around” care, safe environments, first-class education, academic, financial and spiritual support through college with the goal of empowering these young people to complete a college education and put their education to work for the benefit of their families and communities.
Boys Hope Girls Hope provides scholar programs focused on assisting each student in academic planning and support, as well as, college preparation. Since 1991, 100% of scholars who completed the Boys Hope Girls Hope program have pursued higher education. The organizations college retention rate is 89-94% annually, compared to the national average of 66%.
For children whose circumstances require out-of-home placement, Boys Hope Girls Hope also provides a residential program that provides a live-in home, in a safe neighborhood, where children are cared for by live-in, professional Residential Counselors focused on parenting needs.
Visit www.boyshopegirlshope.org to join and donate.
EverFree
Every day, millions of people are exploited and abused in sexual slavery and forced labor – all for someone else’s profit. Most trafficking victims are women and girls, and only a small fraction of survivors receive the care they need to heal and thrive.
EverFree is on a mission to change that.
Working hand-in-hand with our community of partners, donors, and survivors, we unleash lasting freedom for millions and accelerate the end of human trafficking. Because we believe every person deserves freedom forever.
By restoring and empowering survivors, accelerating frontline solutions, and uniting for change, EverFree works to ensure more human trafficking survivors thrive in freedom in their communities and that cycles of exploitation are broken – forever.
Joyful Child Foundation
Formed in 2002, The Joyful Child is a not-for-profit dedicated to preventing crimes against children through programs that educate, empower, and unite families and communities. The organization was intitally organized after the abduction, molestation and murder of five-year old Samantha Runnion.
The Joyful Child’s goal is to ensure that every child is exposed to personal safety education and opportunities to practice in order to cultivate each child’s instinctual response to recognize, avoid, and if necessary, physically resist and escape inappropriate behaviors or violence. To meet this challenge, we have developed programs for parents and children to effectively reach every community. The Joyful Child trains teachers, non-profit partners, and law enforcement agencies to deliver our programs to children and parents.
Building Block’s contributions support programs and sponsor trainings for those who cannot afford them.
Kidworks
Since 1994, KIDWORKS has developed and operated community centers in Santa Ana neighborhoods that provide family support services and engage neighborhood residents in community development activities.
KIDWORKS learning centers provide after-school tutoring, homework help, computer training, one-to-one mentoring, leadership, development for youth and parents, and a safe refuge from dangers of the street. Young people in these neighborhoods are at-risk due to neglect, abuse, drugs, violence, gangs, lack of positive influences, escalating drop- out rates and teen pregnancy.
KIDWORKS influences at-risk youth through positive relationships with role models who provide guidance and tools for emotional healing as well as educational success.
Orangewood Children’s Foundation
Education is a key to opportunity. Sadly for youth in the foster care system, they face overwhelming obstacles just in achieving a high school education, much less attaining a college degree, making them the most educationally at-risk population. Youth in foster care need school as a point of stability. The good news is that we are making progress in helping current and former foster youth graduate from high school and transition to higher education. Orangewood’s Guardian Scholars Program provides personal guidance and access to supportive resources, helping foster youth students achieve their college degree or trade school education and transition to independent adulthood.
The Guardian Scholars Program helps foster youth achieve their dreams of an education and reach their full potential. This is achieved through a team effort of Orangewood Children’s Foundation, the Guardian Scholars institution, public agencies and committed private citizens.
The college assigns a knowledgeable, compassionate staff member to our students and the personalized attention assists with all the issues they face while navigating their education, life on their own, as well as career planning and long-term goals. This incredible support system provides the safety net that most students receive from their families. The program boasts that Guardian Scholars Program students attending four-year schools have a 70% retention rate. This retention rate meets or exceeds the rate for their student peers who have not experienced the disadvantages of the child welfare system.
Each year, Building Block selects Guardian Scholar candidates and provided each a two-year scholarship for college education. By making direct investments in the future of these students, Building Block can monitor the fund’s donation and help our scholarship recipients as they earn their degree.
For the 2011 – 2012 school year, 280 young adults were awarded $619,000 in scholarships for college or trade school. These students attended 76 schools in 16 states. In addition, 40 scholarship recipients successfully graduated from higher education programs.
Taller San Jose
Taller San Jose (St. Joseph’s Workshop) is a place where undereducated, unskilled and unemployed young adults who have taken the wrong path can find hope. The Sisters of St. Joseph of Orange opened Taller San Jose in 1995 in response to the high rate of crime and gang violence prevalent in the City of Santa Ana, California. Since then, Taller has helped over 3,000 high-risk youth, ages 18 to 28, restructure their lives, finish high school and develop marketable skills. Through a focused training curriculum in three key sectors where the demand for skilled workers is high-residential construction, medical careers and computer technology-Taller San Jose offers employers access to a new pool of drug-free, work-ready candidates with training, skills, and support that improve their reliability and retention on the job.
Each year, Building Block funds numerous Amigo Scholarships. Each scholarship provides a student 16 weeks of job training, life skills workshops, and weekly sessions with a case manager to sort out their barriers and achieve goals. By making direct investments in the future of these students, Building Block can monitor the fund’s donation and help our scholarship recipients as they earn their degree. In most cases, our scholars will attend Building Block’s Career Day where they will see and hear first-hand how they can be productive within Orange County’s real estate industry.
Israel arrived at Taller San Jose with no job skills and has now been in the program for six weeks. “I feel great coming to class every day and being productive,” says Israel. Click here to watch the rest of his story. Like Israel, nearly 40% of Taller San Jose’s students have never had a job. By coming to class every day, they gain a sense of responsibility that prepares them for the workforce.