Category: Social Responsibility

Service Without Boundaries Celebrates 10th Anniversary

Posted on by Kate Haslar

When individuals with disabilities age out of school-based programming at 21, families often struggle to find opportunities for them to continue learning and receiving the necessary support. Ten years ago, several families attending the Y’s recreational programs asked if the YMCA at Pabst Farms could provide a day program that would allow their loved ones to grow, learn, and form meaningful relationships while they continued to work and maintain their households. The Y jumped at the chance to serve our participants in this way and, in 2014, Service Without Boundaries (SWB) was born.

Faith O’Leary was one of those families. Her son Kevin has been involved in the Y Special Programs since age 8 and she was overjoyed when the SWB program began just as Kevin aged out of school services. The first day of the program was his birthday. Faith is so thankful to everyone who has been involved in the development and success of the SWB program, “The amount of support our family receives is truly amazing!” Faith appreciates that the program “allows Kevin an opportunity to be involved in HIS community. He has developed friendships with his peers and is always happy and smiling.”

Starting with one day a week and 8 participants, Service Without Boundaries now runs four days a week, serving up to 24 participants a day, and has contributed over 2,000 hours of service across organizations like Oconomowoc Food Pantry, Zachariah’s Acres, Shorehaven Wellness Center, the library and Blue Butterfly Thrift Store.

Missy Kaun, Special Programs Director, reflects “It’s incredible to see how far we’ve come. We started without even having a dedicated space and now we are expanding to include learning, exercising, and crafting.” Full-time caregiver Karen Drwila adds that the program has not only fostered her daughter Kristen’s independence but also provides her with a much-needed break.

The program’s impact goes beyond the participants. Special Programs Coordinator Katie Becker explains, “At the Y we talk about things that fill our cup and often other staff will visit the day program when they need their cup filled. It brings joy to the whole building.”

Reflecting on the journey, former Special Programs Director Jodi Dabrowski highlights the Y’s commitment to community: “I love how the Y can respond to a need. We listen to the families that we serve and do our best to help in any way that we can.” After 10 years, Service Without Boundaries remains a vital program, offering young adults with disabilities meaningful engagement, friendship, and connection to their community.

“The amount of support our family receives is truly amazing!” Faith appreciates that the program “allows Kevin an opportunity to be involved in HIS community. He has developed friendships with his peers and is always happy and smiling.”

Original participants, Kevin, Skyler, Tyler, and Jenn serving at the Food Pantry in 2014

We’d love to hear your Y story!

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Investing in Health: The Corporate Membership Program

Posted on by Kate Haslar

June is Employee Wellbeing Month, highlighting the importance of employee health and wellbeing in all areas of life. The Glacial Community YMCA partners with over 20 local businesses in the area through the Corporate Membership Program. This initiative enables employers to invest in their employees’ memberships, with the Y matching their contributions, supporting employee retention, enhancing well-being, and creating workplace wellness opportunities.

In Watertown, one of our YMCA’s valued local partners is Grinwald Ford. John Grinwald, the company’s president, emphasizes the importance of longevity among his staff and is dedicated to supporting both his employees and their families. After John experienced a heart attack in December, his appreciation for the importance of exercising at every stage of life only grew. He is grateful for the YMCA’s role in helping individuals achieve their fitness goals, stating, “Health is the best investment you can make in life!”

John fondly recalls encouraging his son to shoot baskets with him and getting the entire family involved in physical activities at a young age. He believes that when employees are active with their families, it sets a foundation for a lifelong commitment to health and wellness. “It’s about families working out together and staying active and healthy,” John emphasizes.

John’s nephew, Andrew, works alongside him at Grinwald Ford and has seen this in his own life, noting that “involving our kids in the YMCA at a young age has fostered an active, mindful lifestyle which can benefit them their whole lives.” Andrew appreciates the YMCA’s broad range of programs that support working families, saying, “The least we can do is pass along this opportunity for our employees and their families to engage with what our local YMCA offers.”

By investing in their workforce and the YMCA, employers can strengthen families and show their commitment to employee health and wellness. Together, we can build a healthier, happier workforce and a vibrant local economy.

"Health is the best investment you can make in life!"

To learn more about how you or your employer can participate, visit our website. 

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Mental Health Community Care at the Y

Posted on by Kate Haslar

In honor of Mental Health Awareness Month in May, the Glacial Community YMCA is encouraging community members to care for themselves and others.

Mental health is how we think, feel and act. At the Y, we recognize that we all have mental health, and mental health is an important part of our overall health and social-emotional well-being, as well as a core component of our identity.  

The Y supports the mental health of individuals and communities in all the work we do to help people reach their full potential—whether that’s teaching life skills to youth in our summer camps, supporting our staff, providing spiritual programs, or helping people achieve their best physical health. This type of non-clinical support is called “community care” and includes: 

  • Understanding mental health as something we all have—it is how we think, feel, and act.
  • Applying positive self-care practices routinely.
  • Engaging in conversations in a genuine way, with empathy and the intent of building meaningful relationships.
  • Understanding and applying trauma-informed guiding principles when interacting with others.
  • Understanding the impact of social determinants of health, systemic racism, discrimination, and marginalization on mental health.
  • Modeling emotion regulation, co-regulation, and effective coping skills.
  • Recognizing signs that someone may be struggling.
  • Connecting individuals to primary and specialty support when needed.
  • Providing initial response in crisis situations.
  • Initiating dialogue and collaborating with others to embed mental health informal care support throughout the community.  

All of the above are informed by practices found in social-emotional learning, trauma-informed care, and suicide prevention. Through this work, we can reduce the risk and impact of mental illness, provide early intervention, and support the process of healing and recovery. 

Everyone can play a role in mental health community care. In honor of Mental Health Awareness Month, the Y encourages you to identify simple ways you can care for yourself and others, such as:  

  • Using your powers of observation to notice when someone may be struggling with a hard day, moment or situation. 
  • Intentionally asking “how are you?” and encouraging honest answers so others can share and feel heard.
  • Bringing empathy, compassion and kindness to your daily interactions.
  • When you notice someone struggling, connecting them to mental health resources like the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline (800-273-8255 or https://suicidepreventionlifeline.org). 

At the Glacial Community YMCA, we have taken additional steps to prioritize mental health by establishing a Mental Health Task Force to outline our programmatic response to this growing crisis. The task force is currently working on hiring a Mental Health Program Director who will be responsible for integrating curriculum within programs that develop and strengthen resiliency skills for our members and participants. They will also run their own social connectedness/Mental Health programs and create a network of referral partnerships with community organizations for those individuals who might need clinical care. We look forward to being a resource and supporting our community in this way. 

 

If you have a story about how the Y contributes to your mental health, email Kate.

Strengthening Communities for 179 Years

Posted on by Katie Anderson

This month, we think back on our beginnings as an international organization – On June 6th, 1844, the YMCA was founded by George Williams and 11 other young men, who held a meeting in London that would lead to the founding of the YMCA. For 179 years, the Y has worked to strengthen communities –creating the first group swim classes, spearheading the first English as a Second Language (ESL) class and addressing chronic disease through programs like the Y’s Diabetes Prevention Program.

You might enjoy watching a brief, three-part video series on our history. These videos were produced a couple years ago by Dr. David Newman, a pastor of a church that meets in a Y in Ohio and who loves the YMCA and its history.

The Reason Why Part 1
https://youtu.be/Ebwt69__pZc

The Reason Why Part 2
https://youtu.be/_nqVZk40AfA

The Reason Why Part 3
https://youtu.be/nJO-t9oOYOE 

YMCA Sends Missions Team to Mexico for 5th Service Trip

Posted on by Katie Anderson

Pictured from right to left, in front row: “in selfie” Bruce Osborn (Director of Spiritual Development), then Dave Wasserman, Brandon Davis (EV Short Term Missions Director), Azumi (EV Teen), Savannah Wasserman, Stacie Gorecki. Back row: Jasmine Martinez, Jaime Wasserman, Kim Osborn, Eden Wasserman, Kim Holt.

In February 2023, the Glacial Community YMCA sent a team of nine people to Puebla, Mexico, as part of a mission trip partnering with the orphanage, Esperanza Viva. This was the YMCA’s fifth team to go and serve in this capacity, an outreach and service trip that first began in 2018.

Esperanza Viva, a ministry of Living Hope International, is an orphanage/youth home in Puebla, Mexico that currently provides shelter, family, healing, and hope to approximately 100 children living there.

The Y team’s week consisted of morning service projects around the campus, meals, crafts and recreation with the children, cultural activities as a team, learning more about the ministry of Living Hope International, and relationship building with both children and staff. Trips usually last 8-10 days and include some sightseeing time as well.

In 2020, the YMCA commissioned then-employee, Karlee Webb, as a full-time missionary from their staff to go and serve in the ministry of Living Hope, residing in Puebla at Esperanza Viva. The YMCA at Pabst Farms is proud to be among a select few YMCAs that have commissioned, sent, and helped support a missionary to serve full-time in this modern era.

“The Y has continued to send teams to serve, love, and build relationships within the ministry of Living Hope and Esperanza Viva, because these experiences are life-changing. The children love interacting with teams, and our volunteers are deeply impacted by that love as they serve and care,” said Bruce Osborn, Director of Spiritual Development for the YMCA.

The YMCA offers missionary opportunities multiple times a year, to both members and community participants, as well as their staff members, with trips seen as unique opportunities in leadership development.

The YMCA also partners with the Y-USA and other YMCAs around the country to help support the mission of the Y in Valparaiso, Chile. Past trips to Chile have included service projects, community outreach, teaching seminars, program development and support of their George Williams School.

Osborn adds, “The days are long for our team members during the week, but the work is rewarding. It is a recipe for a radical shift in the priorities of life, and one that I wish everyone could experience.” To learn more about the YMCA’s mission and service work, please visit https://www.glcymca.org/mission-trips-service/.

Y Group Does Part During Hunger Action Month

Posted on Updated on by Katie Anderson

Y’s Service Without Boundaries group helps pack food kits for local community.

September is Hunger Action Month. The Y believes all kids deserve the opportunity to learn, grow and thrive — and access to healthy meals is critical to making that possible. 

According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), over 21 million kids receive free or reduced-cost meals, but only 3.2 million continue to receive meals through the summer. 

Kids and teens benefit from the Y’s Year-Round Food Program at thousands of sites across the country, where they receive nutritious meals and snacks, plus enjoy recreational and educational activities to keep their bodies and minds active.

For many years, participants in the Y’s Service Without Boundaries program have embedded themselves in the community by helping area organizations and giving back. Service Without Boundaries (SWB) is a day program that supports adults with disabilities through weekly activities at the Y and in the community, including regular visits to the Oconomowoc Library to dust shelves and work on special projects, sorting donated food at the Oconomowoc Food Pantry, and a multitude of other projects/activities in collaboration with Zachariah’s Acres.

In 2021, a new opportunity to serve developed from an ongoing partnership with the Watertown Unified School District, along with a generous food grant from the Quirk Foundation. Funds received from the grant made it possible to provide weekend food bags to all Y campers as well as families in need in the Watertown community.

Each week throughout the summer, the SWB group would organize and pack nutritious, easy to prepare weekend meals, including fresh fruit and vegetables, into take home bags and deliver them to the Watertown Area YMCA Camp. The take-home food bags were distributed to camp families on Friday afternoons, and extra food bags were available for pick up at the Watertown Area YMCA for those in need in the community. The weekend food bag program was designed to bridge the gap between the meals provided by the school district during the week. It’s estimated that 715 weekend food packs were provided during the summer of 2021 to families in the Watertown area and was so successful that it was continued in summer of 2022.

Service Without Boundaries, along with other offerings in our special programs line up, also have a broader impact on the families of participants by providing much needed respite time for caregivers so they have the ability to work and care for themselves and other family members, all while their loved one is cared for by Y staff. In 2021 alone, 28,512 hours of respite time was provided while program participants gained independence, made friends, and made a difference in the community.

Granting Access for All

Posted on Updated on by Katie Anderson

The YMCA at Pabst Farms recently received a $10,000 grant awarded by the Stackner Family Foundation, benefiting our Special Programs department.

These programs provide a unique experience for individuals with disabilities with an emphasis on physical activity, social interaction and fun.

Monies from the grant were used towards funding summer trips and activities for the program, making these opportunities more affordable and accessible to individuals with special needs. Established 1966, the Stackner Family Foundation is committed to funding non-profit organizations that provide services and programs to people living with intellectual disabilities, physical disabilities or chronic mental health diagnoses.

John Treiber is the Director of the foundation and has partnered with the Y for over 10 years. Treiber’s daughter has been a longtime participant in Y Special Programs, and their family has seen firsthand the valuable impact of experiential education.

Jodi Dabrowski, Special Programs Director for the YMCA at Pabst Farms, says their department has been excited for this grant opportunity to further the experiences the program can offer. “We are so very grateful for the continued support of the Stackner Family Foundation,” says Dabrowski. “They have truly gotten our Special Programs department to where it is today, and have been instrumental in making these opportunities a reality for all of our program participants.”