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My friends planned a happy hour Downtown, and then they were headed to Crescent Ballroom for a concert. I was only supposed to meet them for a happy hour. I’d been working long hours and felt like I hadn’t been home much in weeks, but I remember them trying to convince me to join them at Crescent and explaining the concert wasn’t just a concert. It was a food drive. A local band, The Senators, was giving out their CD for concert goers who brought canned food donations. By my friend’s comedic logic, if I didn’t go and support the cause, I was against feeding starving Valley children. That got me – I ended up going and I’m glad I did.

Every child deserves a quality education and a bright future. Unfortunately, not all children have a level playing field. Children in families struggling with poverty can be left behind or miss out on key opportunities that will prepare them for college or career.
You can make a difference to grow strong students, and here’s how:

Volunteers of all ages, from 5 on up, are invited to share in packing the food that goes into United Way’s WeekEnd Hunger Backpacks. Each backpack provides enough meals to get a Valley child through the weekend and come back to school on Monday ready to learn. It’s both a celebration of community and a chance to give back.

As a Blue Cross Blue Shield (BCBS) of Arizona employee, it’s part of Sarah Jacobsen’s role to keep clients healthy, but she also works hard to keep her coworkers happy through the spirit of volunteerism.

Because of the needs of people in our community, like Lawrence, we at United Way set a high bar for ourselves, our partners and the Valley. We work hard every day to achieve our community objectives, including to End Homelessness. Although some might scoff and say it isn’t possible, we believe it is. We believe that by changing systems away from a focus on managing homelessness to one of ending homelessness, we will, as a community, make homelessness a vestige of the past.

Jerry Malone recently drove 80 plus miles at the crack of dawn from his home in Wickenburg to Mesa, not for his latest construction contract, but to volunteer to help people experiencing homelessness. He makes the long-distance drive to other sites around the Valley every month as an ambassador for United Way’s Project Connect, a role he’s proudly held for five years.

It may sound strange that when I was 12 years old, my dream job was to be an accountant. Even as a preteen, I loved crunching numbers. My mom was a tax preparer and when she reviewed her documents at the kitchen table of our Chicago home, my best friend and I always helped her match up every penny. I learned at a young age that bank statements tell a story of how people behave—both the good and the bad. I knew then accounting was the career for me.

Funded by United Way‘s Destination Graduation program, the festival was part of Arizona SciTech Festival’s statewide celebration of science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) and helps students spark interest in industries that are essential to today’s workforce. See how these students are creating a brighter future for us all through STEaM.

We all have dreams, but for some youth in our community, the road to realizing those dreams is especially challenging. Some teens have to work to support their family, while others don’t always have a roof over their heads or food on the table. For these students, the dream of graduating from high school—let alone going to college and having a successful career—often seems impossible.