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2009-05-03T17:21:00.000-07:00

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Donkeyball!

2008-12-29T09:36:00.000-08:00

The Bridges Donkeyball event was a huge success. We gave a Durango to a Bridges family (thanks to Button Motors), received our "Youth Investment Award" along with a check for $5,000, saw some great entertainment, and enjoyed some basketball on the backs of Donkeys. The Fire Department beat Kokomo-Center Schools in the Championship. We raised around $6,000 at the game and had a blast watching players from the community fall off their donkeys. Thanks to everyone who helped and came out and supported Bridges!

Bridges Outreach wins "Youth Investment Award"

2008-11-06T11:04:00.000-08:00

The Indiana Youth Institute is proud to recognize Bridges Outreach with an Indiana Youth Investment Award. These awards are intended to highlight extraordinary – but often unrecognized – efforts on behalf of children and youth.
IYI is proud to play a role in honoring these organizations for their exemplary youth work and hopes this recognition will encourage and inspire others to make a difference in the lives of Hoosier children. Bridges was selected in the top 10 out of 250 applications throughout Indiana.
Winners each receive a cash prize to be used for professional development to enhance their work with youth. They are also publicly acknowledged at a local celebration (Donkeyball) and receive free admission to IYI’s annual Kids Count Conference. This year the keynote speaker is Coach Ken Carter (From the movie Coach Carter).

Golfing for Bridges

2008-10-13T10:21:00.000-07:00

Saturday, September 27th Rice's Golf Center hosted Bridges' 4th annual Golf-a-thon. We had a very successful day with 16 adults completing 100 holes of golf each and over 30 students and their families conquering 50 holes of putt-putt each. Everyone had a blast playing golf together and hitting some balls on the driving range. Thank you to all those who participated and went out and raised money to support Bridges Outreach. We greatly appreciate everyone's pledges!

New Full-Time Staff at Bridges

2008-07-30T13:03:00.000-07:00

We have added our first full-time staff to our Bridges team. Michelle Chaddock was hired at the end of July to manage our "Bridges to College" & "Churches Bridging Schools" programs. She grew up in Wheaton, IL, graduated from Taylor University and has worked with youth in Texas and Pennsylvania. She has lots of experience in youth ministry, but we really hired her because she is a huge Cubs fan.

Joe Toren named Volunteer of the Year in Kokomo

2008-04-30T10:54:00.000-07:00

Bridges nominated Joe Toren for his service to our ministry. He has been a board member, tutor, mentor, after-bridges-classes leader, hosted a Bridges spiritual retreat and has connected many of our students into his youth ministry. He has helped us fulfill our mission and vision for this community. He was recognized as the Howard County United Way "Volunteer of the Year." It is a tremendous honor and we are priveleged to have him involved with Bridges.

Bridging Communities

2008-03-10T07:56:00.000-07:00

When some think about Bridges they often think about the work we do with schools and churches. However bridging our community is also extremely important to us and we have had a few chances in the past couple of months to do that. Here are a few examples:

Casey presented the "Bridges Model" at a breakout session at the State Education Conference. Casey & Travis are on the INSAI community service committee that is working on improving our schools here in Kokomo.
The Howard County Leadership Summit (a one day event that brings high schools students from all 5 schools in the county together) invited us to present for the thrid staright year. This year the theme was "Walking Wisely" and we talked about using athletics to help influence others.
The YMCA has been extremely generous to us (a free room for our high school program, access to the pool and Hyve, and the value of "Huddle" that has poured into our lives). This year we are the chairs of the "Church Division" for the Partner with Youth Campaign that raises money for scholarship help for youth in our community. We hope that you would consider supporting the YMCA and their ministry of keeping youth in a positive environment.

Let us all continue to "Bridge Our Community Together!"

Churches Bridging Schools

2008-02-18T11:49:00.000-08:00

Bridges Outreach has partnered with Kokomo Urban Outreach and Kokomo-Center Schools to start an exciting new program called Churches Bridging Schools. The objective of this program is to give churches an opportunity to be the hands and feet of Jesus Christ in our public school system. Our goal is to have every school in Kokomo-Center School district (starting with elementary) adopted by a church or group of churches. The goal is for that church, or group of churches, to meet the schools' and students' needs whatever they might be. Most of the partnerships will include mentors that will meet once a week for 30 minutes with a student. Mentors will meet with the same student every week and work on developing that students' academics and self-esteem. Other ideas include having a teacher appreciation dinner, helping teachers work on bulletin boards and anything the school might need. This program is just getting underway, put the potential is endless. If you are interested in getting involved with the CBS program give us a call at (765) 452-5723.

Fresh Start

2008-01-25T10:06:00.000-08:00

Honestly, we have not done a very good jod of keeping up with the latest news in and throughout Bridges. Our New Year's resolution is to do much better of keeping our website up to date.
Our goal is to update our supporters a couple times a month.
Here is what has happened so far:
Programs/student news = in January we took 22 kids to the Globetrotters game, 9 8th graders skiing in MI and went ice skating in Indy.
Organization news = Our board of Directors has really stepped up and contributed to us developing Bridges in the correct fashion. A big thank you to them for all their hard work and time and money invested in Bridges.
Other News = A big thank you to the Dean Etherington & family who named Bridges as the recepient of the Barb Etherington Memorial Fund. She left a legacy to us all that taught us to be "determined to serve others." Bridges appreciates this generous gift and will use all the contributions to invest in the youth of our community.

Summer Slam

2007-08-01T12:02:00.001-07:00

We recently concluded our Summer Slam program for Bridges Outreach. We had an awesome time with our students and were able to give them some very valuable information. The theme for summer slam this year was health and fitness. So we were able to talk to our students about how important it is to partner healthy eating habits with regular exercise. We partnered with some fantastic people and groups that really came along side us and gave us some great resources. Thanks to Janet Yoder we were able to take our students to a gym called "Curves" a few times and give them an opportunity to work out. Mrs. Fruth, a teacher from Central, came in a few days and talked to the students about making smart, healthy food choices. The program also included 30 - 40 minutes of exercise everyday for the students. They had the option of walking or playing whatever sport was on the schedule that day. We had a great response from the students and they had super attitudes. We even had a few students lose over 10 lbs. in the four weeks we met. There were 29 different students that attended Summer Slam for a total of 247 students. 48 students went on the field trips with us and we had five different volunteers. We concluded the program with four days of community service and then a trip to Indiana Beach.

Celebration Night

2007-07-16T12:36:00.000-07:00

Sunday Night, July 22, Bridges Outreach will be conducting a program at First Church of God. We will be sharing what has been going on with Bridges Outreach in the past few months. It will be an evening full of student testimonies about Bridges, students sharing about summer camp and some student performances. If you would like to see our students in action join us at 6:00 at 2222 W. Sycamore.

2007 Awards Night

2007-05-31T09:44:00.000-07:00

Wednesday, May 30th, we had our annual awards ceremony that honors students and volunteers for their accomplishments throughtout the year. We give awards for attendance, character/attitude, and academic achievement. Thanks to all the studnets and parents that attended- hopefully next year we can have more school staff and community members.
Here's the summary:
*At Bon Air, the students who received awards in all three categories (attendance, behavior, and academic performance) were Maria Lane, Sierra Waggoner, and Brittany Giesen . Our outstanding 8th graders were Rachael Arredondo, Sebastian Frank, Anthony Roberts, Gary Thacker. The Students of the Year were Travis VanNess and McKenzie Urbina (both had an attendance rate of over 95% and an A- grade point average)! The Volunteer of the Year was Adam Pickard who was there 107 of the 116 days.
*At Central, the all-around awards went to Kierston Brisker, Shaneece Reeves, Heather Thomas, and Scottie Williams (all of these students were high honor roll candidates). The Outstanding 8th graders, which have been in the program for 3 years, were Kirstin Freeman and Andrew Berg. The Student of the Year was Jashaun Bottoms and the Volunteer of the Year was Joe Toren! Carol Gagnon received special recognition for her dedicated work and service to Bridges through cooking on a weekly basis for our youth.

Thank You Joe Toren

2007-01-23T09:59:00.000-08:00

A big thank you to Joe Toren and "the attic" youth group for taking 5 Bridges students on their ski trip to Michigan and plugging them into their church at Courtland Avenue Friends.

Christmas from a Bridges Board Member

2007-01-19T11:24:00.000-08:00

“Each one should use whatever gifts he has received to serve others, faithfully administering God's grace in its various forms.” I Peter 4:10: As a Bridges board member I experienced various ways of people giving thanks to loved ones during this Christmas season and wanted others to know that as we devote ourselves to better ways of celebrating life, we often help make a difference in other people's lives.
I first would like to say THANKS to the Kokomo community as a whole. As Bridges embarks on it's third year of operations you have played an integral role in the development and success of the program. There would be no services or programs in Kokomo that could exist without this kind of generosity and Bridges appreciates everything each of you have provided. I would ask that you continue to support us in any way that you prayerfully have considered and please tell others about Bridges when the opportunities are presented.
Secondly, a huge THANKS to First Church of God for providing a Christmas party for our middle school students. Three different groups within the church volunteered to decorate tables and provided enough food to fill the bellies of 65 kids that were recognized for their efforts in attendance, behavior and attitude. One person from the church gave a personal testimony that hopefully will help in their decision making processes when confronted with difficult obstacles. An anonymous family provided gifts to each student and the joy on those kids faces was worth more than money could buy. I think for some of these kids it was hard for them to accept these rewards and gifts. They don't always accept compliments well either. I believe it comes from years of self-doubt and an inability to believe in their own worth. The party was just one way that the community is helping to "bridge" those gaps and begin to show these kids that they are valuable to us. "He Knows Your Name" was sung and provided a perfect message of hope, that regardless of the circumstances in our lives, God is always there and will provide what is necessary to get us through.
Thirdly, I wanted to share a story that had a profound impact on me and provided me with a sense that the mass consciousness of mankind is changing. There is far more goodness in the world than others would have us believe. Bridges was contacted by Ken Johnson, Chaplin for the Colts, and asked to bring their senior high kids to a program in Indianapolis. There would be meal, gifts, and Tarik Glenn (Offensive All-Pro Tackle) would be the guess speaker. Tarik did a wonderful job talking simply about the kids being connected to something positive in their lives and to always hang on to those strong values. After the meal and message 20 single moms that had been given special invitations were asked to sit in a circle. As the ladies sat waiting on instructions I noticed one of the moms talking with another mom. I really did not give it much thought, because in minutes little "elves" began to bring outs various gifts: dishes, vacuums, toasters, digital cameras, 40 inch TV's and a large container of food that included a frozen turkey, ham and pantry items. You could not believe the appreciation coming from these moms as the gifts were delivered to everyone of them! I watched in particular the single mom from Bridges that had been invited and although she was very grateful for each gift, she was particularly emotional about the groceries. While this exchange was going on, the kids were taken to a warehouse and given the opportunity to pick three gifts each. Not knowing exactly how the gifts would be given out, Travis had given them special instructions that if they received something they didn't like to still be grateful . Several of these kids, (some don’t have many material things) stated that if that happened, they already had people in mind that they could "give" the gifts to! Wow, how these youth have matured. As everything was being loaded into vehicles I was inquiring with the Bridges mom about what had just taken place. I specifically asked her why so much emotion escaped when the food was brought out. Her answer of hope, joy and gratitude inspired me to reflect on what is really important in our lives. She explained that while they were waiting for further instructions the lady next to her began sharing a story. This woman had lost everything in a fire before this event and having 3 small children, she did not see any way she would be enjoying the holiday season. The Bridges mom reached in her purse and gave $, which was all the money she had for groceries that week. I witnessed the hug and exchange between what only two single moms could even begin to understand. The Bridges mom explained that when she gave up her own food money she began to wonder how she would provide for her two children. When the groceries were brought out, God's marvelous promises were exposed to this woman in a personal way. He will always provide! There was four times the food in that box then what her $ would have bought!! I told her THANKS and that she had just given me a glimpse of heaven.
In closing, I wanted to again express my sincere THANKS to each of you personally. Although my interest is tied in directly as a board member and parent, I have witnessed extraordinary growth and development in these kids. Without everything this community has provided, not one child would have been transformed and that would have been a real tragedy. Bridges is making a difference not only in the lives of our children, but as you just read, in the lives of others too!!
God Bless You!
Bruce Taflinger, Bridges Board Member