Our Sponsors
The Circle of Friends appreciates all of our faithful sponsors. grantors and donors. They are key to providing individuals with intellectual and developmental differences equitable access to our quality skill-building program. Our community is stronger when we work together! Thank you all, with the utmost sincerity!
Click on our sponsors' icon to be directed to their website​!
First Baptist Church of Lake Wales
Mountain Lake Community Service
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First Presbyterian Church of Lake Wales
Grants are Seeds that Grow into Wonderful Deeds!
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The Empower Polk Grant, through the Givewell Foundation, has provided the opportunity for continued education of our P.O.P. Program Instructor, Cortney Grunder. Cortney has been a faithful member of the Circle Team since she began volunteering at 9 years old. This nurtured her passion for providing a way forward to the intellectually and developmentally disabled through teaching independent living skills and building meaningful connections between members of the community and our students through volunteer work and advocacy. Once Cortney has finished her degree, she will qualify for the promotion to P.O.P. Program Director and be better able to provide quality services and education to our students.
The E.R. Jahna Foundation has been faithful in its' annual support for our program. Their financial provisions through grants have acted as the key to unlocking the opportunity for low-income intellectual and developmentally disabled adults to gain independent living skills, improve their quality of life, and participate with the public through community and educational activities. Their charitable giving and support have changed the lives of many special needs families, giving them hope for the future.
Votum Foundation has gone over-and-above with support for our program, mission, and students. The foundation had become fundamental in the success of moving forward with program improvements, scholarships, and our vision for supervised housing for adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities. We are humbly grateful for all the support provided through the Votum Foundation.
Mountain Lake Community Service
Mountain Lake Community Service (MCLS) has provided support to many nonprofits, assisted in advancing improvements throughout Lake Wales, and continues to be a vital resource throughout our city. We have been honored that MLCS have counted our program and students as one of the worthy causes that they financially support and advocate for. Lake Wales is truly blessed to have a community like Mountain Lake that sees the good and potential in people and projects that may not have the support given by other donors and sponsors. MCLS has been responsible for providing the finances for more scholarships to low-income disabled adults than any other foundation in 2022! This fact is worth mentioning and we are humbled by the support they have given us. We look forward to networking with MCLS for future scholarships in order to make sure that every person with disabilities has a chance to quality programming regardless of income.
Truist has been true to its mission to support nonprofits that provide inclusion and diversity within the workplace and when working with consumers. The Truist foundation has been a great support of our mission to empower, equip, and provide inclusion to those with intellectual and developmental differences. Thier grants have provided the funding for a scholarship for one low-income intellectually and/or developmentally disabled adult each year! As a financial institution, they are laying the groundwork and setting the example for other such institutions to get behind sponsoring a disabled adult so they too can attend a program that has been created and specifically designed to suit their needs, pull their potential, and become independent within our community. The development of independent living skills within our differently abled population benefits every part of our great city and we are grateful that Truist understands this and actively supports our program so we can continue to strengthen our student and community through inclusion, enlightenment, and encouragement.
Florida's Natural Growers Foundation is part of Lake Wales as the skin is part of the body. We support Florida's Natural through product purchases and donating gift baskets to for raffles at their annual Golf Fundraiser. We choose to invest in their fundraiser because they provide opportunities for employment to our fellow community members and because they have a foundation that was put in place to help nonprofits, such as ours, remain active and available to those less fortunate and high-risk community members. Every year we have the opportunity to apply for a grant from the Florida's Natural Growers Foundation and every year we ask for grants that will help our low-income disabled adults with funds for scholarships to attend our day program. We are thankful that every year they have provided a portion of one students' scholarship. These funds from the grants we receive help reduce the amount of tuition we need to raise for one student's scholarship. Lake Wales is fortunate to have a "hometown" company with a heart for low-income disabled adults!