By being enrolled in the KidsFOCUS program, Fiona has been helped by staff members and tutors to keep organized and focused, completing her homework each day.

In addition, the Center’s Family & Emergency Services Program has been able to assist Fiona’s mother with the consistent purchase of her medication. The Christian Service Center has been there in the family’s times of need with prayers, encouragement, and supplies, as well as temporary financial assistance and academic and supportive counseling for the children. One of the biggest challenges the children have is how to plan and organize their work, play, energy, and focus. Often they lack the ability to buy school supplies and clothing, including backpacks, shoes, socks, and healthy snacks. The Christian Service Center, aided by generous supporters, has been able to provide the one-on-one counseling, nutrition, and education the children need to pull them through.

Fiona and her two sisters’ grades have improved and the family is becoming more stable. Their FCAT and semester grades have improved so much as to amaze their teachers, who are collectively working with KidsFOCUS staff and the program director on a plan for their continued improvement.

Fiona’s mother is encouraged and the children feel appropriately proud! They are given praise, medals, and certificates as well as toys and other treats as they accomplish the goals they’ve set. It is a truly heartwarming transformation to see this family recovering and moving forward with the help and encouragement of the CSC’s KidsFOCUS program!

The Christian Service Center has a solution for that expensive wedding day. Christian Service Center has teamed up with local wedding vendors to raffle off a $25,000 wedding!
With the cost of weddings going through the roof, the Christian Service Center has teamed up with The Tap Room at Dubsdread, the Perfect Wedding Guide, and several other local wedding vendors to raffle off a complete wedding reception valued at more than $25,000.  The Bridal Ensemble package includes a sit-down meal for 100 people, wedding cake, limousine, flowers, photography, video and even a preacher, if needed. It’s called, WIN A WEDDING…FEED THE NEED! 

“With most wedding proposals happening between Christmas and Valentine’s Day, what better way to save money and help our community than to support this great event,” said Christian Service Center’s Executive Director Robert Stuart.  “And, with partners like The Tap Room, Central Florida’s number one place for that special day, it just can’t go wrong!”
Raffle tickets are $50 each and are available at The Tap Room, through the Christian Service Center or through PayPal’s secure online portal.  For a complete list of raffle rules, vendor information or to purchase your raffle ticket, go to WinAWeddingOrlando.com.  For more information on WIN A WEDDING…FEED THE NEED!, contact Mary Lee Walker at the Christian Service Center at 407-425-2523 x230.

WIN A WEDDING…FEED THE NEED! Bridal Show
Monday, April 16, 2012
6:00 PM – 8:00 PM
@
Historic Dubsdread Ballroom
549 W. Par St., Orlando, FL 32804

One lucky individual will hold the ticket to win the WIN A WEDDING…FEED THE NEED! Wedding Ensemble Portfolio, valued at approximately $25,000. The Wedding Ensemble Portfolio is filled with local vendors donating all the products and /or services a bride would need to have the perfect wedding. The Wedding Ensemble will be awarded at the Bridal Show held at the Historic Dubsdread Ballroom. Ticket holders will want to be sure to attend the Bridal Show not only to see who wins the Wedding Ensemble, but also to be eligible for the door prizes given away throughout the evening.
Visit WinAWeddingOrlando.com for complete rules & regulations and view participating vendors.
Proceeds of the WIN A WEDDING…FEED THE NEED! charity raffle benefit the Christian Service Center for Central Florida, Inc.  Money raised will addresss the growing needs of our neighbors right here in Central Florida.

Miles Neslaw combined Soup R' Bowl canned food drive with Eagle Scout Leadership Service Project for a touchdown win!

When Miles Neslaw, a Life Scout with BSA Troop 48, heard about the Center’s Soup R’ Bowl Sunday canned food drive, he knew he had a theme for his Eagle Scout Project, but also had a lot a work ahead.  The Eagle Leadership Project is a requirement for the Eagle Scout rank, the highest achievement in Boy Scouts, and is meant to demonstrate the planning and leadership skills of the scout as they provide service to others.

The first thing Miles had to do was create a proposal that would gain approval for his service project from his Scoutmaster and Troop committee.  His plan included asking for donations from Publix for the bags needed to collect donations. He then designed flyers to promote the canned food drive. Miles mapped out the neighborhoods surrounding his church, Park Lake Presbyterian, into sections and recruited help from his fellow scouts.

Last weekend he put his plan into action when adult drivers and over 15 scouts from BSA Troop 48 fanned out into the sectioned neighborhoods, and dropped off over 800 bags. This weekend the bags were then collected by scouts, resulting in over 860lbs of food donated to the Center.

Amy Neslaw, Miles’s mother, couldn’t be more proud, stating, “Scouting has been a huge part of Miles’ life for the past 9 years. I have seen my son grow into a fine young man with skills that will last a lifetime. Once an Eagle, always an Eagle.”

Miles made Soup ‘R Bowl Sunday a win for the Scout Team!

Teachers at Englewood Elementary get food bags ready for their homeless students to take home to their families over the weekend. Photo by Sarah Wilson

Hungry after school By Sarah Wilson

published in theEast Orlando Sun February 2, 2012 

 click here to follow the link

From sleeping in motels, shelters and cars, to living off of free school breakfasts and lunches, and donated groceries,Orange County Public School staff, administrators and teachers say they’ve seen and heard an increasing number of stories of homelessness and hunger from students in the past five years.

As of Thanksgiving, there were 3,241-recorded homeless students in Orange County.

Homelessness and hunger are problems that go hand-in-hand as two of the biggest hurdles facing students living and learning in Orange County, said Homeless Education Liaison for OCPS, Christina Savino.

To help these kids, she said, the county, along with individual schools and partnerships with local businesses and organizations, have increased the number of services they have available to help needy students get by and succeed.

“These students often fall behind, and with education really being the focus and key of getting out of poverty and homelessness,” she said, “it’s important to wrap them around with as many services as possible to keep them on track for graduation.”

From corporate sponsored food pantries and emergency stashes of granola bars kept in teacher drawers, to stocks of surplus school supplies and an extra available jacket when its cold, Savino says every little thing helps.

On Friday afternoon, 26 students fromEnglewood Elementary School file one by one into an unassuming storage closet next to the school’s auditorium.

Their names are checked off a list complied by teachers and administrators as students listed a homeless or in great need, and they’re each handed a paper or plastic bag– sometimes seemingly bigger than they are – filled with six nonperishable food items to take home to feed their family over the weekend.

“Some of these kids during the week depend on our free breakfast and lunch, but then come in again Monday after the weekend and you know they may not have eaten since,” Compliance Teacher Guadalupe Armenteros said. “This way we can make sure they had food.”

Friday, Jan. 27 was opening day forEnglewood’s LOVE Food Pantry – one of 30 to open in Orange and Seminole counties public schools since the fall, coordinated by the Christian Service Center for Central Florida– and half of its shelves are already empty.

 At Timber Creek High School, economics teacher Michael Robbins and his students started their own food pantry out of a cupboard in his classroom last year, stocked with canned foods, soups, cereals and granola bars donated by the school community. Robbins says students can drop by whenever they’re in need, or students will be referred to as in need by a teacher or the school’s Homeless Coordinator, Jo Lynn Schall, and provided a bag of food to take with them to their families.

“We recognized that some students at our school didn’t have enough food at home and that times are tough, so we decided we wanted to provide a helping hand,” Robbins said. “…Students can’t learn if they don’t know where their next meal will be coming from.”

In addition to food, Timber Creek as well as other local schools, like East River High School, have clothes closets available to students who might need a jacket when it’s cold, or new pants or shoes if theirs get worn out. The schools also have stocks of school supplies in the office to hand out to students as needed.

“The whole idea is to keep them stable at school since their situation already is what it is at home,” Yolanda Dorta, a social worker for OCPS, said.

Sponsoring change

After CBS’s “60 Minutes” ran two specials on the prevalence of homelessness among students in Central Florida last year, Sarah Au, the senior specialist for Partners in Education with OCPS, said the school board has seen an outpouring of support from local businesses and organizations to try to help students in need.

“It has had such a positive impact in bringing together people who want to help and people who need help,” she said. “We’re trying to match up the businesses that want to help with the schools who need it.”

The LOVE Food Pantry installed at Englewood Elementary is an example of one of these efforts. After viewing the specials, members of the First Baptist Church of Orlando pledged $5 million dollars to go toward helping Central Florida’s hungry and homeless students.

Partnering with OCPS and the Christian Service Center of Central Florida, they decided the money would be best spent toward installing food pantries in schools in need, opening 13 in the fall of 2011. This spring, 17 more have opened across the county, each totally free to the schools they service and restocked weekly.

“After the first semester, the project doubled in size,” Danny de Armas, senior associate pastor at First Baptist Church Orlando, said. “It was not even by us giving any more money, but by other sponsors and businesses hearing about it and wanting to fund more.”

Associates at Keller Williams Realty in Waterford Lakes also saw the CBS special and have decided to dedicate their annual day of service on May 12, known as RED Day, to helping local East Orlando students in need.

Beth Hobart, a realtor with Keller Williams, said the firm has decided to adopt three local schools – Castle Creek, Camelot and Timber Creek – and is currently working out details with the principals and faculty at the schools to assess their needs, and how Keller Williams can best help.

“When we saw the ‘60 Minutes’ special and realized this is happening right in our own backyard, we knew we had to do something,”Hobartsaid.

Stephanie Phillips, the homeless education coordinator at Castle Creek Elementary, said she is very excited about the partnership her school has in the works with Keller Williams and the aid it can bring to her students.

“It’s such a wonderful thing,” she said. “We have a lot of need in our community, but we have a lot of people wanting to help, too.”

Thomas Cook, President of 2012 CSC Board of Directors

Third on the list of 40 ways to serve through the Christian Service Center is to commit to serving on the Board of Directors.

Christian Service Center for Central Florida announces the following 2012 Board of Directors and Officers:

President, Thomas Cook, Anne Rogers Realty

Past President, Renee Alivento, New Traditions Bank

Vice President, George Graham, Akerman Senterfitt

Secretary, Nate Groover, Metro Orlando Economic Development

Treasurer, Terry Bitner, New England Financial Services

Members At Large:

Bob Bates, Custom Communications

Ian M. Bennett, The Budd Group

Trenton (Jeff) Bledsoe, Daikin AC Americas

Jim Bowman, AOK Networking

Richard Bryan, City National Bank

Walter Carpenter, Pinel & Carpenter, Inc

Rev. Kelvin Cobaris, Empowerment Ministries

Keith Corino, Massey Services, Inc.

Wesney Dubic, Community Volunteer

Mary Ann Etzler, Miller Etzler, P.L.

Eric Faulkner, Marks Law Firm

Karen L. Flood, Florida Hospital

Jason Fraizer, Fraizer Foto

Joyce Fuller, Joyce Fuller, P.A.

Mary Lytle, Law Office of Mary E. Lytle

Tom Murphy, Mercury Plumbing

Peter Reinert, Lowndes, Drosick, Doster Law Firm

Jason Smith, EJS Associates, Inc

Anne M. Taylor, Cathedral Church of St. Luke

Thank you for your leadership and commitment of faithful service.

Mercedes Marquez, HUD Assistant Secretary, serves at Daily Bread during Point In Time survey of homeless.

Today was a busy day at the Center. UCF students surveyed Daily Bread clients to gain knowledge of the Orange County’s homeless situation in conjunction with a national census of homeless persons. The annual count will help determine federal funding for a range of programs, including those that target school-aged children, veterans and critically ill adults living on the streets or in camps.

Representative from US Department of Housing and Urban Development, including HUD Assistant Secretary Mercedes Marquez, were at the Center to see first hand the count’s progress and learn about the homeless in Orange County. Ms. Marquez has responsibility for administering grant programs that help communities plan and finance their growth and development, increase their capacity to govern, and provide shelter and services for homeless people. Ms. Marquez leads the management of approximately 800 employees in over 43 field offices nationwide, but still took time from her busy schedule to serve meals at Daily Bread.

There are more than 4,000 homeless persons in Orange, Osceola, and Seminole Counties on any given night. As many as 10,000 children have experienced homelessness during this past year. Too many families are one paycheck or financial set back away from homelessness. The Christian Service Center helped over 8,000 families stay in their homes through our Family & Emergency Services program last year.

The aggregated data is reported to the Department of Housing and Urban Development and is used by local governments, foundations, businesses and nonprofits to develop programs that serve the needs of the homeless in our community.

Who has the best fans, Giants or Patriots?  

Are you having a Super Bowl party? Make it a Soup R’ Bowl!

Have your guest bring in canned goods to donate to the Christian Service Center for distribution to hungry families right here in Central Florida. Make it a competition to show team spirit. Which team’s fans will bring in the most can goods?

Who will win? Make it a win for God’s Team.