Blogs

In case you haven’t heard, it’s duck season in Kearney! Hold on, don’t be rushing to grab your shotguns, instead, rush to our sponsor locations below to grab an adoption form! Sales for the United Way “Splash for Cash” Duck Race are underway! The race is only two weeks away!

Adopt a duck and you could win the Grand Prize of $10,000 or any of these great prizes:

There are many different reasons people come back to get an education later in life. For Juan, an injury caused him to stop his physically demanding job. He decided he needed to reeducate himself for a skilled and less strenuous job.

In a Love and Logic class that took place during October of 2011, a single mother made a huge breakthrough. Love and Logic provides simple and practical techniques to help parents with kids of all ages to raise responsible kids, have more fun in their role, and easily and immediately change their children's behavior. The first three sessions were pretty quiet, as people weren’t quite sure whether they could open up or not. In the fourth session, we were discussing parenting styles, and Anna started to open up about her childhood.

Becca was in danger of losing her daughter; she found out her roommate was a sex offender. Moving home wasn’t an option as her stepfather relentlessly ridiculed her as a person and a parent. In her early 20's with a 2 year old daughter, Becca didn’t know where to turn, until she found out about the Residential Assistance for Families in Transition program. When she started with RAFT, her self-esteem was so low that she would hardly speak and at first appeared to have some learning disabilities. Becca only had a 9th grade education.

One of the most common questions people ask about United Way is what difference their gifts make. You might be surprised at how much an affordable weekly gift can accomplish when you invest in United Way’s agencies.

As I began my second year as Communications Manager with United Way, I soon realized it was time to start getting ready to go back to school. This time of year is always so exciting, you can just feel a buzz in the air. Parents are scurrying about snatching up new clothes and finding the best deals on those hip new bookbags and school supplies. Who could forget the smell of a brand new box of crayons? Or putting on your brand new outfit the morning of the first day of school, thinking to yourself "this year will be my year!"

“Our world has changed and it has opened our eyes to new issues.” That is what Ruby Timm, the 2012 United Way Duck Race grand prize winner, said when she told us about her granddaughter Kendra. (She purchased her duck from longtime friend and Kearney Elks Club member, Lane Nansel.)

United Way and the American Human Development Project have created a tool to forecast how things might change if educational outcomes were better.  View statistics by community.  Learn more here.

The United Way Campaign for the Common Good will mobilize millions of people and organizations across the country to take action and improve the education, income and health of America's communities. The campaign kicks off with a focus on education and an ambitious goal to cut the high school dropout rate in half.