The 2014 Connect with Southern Indiana final session was
held June 6, 2014 in Vanderburgh County. Evansville, which is one of the largest
cities in Indiana, is located in Vanderburgh County. Evansville has always
reminded me of a smaller St. Louis. The final session was held at Innovation
Pointe located in downtown Evansville.
The first project was Operation Blossom. Operation Blossom
aims to help solve the problem of homeless families in the area. In the past
couple years the individual homeless population has decreased, but the
population of homeless families has increased. There currently is and a place
for program where families can go to receive not only shelter, but also food,
supportive services, and other assistance on a permanent basis.
The second pitch was for the Volunteer Olympics. The Volunteer
Olympics is an interesting idea that makes giving and volunteering a competitive,
fun integration into the workplace. The concept is that businesses would
represent the countries in the regular Olympics. The events would be based off
the needs for different nonprofits and charities in the area. So for example,
you might have a food drive for a whole week to benefit a local food pantry and
the business that had the most canned goods donated would win that event. The Volunteer
Olympics would span eight weeks and would continually be covered in the media
to update the public on the point then positions of the different business
participants.
The third pitch was my group’s project, which we called
B.E.A.R. (Boosting Environmental Assets Regionally). The premise for our
project was that there is a declining environmental health problem in the area,
as well as, a lack of outdoor activities and events for people to engage in. There
are some groups that have things going on, such as Wesselman Woods, but there
is little collaboration between existing initiatives. B.E.A.R. would create a
website and an app so that people could easily find the events and programs
going on in their area. This could include farmers markets, outdoor concerts,
hiking or marathon events, educational opportunities, etc. B.E.A.R. would also
sponsor its own original events, which could be a community facelift initiative
(painting, landscaping, etc.), community gardens planting parties, or Litterathons. 
The fifth project pitch was for the Traveling Arts show. Traveling
Arts would aim to connect the young professionals in the different communities
so that they can organize and host an art event. A neat component of this
project is that it would encourage each art event to commission a new piece of
public art to leave behind in that community.
The final project pitch was for Southern Indiana Career
Camps. This group emphasized that there is a problem between children and young
adults being expected to obtain a bachelor's degree but the lack of jobs that
someone can get with those degrees. Southern Indiana Career Camps would educate
children from a young age about the middle skill jobs and opportunities that
are available in the area. This would allow kids in middle school and high
school to work toward a viable career path that doesn't require a bachelors or
higher degree.
After the final project pitches, Leslie Townsend presented
each participant with their certificate of completion.
Then we headed to Turoni’s Pizzery & Brewery for a final lunch and social hour. Turoni's is an Evansville institution with 3 locations. More information about Turoni's can be found at http://www.turonis.com/.
I must say that now the program is over it's
going to be really weird not seeing the other participants. Since the first
session back in January, we have all become friends and I'm going to miss
seeing these people fairly regularly. I think we had a really great group this year. We got along, helped each other, and challenged each other to do our best.
