Teen philanthropy group invites grant applications from QCA nonprofits

Teen Philanthropy Group Invites Grant Applications from QCA Nonprofits

Thirty-five students from 10 Quad City area high schools will grant $10,000 to charitable organizations serving Rock Island and Scott counties. Grant applications should be submitted online by March 1, 2013.

The students are members of Teens for Tomorrow (T4T), a philanthropic initiative of the Quad Cities Community Foundation.

“The T4T program teaches high school students about the important work nonprofits do and valuable lessons about leadership and philanthropy that will last a lifetime,” said Susan Skora, President and CEO of the Community Foundation.

During the nine-month T4T program, students from high schools in the Iowa and Illinois Quad Cities learn about the role nonprofits play in the community. They work together to identify community needs and explore the grant making process. At the end of the year, they distribute T4T grants to local nonprofits.

“Each year, as they get more involved in the application process and make the site visits to local nonprofits, the teens begin to see the good that nonprofits do in the community, and they begin to care more than they expected when the school year began,” Skora continued. “We love to see the growth these teens experience every year, and we look forward to seeing the decisions they make about the grants.”

Teens for Tomorrow became a permanent program of the Foundation thanks to an endowment created by Herb and Arlene Elliott in 2010. T4T now grants $10,000 annually to local nonprofit organizations.

Grant applications must be submitted online. For more information about Teens for Tomorrow, contact the Foundation’s Youth Initiatives Advocate, Kodie Wittenauer at (563) 326-2840.