Summit Community Care Clinic 
Summit Community Care Clinic (SCCC) opened its doors in 1993 to treat the uninsured population of Summit County. The clinic is open on Monday and Friday in the Medical Office Building in Frisco. It is centrally located and at a scheduled bus stop with an evening route. It operates on a first come/first serve basis with no appointments necessary.

Physicians, nurses and front desk staff all volunteer at the clinic on a monthly rotation. Charges for a doctor's visit as well as laboratory and radiology charges are on a sliding scale. Prescriptions are discounted at City Market and Walmart. Healthcare services are never denied to those who can't afford to pay. Dental services are now available as well.

The Summit Foundation has supported the SCCC throughout the years with the prescription voucher assistance program. This program awards free vouchers for prescription drugs to those patients who cannot afford treatment. This program has been invaluable in treating illness in our uninsured and underserved population.

Team Summit
The recently reorganized Team Summit combines the former Copper Mountain Ski & Snowboard Team, the Summit Sports & Education Foundation and the Breckenridge Ski Club, pooling some 87 years of competitive ski & snowboarding tradition in Summit County. Team Summit is now poised to settle into its role as a vital community organization, providing opportunities to athletes and families from Summit County, the Front Range and neighboring communities.

The organization has a devoted benefactor in The Summit Foundation, using funds granted over the last several seasons to provide scholarships, to purchase specialty equipment, to provide uniforms and among other things, to host the FREE local race series, The Summit Cup. Ongoing support by The Summit Foundation has played a major role in smoothing the transition from three teams to one. As a growing entity and central to the lives of many residents and guests of the county, Team Summit is now embarking on an exciting new project - the establishment of a central team facility.

Membership with Team Summit begins a lifelong respect for the mountain environment via organized winter sports. Team Summit athletes are excited about their sport and committed to athletic and academic achievement. They learn the lifelong skills of goal setting, sportsmanship and leadership. Many of these athletes will make valuable community contributions later in life.

The Summit High Blue Line Club
The Summit High Blue Line Club was formed as a not-for-profit corporation to promote and ensure the success of Summit High School Tigers Hockey. The push for high school hockey began as a way to recruit and keep more young athletes involved in a positive extracurricular activity. The parents and volunteers that make up the Blue Line Club have been involved with youth athletics and particularly with hockey for years. They observed a need to provide an incentive that keeps high school age athletes interested and involved. The High School Hockey Program does this by providing the athletes with the support of their peers and their school. It provides high quality coaching, competition and a verifiable participation standard for academics and conduct.

In 1999 the Summit County School Board gave conditional approval to Varsity Hockey for Summit High School. One of the conditions of the approval was that the program be self-funded through the 2001-2002 season. In order to meet the funding mandate of the School Board, the Blue Line Club turned to the community for financial support.

The support of the community, parents and especially The Summit Foundation, has been outstanding. The single biggest budget item for the program and one of great concern, was the cost of ice time. The Summit Foundation provided funds to cover these costs for this season. Those monies afforded three coaches and 20-25 athletes to practice and play on the ice and to make the Summit High Hockey Team a reality in 2000-2001.

The Summit Foundation funds also took enough financial pressure off of the program to allow free admission to games. Consequently, the hope is to fill the ice arena for each home game and to give the players positive feedback for their efforts.

Family and Intercultural Resource Center
The Family Resource and Intercultural Center is a community-based organization that has the unique role of coordinating and managing family directed services and programs such as Warm Welcome, Early Childhood Connections, Strengthening Families and Heart to Art. Additionally, it directly provides timely emergency assistance in the way of food, clothing and temporary financial support to those living and working in Summit County.

Owing in large part to the recent grant from The Summit Foundation, the Family Resource Center has been able to move its offices and its programs to a new location at 340 Fiedler Avenue in downtown Dillon. This new location is ideal for space, convenience for clients, efficiency for staff and overall effectiveness.

The Family and Intercultural Resource Center has been looking for a permanent home since it began in the early 1990's. Ann Small, past President of the Board of Directors for the Family Resource Center, stated "The support of The Summit Foundation made this longtime dream actually come true. Without the Foundation's grant of and the generosity of those who support the Foundation, the purchase of this location would not have occurred. We are immensely grateful."

Colorado Fourteeners Initiative
With 54 mountains rising above 14,000 feet, Colorado is home to more Fourteeners than any other state in America. The beauty and challenge offered by these mountains now draws approximately 300,000 visitors to them each year. Increased recreational use has negatively impacted the water, wildlife, and vegetation on many peaks. The Colorado Fourteeners Initiative (CFI) was established to protect and preserve the natural integrity of Colorado's Fourteeners.

Funding from The Summit Foundation has contributed to the following programs on Quandary Peak:

Field Projects - CFI's field staff coordinated the work of over 100 volunteers on Quandary Peak. Together, they delineated more than 17,600 linear feet of sustainable routes, and restored over 28,000 square feet of damaged alpine landscape. As a result, there is now a sustainable and well-delineated climbing route to the summit of Quandary Peak, and the most heavily-impacted areas have been restored.

Peak Stewards - CFI's Peak Steward Program enables Fourteener-enthusiasts to hike these peaks, answering questions and educating others about minimum-impact practices for high alpine environments. In a recent year, 18 Peak Stewards worked 320 hours on Quandary Peak, contacting 1,087 other visitors about Leave No Trace, area regulations, sustainable recreation, and CFI's educational message.

Signage - CFI collaborated with land managers, local community members, and graphic artists to develop the content, graphics, and design strategies for a Quandary Peak kiosk. The 3-panel educational kiosk went into production, and have been installed.

Adopt-a-Peak Program - CFI's Adopt-a-Peak Program was developed to ensure that Fourteener routes and restoration projects receive the regular maintenance needed to prevent future problems and promote full recovery from past impacts. Quandary Peak was among the eight Fourteeners adopted through this program.

For more information about CFI, please visit www.14ers.org or call 303.278.7525.

Snowboard Outreach Society
The Snowboard Outreach Society's programs are dedicated to service and inspiration. Using snowboarding as the backdrop, SOS teaches core values, provides adult mentorship and creates community outreach opportunities. And it does all this by taking youth who may not have otherwise had the opportunity to experience snowboarding, and turning many of them into active participants in the sport.

More than 4,000 participants have experienced SOS. SOS has learned and discovered key points to creating not only a successful community youth program, but also to keeping the youth involved in the sport of snowboarding.

Learn To Ride (LTR) is SOS's fundamental program. It is a resilience-based outdoor mountain adventure experience designed for youth with risk factors in their lives. Each of the five days of the LTR program focuses on one of five values: Courage, Discipline, Integrity, Wisdom and Compassion. Utilizing the fast learning curve and "cool factor" of snowboarding, students are able to overcome fears, reach new goals and discover new possibilities. LTR has been incredibly successful in Summit County. In response to feedback from participants, parents and counselors who expressed a desire that SOS continues to help local students build resilience, SOS began the University Program.

With the support of The Summit Foundation we have been able to expand and develop the University Program to include 20 local students. The University Program provides five days of snowboarding and five days of community-based service learning with an SOS trained mentor called a Sherpa. These students continue to focus on the SOS core values but more importantly, the students are introduced to service opportunities where they are acknowledged as community assets and experience the fulfillment of serving others.

CASA OF THE CONTINENTAL DIVIDE
Every week there are news reports about children hurt or beaten by their own parents, children left home alone, neglected, living in "meth-lab" homes, or babies born addicted to cocaine. These are the children that CASA of the Continental Divide serve.

One child helped by a CASA volunteer this past year was removed from home where she was living with her mother and grandfather and placed in foster care. The five year old was found sitting in the living room floor rocking back and forth while clinging to a stuffed animal. She had a black eye and multiple bruises. The mother, who is mentally delayed, reports that she was sexually abused by her father in the past and that he had beaten her child. While the mother did not defend the child she later called 911 to report.

The CASA volunteer helped the mother and child get appropriate psychotherapy, and developmental evaluation. She also help the mother get parenting classes, and training to live independently and be able to provide for the child. The CASA also helped the child get appropriate developmental evaluation and psychotherapy. The mother and child are now doing well and living together in a cute clean apartment. The father/grandfather is in prison.

The children who come into contact with CASA are children who have been victimized by their families, and who have not been given much of a chance. Statistics show that many of these traumatized youth, if mishandled by the system, end up later being involved in the juvenile and adult criminal justice systems. CASA is a community program that works to break the pattern, to give these young people a chance.

Judges, attorneys, and caseworkers applaud CASA volunteers as being very helpful, provide a fresh perspective, and go the extra mile. They are considered to be a necessary part of the child(ren)'s case.

CASA volunteers are ordinary citizens doing extraordinary work for children, and along the way bringing passion, dedication, and effort to their work.

Friends of the Eagles Nest Wilderness 
Friends of the Eagles Nest Wilderness (FENW) was founded in 1994 by Summit County backcountry enthusiasts concerned for the ecological health of local federally designated Wilderness Areas. Local attention to low levels of funding available from the U. S. Forest Service (USFS) was brought to the forefront through an article in the Summit Daily News by outdoor writer John Fayhee after he took a backpacking trip in the Gore Range with the only two Wilderness Rangers budgeted and staffed by the USFS at the time.

John noted poor trail conditions due to lack of regular maintenance, insufficient information available regarding minimum impact travel and camping practices, as well as a dire shortage of adequate education, enforcement, and public contact personnel. John suggested that interested citizens meet and explore these issues by forming a locally based public lands stewardship organization that would assist the USFS manage the Eagles Nest Wilderness. FENW was formed in May, and began working with the Dillon Ranger District that summer by organizing campsite clean-up and trail maintenance projects.

FENW Board of Directors soon recognized that education of users in appropriate minimum impact techniques (Leave No Trace), wilderness regulations and values (such as fire restrictions, dogs on leash, and non-motorized, non-mechanized use only), and local history was essential. They applied for grants from The Summit Foundation with the belief that an educated public will have a better sense of stewardship for the National Forests.

The Foundation grants have assisted by funding an interpretive display at the Dillon Ranger District office, portal signs marking wilderness boundaries, and signs at trailheads, which explain regulations, wilderness ethics and values. The importance of the support and contributions from the Foundation to FENW cannot be overstated.

FENW looks forward to the future with the goal of forming associations with diverse community groups in order to educate residents and visitors about wilderness resources and proper stewardship.

Frisco Elementary Reading
During the past two years, The Summit Foundation has supported the supplementary reading program at Frisco Elementary School enabling them to meet the needs of their diverse learners and regular learners as well. These supplementary materials have helped "open the door of reading" to both English and English Language Learners in preschool through fifth grade. Some of the programs purchased with the grant monies provided by The Foundation include:

Keep Books: Published in both English and Spanish, students are given a copy of each story to keep at home to practice reading English benefiting both the students, their parents, and other family members.

Recorded Books: Popular with both non-English speaking students and regular readers, these books promote reading in English by listening to the taped book and seeing the printed word in English.

Accelerated Reader Test Disks: Over 1,000 test titles have been added to this successful computerized reading program resulting in highly motivated readers. After reading the books, students take comprehension tests to earn points, which are calculated each quarter to determine if students are achieving their goal.

Accelerated Reader Books: Numerous books in both English and Spanish have been added to motivate our non-English speakers to read books and work toward a reading goal. Students learn to read by reading, and English Language Learners are no exception.

Books For "At Risk" Readers: Used by the reading specialist and classroom teachers to help "at risk" readers become competent readers, these books are also used in small groups as instructional materials to teach beginning readers and non-English speaking students.

The supplemental reading program at Frisco Elementary School continues to strengthen the reading skills of ALL their students. The students continue to do well on school AND state reading assessments. The Summit Foundation has been a big part in purchasing reading materials to help support our students in an ever-increasing diverse population, and Frisco Elementary says "THANK YOU!".

Lake Dillon Foundation For The Performing Arts
Since the early 90s Lake Dillon Foundation For The Performing Arts has played a significant role in the arts throughout Summit County. Starting with our first event, Sunset at the Summit (the free concerts at the Lake Dillon Amphitheater) we have now grown to include other aspects of the arts. The Lake Dillon Theatre Company, housed in the old Town Hall in Dillon offers a year-round season of plays and musicals. The Young People's Theater Workshop has, for the past 8 years, offered a 6-week summer theater workshop for children ages 4-18 culminating in a wonderful musical production. Our Outreach Program brings educational theater to the schools of Summit County and surrounding communities. Music of the Summit, a series of chamber music concerts has contributed to the widening interest in classical music in our area. With the continued support of The Summit Foundation, we have been able to grow and to follow our mission of uniting the community through the arts. We greatly appreciate The Summit Foundation and its belief in LDFPA as we continue to serve the community.

The TAME Foundation - Therapy Animals Mean Equality
In 1996, a fledgling organization called TAME - an acronym for Therapy Animals Mean Equality - came into existence here in Summit County. Until this time, Summit County never had a program quite like it. At TAME, children with disabilities are given the opportunity to have their physical or occupational therapies done on the back of a horse rather than in a traditional office setting.

Beyond the physical benefits, TAME is the great equalizer, because a horse has no conception of disabilities. According to one mother, "Having a child with a disability can be very heartbreaking. When all the other kids are running and playing my daughter isn't, or she is trying but cannot keep up. With the TAME program my daughter has found an activity that she loves and also one that is her own. She doesn't have any competition and doesn't get left out because of her disability. She has also gained a lot of confidence which was much needed in her life."

Also in 1996, a fledgling Executive Director sat down at her desk and wrote her very first grant to The Summit Foundation. It was a request for some much needed equipment. In June of 1996, the TAME Foundation received its first grant from The Foundation. Over the past eleven years, The Summit Foundation has been the fairy godmother to the TAME Foundation granting such requests as partial funding for a therapy horse to a capital expenditure for an indoor riding arena. Thus turning a fledgling organization into what TAME is today.