Projects
The Brave Heart Foundation is proud to have supported a number of Indianapolis and Indiana-based organizations working to impact the lives of community members. Learn more about recent projects we’ve helped fund and their outcomes.
Dress for Success
$4,760 Grant | 2019 IT Support
In 2019, Dress for Success found themselves in need of a major IT overhaul to update technology that hadn’t been upgraded in approximately 10 years.
The Brave Heart Foundation was able to provide support to this important capacity building project. This grant directly went toward:
- Purchasing four staff computers
- Hiring an IT consultant to develop their game plan and initiate work saving and moving important data, updating operating systems, and repairing a faulty network
- Setting the organization up on a cloud-based server, allowing them to easily store and access historic client and organizational data
Keep Indianapolis Beautiful
$5000 Grant | 2019 KIB Youth Tree Team
In 2019 The Brave Heart Foundation supported Keep Indianapolis Beautiful’s (KIB) Youth Tree Team, a summer program for city youth that combines service, life skills development, and special enrichment opportunities.
In addition to maintaining 14,620 public trees planted by KIB over the past three years, participants:
- Planted, maintained, and harvested a vegetable garden
- Enjoyed a guided hike at Eagle Creek with KIB Naturalists
- Attended Lunch & Learns about the community and important wellness topics like mental health awareness
- Participated in special trainings and hands-on activities in leadership, teamwork, financial literacy, and more
- Visited the Subaru plant in West Lafayette to learn about no-waste manufacturing and robotics
The grant funding directly went to support 500 hours of wages for the teens and work-related supplies, including uniform shirts and water bottles.
Exodus Refugee
$25,000 Big Heart Grant | 2019 Capacity Building
As a previous Brave Heart Foundation grant recipient, Exodus Refugee was invited to apply for the Big Heart grant program, providing $25,000 toward a larger capacity-building project.
Exodus utilized this funding to expand staff training, learning new skills and improving upon current skills in order to better serve their clients.
The Big Heart Grant directly supported 12 trainings covering key topics such as teaching English as a second language, case management, mental health and healthcare, and more. As a result:
- Staff in various levels of the organization were able to fully engage in critical trainings that put them in a better position to execute their mission and create social change
- Team member morale and confidence increased with better knowledge of new resources, trends, and connections
- Leadership is better poised to direct organizational changes, including implementation of new technology and systems
Indianapolis Parks Foundation
$5000 Grant | 2019 Indy Urban Acres
Indy Urban Acres works to keep Indianapolis healthy by harvesting, on average, over 20,000 pounds of produce a year. Brave Heart’s support of the 2019 growing season contributed not only to the significant harvest, but to the program’s growing Veggie Boxes program.
In 2019 they:
- Delivered 74 vegetable boxes (an increase from the previous year’s 50 boxes) throughout a 16 week delivery program
- Welcomed over 692 youth to the farm to learn about farming and food production
- Hosted 51 farm apprentices through Teen Works for a 6 week program working to plant, maintain, harvest, and deliver produce
Arts for Learning
$5000 Grant | 2019 Inside Arts Programming
Arts for Learning’s Inside Arts program brings arts enrichment to at-risk and incarcerated youth and women throughout Central Indiana. As a 2019 funder, The Brave Heart Foundation was able to directly support this life-changing programming, including:
- Funding a performance
- 21 workshops in theatre, film, comic book drawing, and other art forms
- Serving 160 individuals at Bartholomew County Youth Services, Marion County Juvenile Detention Center, and the Marion County Jail
- Subsidizing teaching artist fees, program supplies, staff salaries
Ascent 121
$5000 Grant | 2018 General Services
Ascent 121 provides trauma support services for Indiana’s teen survivors of human trafficking. Brave Heart Foundation funding has directly supported their crucial services, including:
- Therapy focused on trauma, risk reduction, and areas tailored to each individual survivor’s needs
- Case management services to help them build self-identify, self-confidence, and self-competency
- Support for those survivors who have aged out of the DCS system
- Funding to pay for school-related expenses, including applications and enrollment fees, books, and supplies
In addition to the above projects, The Brave Heart Foundation is proud to have awarded funding to the following organizations:
- ArtMix
- Assistance League of Indianapolis
- Back on My Feet Indianapolis
- Exodus Refugee
- Brooke’s Place
- Child Advocates
- Children’s Bureau, Inc.
- Coburn Place
- CoCoDA
- Community Health Foundation
- Craine House
- Dayspring Center, Inc.
- Decatur County YMCA
- Desert Rose Foundation
- Flight1
- Freewheelin’ Community Bikes
- Girls Inc. of Greater Indianapolis
- Gleaners
- Green Cross
- Happy Hollow Children’s Camp, Inc.
- Hope Academy
- Hope Family Care Center, Inc.
- Horizon House
- Indiana Coalition Against Domestic Violence
- Indiana Coalition to End Sexual Assault
- Indiana Blind Children’s Foundation
- Indianapolis Art Center
- The Jackson Center for Conductive Education
- LifeSmart Youth
- Schools on Wheels
- The Sharing Place
- Sheltering Wings
- Teen Works
- The Julian Center
- Wheeler Mission
- And more!