MOVING INTO THE 21ST CENTURY – Voice Of The Township
In celebration of spring the Trustee Office has opened a Facebook page to better interact with the citizens of Wayne Township. In the past we have relied on face-to-face, phone communications and our web site, but since the beginning of the pandemic last year we have diversified our methods and ‘come into the 21st century’ as Trustee Knox likes to say.
Over the last few weeks we have posted about our involvement with Forward Indiana’s community pantries, the YWCA’s free mattress giveaway, our Richard A. Stevenson Scholarships, our involvement with the Courageous Healing program and Sammie’s Buddy Bench Project.
Applications for the 2021 RAS scholarships are now available through our Facebook page for Wayne Township high school seniors who will be going on to higher education after graduation. This is a $500 award that goes directly to the student to help defray some of the incidental costs of entering the next phase of their education. For younger students (from kindergarten to grade 11) we are again offering our Academic Encouragement Award, designed to get younger students into the pipeline of going after scholarships in their future. Applications for both of these awards are also available for pickup from our office or by calling our office for a mailed packet [(260) 449-7000 extension 328].
About a year ago Trustee Austin Knox’s parents, who are both Fort Wayne teachers, got us started collecting bottle caps for the Sammie’s Buddy Bench Project. This project was started by 12-year old Sammie Vance a local youth who spearheaded a program to turn bottle caps into park benches where kids could sit to signal to others that they would like some company. The idea was to encourage kindness and discourage bullying. When the pandemic hit and kids were out of school the program was put on hold. In the last month, though, Wayne Township became a public collection site (right inside our front door) and has amassed close to 100 pounds of caps to be recycled into buddy benches. For more information and a link to Sammie’s story see our Facebook page.
As spring gets underway it gives us hope and optimism to see our community’s young people getting active with their new projects and getting our own activities up and running again. Visit us at facebook.com/Wayne TownshipTrusteeOffice/ and follow along to keep up with all of our activities. And let’s get a Happy Spring underway.
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