Galloping Grace Youth Ranch Receives $2,500 Grant From the New Mexico Children’s Foundation – Essential Funding to Help Keep the Children/Family Focused Education and Enrichment Programs Running Smoothly At The Ranch
Galloping Grace Youth Ranch (GGYR) has received a $2,500 grant from the New Mexico Children’s Foundation. The New Children’s Foundation (NMCF) has announced that they are giving $109,100 in grants this year to forty-three non-profit children’s organizations, including GGYR. NMCF is giving the highest number of dollars in grants in the Foundation’s history to fund nonprofits that help our children and families.
The grant awarded to GGYR will be used to support the children/family-focused programs offered at the ranch, specifically the Junior Leadership Development Program. GGYR is a local farm/ranch in Rio Rancho that offers and promotes programs that educate children about farming and sustainable practices through experiences growing crops and raising animals on a working ranch. GGYR’s programs include:
Summer Program: Our youth-led summer program that focuses on education and leadership development through hands-on activities and play. Over eleven weeks, youth employees and 150 Junior Leaders help organize, lead, and teach more than 4000 youth of all ages learn and teach about the relationships between humanity, animals, crops, insects, worms, fish (aquaponics), and soil in food production through hands-on, innovative, and experiential learning.
Farm to Classroom: GGYR works with the Rio Ranch Public Schools, Ag in the Classroom, Center for Hands-On Learning, and the NMSU Cooperative Extension Service to create a robust Farm to Classroom program focused on teaching kids the origins of food and the importance of agriculture. GGYR first farm to classroom project, “Chicks in the Classroom,” provided a kit that included a brooder and supplies to care for growing chicks in more than 70 classrooms. GGYR has also piloted a mobile farm/ranch at Puesta del Sol Elementary and intends on expanding this program during the 2014-2015 school year.
Pumpkin Patch: An annual, month long, Pumpkin Patch with the City of Rio Rancho, several local nonprofits, the business community, and educational institutions for a city-wide fall celebration that engages the community in outdoor agricultural based activities centered on sustainability and community health education. Average attendance has grown to exceed 40,000 visitors.
Community Supported Agriculture: CSA or Community Supported Agriculture is a partnership between the local consumer market and the farmers and ranchers that serve their area. Consumers commit to paying the farmer in regular installments in return for regular shares of produce, dairy, eggs or in lump sum amounts of meat. CSA the Galloping Grace Way is a new and innovative approach to community supported agriculture. Our monthly membership fees are, in reality, monthly donations. When we have produce or animal products ready to be consumed, we donate it to local food support organizations, who in turn give it to members of our community who need help feeding their children and families.
GGYR operates on donations from individuals and the community. Funding like the grant received from NMCF is essential to maintaining daily functions and program success. For more information on Galloping Grace Youth Ranch and how you can help support it’s programs, please visit www.ggyr.org. To learn more about the New Mexico Children’s Foundation, please visit www.nmchildren.org.
About Galloping Grace Youth Ranch – GGYR is a local farm/ranch in Rio Rancho that offers and promotes programs that educate children about leadership, raising animals, growing crops, exploring the outdoors, and enriching the community. Children are empowered to lead, teach, work, and play alongside others while experiencing joy with our programs. GGYR provides children and families with a free and unique opportunity to interact with a local, sustainable, farm/ranch which focuses its efforts on enhancing agricultural education, improving the environment, and encouraging charitable giving in our community. Galloping Grace Youth Ranch (GGYR), founded in 2007, has been a registered 501(c) (3) since 2008. We believe that by cultivating healthy children today, they will harvest a healthy society tomorrow.
About the New Mexico Children’s Foundation – Founded in 1992 by Alice King, the New Mexico Children’s Foundation provides grants to needy children’s organizations statewide. The mission of the NMCF is to support small programs state-wide that serve the physical, mental, educational, and social needs of children and their families. The Foundation gives small grants to non-profits with budgets less than $300,000 that provide services to children and families.