Berkshires Beat: 'Walk & Roll' Raises Brain Injury Awareness
Walk & Roll: Residents from across Western Massachusetts gathered to the Ashuwillticook Rail Trail in Cheshire on Sept. 10 for a Walk & Roll hosted by the Brain Injury Association of Massachusetts.
The walk aimed to further help their mission of creating a better future for brain injury survivors and their families.
One participant was Matthew LeBorgne, who suffered a traumatic brain injury in 2014. For Matt and his family, raising education and supporting BIAMA has become very important since his accident.
"Many people don't know a lot about brain injuries, both traumatic and acquired. I know we didn'r before Matt's accident," said Dawn LeBorgne, Matt's wife. “We are excited to bring our 'Believe in Miracles Team' to the Western MA Walk and Roll. We hope to keep expressing our support and mission of this great cause."
BIAMA is the first and oldest organizations in the state to offer support and resources to brain injury survivors and their families, in addition to prevention programs, education and legislative advocacy.
More library hours: Starting Sept. 12, there will be even more time to enjoy the Berkshire Athenaeum with the start of the library's extended hours on Mondays. The library will be now open 9 a.m.-9 p.m. Monday through Thursday; 9 a.m.-5 p.m. Friday; and 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Saturday.
With this increase, the city’s library is open 63 hours a week; since 2010, the library has been open 59 hours per week. With over a quarter of a million circulations last fiscal year, nearly 100 items were borrowed for each hour the library was open.
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Jobs4 11 youths: Eleven North County youth were recognized on Aug. 25 at North Adams City Hall for successfully completing the Berkshire County Regional Employment Board's North Adams Jobs4Youth Summer Program. Mayor Richard Alcombright and state Rep. Gail Cariddi honored the youth participants for their hard work and commitment demonstrated toward their summer work experiences and presented each youth with a certificate of completion and a citation from the Massachusetts House of Representatives.
The youth participants completed 10 hours of work readiness training in June at Drury High School's College & Career Center taught by Reconnect Center staff followed by 125 hours of structured work experience beginning July 5 through Aug. 12. Job responsibilities included camp counseling, child care, clerical tasks, pet grooming, building maintenance and landscaping. Recognized host employers included Brayton Elementary School's Summer Science Camp, United Cerebral Palsy of Berkshire County, Just-Fur-Pets Grooming, North Adams City Hall and the Historic Valley Campground at Windsor Lake.
The North Adams Jobs4Youth Program is essential to the Northern Berkshire community as it helps to remedy the low youth employment rate, exposes youth to the career opportunities available to them and the skills they will need for career success and assists the region’s industry sectors with growing their future workforce. Unlike the city of Pittsfield’s Youth Works Programming which is supported annually through state funding, the sustainability and expansion of the North Adams Jobs4Youth Program is solely dependent upon community and business-based donations. For additional information regarding the BCREB’s Jobs4Youth and/or additional Career Readiness Programs, visit www.bcreb.com.
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Getting grilled: Robert and Ann Farrara of Eagle Bridge, N.Y., have donated a barbecue grill to the Centers for Living and Rehabilitation at Southwestern Vermont Medical Center.
The couple was inspired to make the donation after Robert received excellent care during a short stay at CLR in May.
Good cause: The Boys & Girls Club of the Berkshires’ Gerard Miller Children First Golf Tournament was held Aug. 29 at the Country Club of Pittsfield. A field of 144 golfers helped the club raise a net profit of $40,000. The funds will benefit the club’s many programs and activities.
The tournament, celebrating its 15th year, honors Gerard Miller, a founding member of the Alumni Golf Committee and an original Alumni Board member at the club.
Good news: Edith Wharton Restoration, the nonprofit that oversees The Mount, Edith Wharton’s Home in Lenox, has been awarded a Massachusetts Cultural Council Gateway grant in the amount of $3,000. This news came days after The Mount learned that they had been accepted in the MCC’s UP Inclusive Design Initiative and received UP designation from the state agency. UP stands for Universal Participation.
The Gateway Program is a highly competitive grant program which provides two years of unrestricted operating support and is the pre-requisite to move into the MCC’s Cultural Investment Portfolio (CIP). The CIP provides unrestricted general operating project support grants to nonprofit organizations that provide public programs in the arts, sciences, and humanities in Massachusetts and have an established record of programmatic service and administrative stability.
The UP Designation is applied to organizations that have made a commitment to learn, take action and embrace inclusivity as a core institutional value.
