A Different Kind of Christmas 2022
What is A Different Kind of Christmas?
The idea is simple! Christmas is a time of giving. We give gifts to family and friends as a way of celebrating the birth of Jesus. Why not give a gift in honor of Jesus to celebrate his birthday? After all, Christmas is Jesus’ birthday!
2022 Project – A Recreation Center in Sandy Valley, Nevada.
Congratulations! We raised $56,001!
We are excited to partner with Keystone non profit in Sandy Valley, Nevada. All money given to A Different Kind of Christmas will be used to open an after school recreation center. The “Rec Center” will provide food, recreation, arts, mentoring, and tutoring after school for children and youth in the community.
Your donation purchases needed sports equipment, art supplies, tutoring resources including computers, as well as providing staff and facility support. In addition, the funds will open avenues for grant funding that will sustain the Recreation Center for years to come.
About Phase Two of our Keystone Partnership
As many of you know, our 2019 Different Kind of Christmas offering was used to form a partnership with Keystone in Sandy Valley, Nevada to address food insecurity in that community. As the pandemic dragged on, food insecurity grew as did our ability to meet the needs of residents in the community. We were able to leverage our offering to secure County and State grants to fund the program well into the future.
We understood that our efforts in Sandy Valley were “Phase 1” of a much bigger project. With the overwhelming success of “Phase 1”, we are now ready to embark upon “Phase 2,” the creation of a recreation center at Keystone that will provide after school programming for children in the community. The recreation center will operate in partnership with the local school and will provide children after school food, recreation, arts, and tutoring. The need for this center is great, and the impact this center will have will be even greater.
About Sandy Valley
Sandy Valley in located on the border of Nevada and California approximately an hour’s drive from Las Vegas. Sandy Valley is a rural community with a population of about 2500 people.
There are about 200 children enrolled in the Sandy Valley K-12 public school. 99% of the students qualify for free lunch and the school is designated as a Title 1 School serving economically disadvantaged children. Outside of the school, there are very limited recreational and educational opportunities for children and youth.
In 2020 Desert Spring partnered with Keystone nonprofit in Sandy Valley to address food insecurity in the community. Addressing food insecurity was the first phase of a two-phase plan to bring community resources to Sandy Valley.
Keystone has been very successful in its work to provided needed food for food insecure residents. Currently Keystone provides food for over 1500 people every month! Keystone food programs are sustained through partnerships with Three Square as well as through county and state grants.
