I feel as if we won the lottery last night. Last night I was holding back my tears in a room of stunned and proud parents, just trying to absorb what was happening. I was waiting for the catch because if something is too good to be true, it usually is. I read every paper given to us looking for why this was not real. I was overjoyed to find out that I was wrong and called all of my family and friends to tell them the good news. None of my siblings have gone to college or graduated high school. I have been working very hard to change that for my children.

These are not just words on a page. For 47 second graders at Lidgerwood Elementary School in Spokane, Washington, these words represent what so many stunned parents and children were feeling in the Fall of 2008 when they discovered that all 47 students were guaranteed funding for college at no cost to their parents. Additionally, the children will be provided after-school programs five days a week through 6^th grade along with mentoring and tutoring through 12^th grade.

Reach for the Future!, a nonprofit partnership for educational success, began with a group of friends in a living room—a small group of local women saw a segment on television about children in low-income neighborhoods having difficulty reaching their educational goals.

Four remarkable years later, this group has launched a project created to empower children from low-income communities to reach their educational and career goals by providing a long-term program of mentoring, tutoring, enrichment and tuition for higher education. The support structure that has been created includes an after-school program and a summer program of tutoring, homework support, field trips and social and cultural enrichment activities in collaboration with the Boys and Girls Clubs of Spokane County.

With a $30,000 Community Strategies grant to support operations of the after-school program, Reach for the Future! is assured a strong start to this long-term program. This grant was made possible by the Leuthold Endowment Fund and Henrietta Burkowsky Fund. Reach for the Future! continues to raise money for the students’ tuition and use the Guaranteed Education Tuition Program (GET) to support their work.

The parents and grandparents of these children truly explain what this means best:

I cannot believe that they kept this secret for four years, and no one whispered a breath of it until last night.  Imagine the ripples that will be felt in our society over the next 20 years as these 47 children begin to realize opportunities they might never have had.  It is amazing! I am so excited and not just for my grandson, but there are so many children in that group that will be the first generation of their families that will go to college!

Truly, that is what giving and receiving is all about.