SOCIAL SERVICES NONPROFIT OF THE YEAR
|| ACCEL ACCEL is a nonprofit organization that serves children and adults with developmental disabilities, including autism spectrum disorder, cognitive disabilities and behavioral disorders. ACCEL serves 500 individuals with school campuses in Phoenix and Tempe and satellite campuses in Buckeye and Tonopah. With virtual learning taking over this school year, students with developmental disabilities tend to struggle. The teachers at ACCEL are doing an incredible job of making sure their students continue to receive high quality special education despite the challenges of online learning. || Family Promise Greater Phoenix The first nonprofit of its kind in Arizona, Family Promise Greater Phoenix is an organization that rescues primarily first-time homeless families and their pets. Amid increased demand for their services this year due to the pandemic, the organization reworked their day centers to be shelters for up to 12 families at once. They received donations from community members and other organizations and were able to continue graduating families from the Family Promise Program consistently since the beginning of this year.
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AB | November - December 2020
|| Mission2Alpha Mission2Alpha is a volunteer-based organization that is committed to community service, service to the military and service to first responders. Through a variety of fundraising endurance events, such as their annual 400-mile bike ride from Scottsdale to San Diego, the organization raises awareness and much needed financial support for local military, veteran and firstresponders in need. Working together with other charities, Mission2Alpha has raised over $1 million and prides itself on deploying resources swiftly and efficiently.
|| Payson Senior Center The Payson Senior Center is a community-based organization whose goal is to assist local senior citizens in achieving and maintaining self-sufficiency with dignity. They provide a wide range of community and home based services in order to best serve their seniors. Since the beginning of the pandemic they’ve expanded their meal program to serve over 900 meals a week, provided essential toiletries, gifted goody bags and made frequent happy check phone calls to their seniors who were homebound. || St. Joseph the Worker St. Joseph the Worker is a Phoenix-based nonprofit employment agency that provides access to computers, phones, a printer, resume assistance, strategies to explain gaps in employment, interview coaching, professional clothing, hygiene supplies and bus passes for reliable transportation to and from interviews for more than 5,000 homeless people across the Valley. They’ve successfully launched the state’s first ever mobile employment support as a way to help better serve the community amidst the coronavirus pandemic.