OAK BROOK, IL – The National Fraternal Congress of America (NFCA) recognized this year’s 10 JOIN HANDS DAY Excellence Award winners.  The 2006 JOIN HANDS DAY Excellence Awards were presented at the Celebration of Fraternalism Luncheon held during the 120th NFCA Annual Meeting, September 7-9, in Scottsdale, Arizona.

The 10 awardees were selected from hundreds of volunteer projects that emphasized youth and adult partnerships on May 6, 2006.  Each award-winning project received $1,000 and a distinctive glass trophy.  The coordinating groups will choose how the funds are used.  Some organizations donate the money to the beneficiary of the project or another benevolent cause.  Others save the funds to use as seed money for the following year’s JOIN HANDS DAY event.

JOIN HANDS DAY, which promotes fraternalism and fraternal benefit societies, is the only day of service on America’s national calendar that seeks to build youth and adult relationships through planning and participating in a day of volunteering.  This signature event provides fraternal benefit societies with an opportunity to connect with other volunteer organizations to make an important impact on their communities.

In selecting Excellence Award recipients, the most important consideration is the quality of the youth and adult partnership in planning and conducting the event.  Other criteria include the quality of the project to the community or persons in need, effectiveness of the mobilization group and the potential for relationships to continue after JOIN HANDS DAY.

“This is fraternalism’s day, a day when fraternal benefit societies and volunteer organizations reach out to people or communities in need, connect generations and develop relationships that would never happen otherwise,” said Fred Grubbe, JOIN HANDS DAY President.  “Fraternalists ‘JOIN HANDS’ year-round, because fraternalism is not a one-day-a-year event.  However, JOIN HANDS DAY provides all fraternalists and nonfraternalists alike with the opportunity to make a difference in their communities through helpful projects that connect youths and adults.”

Eight of the 10 winning projects were coordinated by fraternal benefit societies.  The other two projects were conducted by local community groups and volunteer organizations.

2006 Excellence Awards—Fraternal Winners

Catholic Life Insurance – Volunteers in Gainesville, Texas, worked tirelessly to pack and then send 14 fully-stuffed boxes to appreciative servicemen and women in Iraq.

Gleaner Life Insurance Society – The Adrian Arbor and Big Brothers Big Sisters of Lenawee County cleaned debris, transplanted flowers, pruned and planted perennials at the main intersection of Adrian and at the memorial gardens on the Adrian College campus in Michigan.

Thrivent Financial for Lutherans – Each Lutheran congregation and youth group in Opalaka, Florida, conducted a countywide food drive.  They partnered with community civic and business organizations including Kiwanis, Rotary International and The Giving Tree.

Ladies Pennsylvania Slovak Catholic Union – In Easton, Pennsylvania, volunteers held an old-fashioned May Day Celebration for Special Olympics complete with a May pole made by the Boy Scouts.

Modern Woodmen of America – Working with a Thrivent Financial for Lutherans chapter, this group of volunteers cleaned up and performed maintenance work at a recreational area in Burke, South Dakota.

Royal Neighbors of America – Chapter volunteers picked up trash, pruned trees, planted a tree gardened and weeded the city park in Bountiful, Utah.

Woodmen of the World/Omaha Woodmen Life Insurance Society – In Deland, Florida, Cub Scouts, Woodmen lodges and the Florida Sheriff's Youth Ranches built bat boxes to protect endangered bats that eat more than 1,000 mosquitoes every night and were losing their habitat to development.

Thrivent Financial for Lutherans – These volunteers built a meditation garden and refurbished the labyrinth built several years ago on JOIN HANDS DAY in Tampa, Florida.
 

2006 Excellence Awards—Non-fraternal Winners

Northwest Indian Opportunities Industrialization Center (OIC) – The communities of Walker and Onigum, Minnesota, joined hands across the bay to help clean one community and build better relationships between both communities.

S.K.I.P. [Special Kids in Preschool] – Youth and adult volunteers planted flowers with senior citizens outside the complex at Amber Ridge Assisted Living Center in Moline, Illinois.

2006 Excellence Awards—Honorable Mentions

National Slovak Society of the USA – Volunteers from the entire community of Struthers, Ohio, (including local churches, local schools, the City of Struthers and other groups) conducted multiple projects, such as building a porch for a handicapped person, removing gravel from a senior citizen’s lawn and planting flowers in 25 different locations throughout the town.

National Mutual Benefit – Volunteers worked with the Boy Scouts of America to beautify a local roadside by picking up trash along a mile-and-a-half stretch of highway in Brodhead, Wisconsin.

Thrivent Financial for Lutherans – In Wilmington, Delaware, volunteers collected 15 tons of food, plus clothing, household goods and furniture, and delivered the items to the Sunday Breakfast Mission, which provides shelter for more than 165 homeless men nightly.

St. Mary's/St. Joseph's Parish Youth Group – In Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, volunteers joined hands with the First Catholic Slovak Ladies Association and Penn State Cooperative Extension to present “Bullying, Bullying, It’s not Just Child’s Play, What Parents Can do About It!”—a program created to increase awareness on the subject of bullying.

YMCA of the USA – Almost 4,000 people performed a community cleaning for the entire city of Prescott Valley, Arizona.  More than 930 tons of trash was picked up and dropped at the local dump including cars and large appliances.

“Congratulations to the JOIN HANDS DAY 2006 Excellence Award winners, and we’ll see you out in full force next year, on May 5, 2007.  Until then, join us in celebrating fraternalism by JOINING HANDS 365 days a year,” said Grubbe.

Sponsored by America’s fraternal benefit societies, JOIN HANDS DAY is the fraternal national day of service when youths and adults work together to plan and implement projects that benefit their local communities.  To learn more about JOIN HANDS DAY, visit the Web site at www.joinhandsday.org or e-mail actioncenter@joinhandsday.org.

About the NFCA
The 120-year-old NFCA unites 75 not-for-profit fraternal benefit societies operating in all 50 states, the District of Columbia and Canada. The association represents 10 million people in 36,000 local chapters, making it one of America’s largest member networks. Fraternal benefit societies provide their members with leadership, social, educational, spiritual, patriotic, scholarship, financial and volunteer-service opportunities.  Combined, the NFCA’s member-societies maintain more than $324 billion of life insurance-in-force and, in 2005 alone, contributed almost $400 million to charitable and fraternal programs.  In addition, fraternalists volunteered 93 million hours toward community-service projects during that same period.