Child Protection Training Center Receives Major Gifts
by October 22, 2012 3:52 pm 110 views
The Northwest Arkansas Community College Foundation said Monday a training center for those who work with abused children has received new financial support topping $1.5 million.
The funding includes a donation of $1.3 million from Melba Shewmaker to help transform a former oncology building now owned by the foundation into a state-of-the-art training facility.
“In recognition of this gift, we plan to recommend at the November board of trustees meeting that the center be named the Melba Shewmaker Southern Region National Child Protection Training Center,” NWACC president Becky Paneitz said in a news release.
At a news conference Monday, the NWACC Foundation also said the center has received a $100,000 grant from the Walton Family Foundation.
Additional gifts include $25,000 from Mel and Vicki Redman, who also donated $25,000 in February; $30,000 from the Bogle family on behalf of Bob and Marilyn Bogle; $25,000 from Johnelle Hunt; $25,000 from John and Emily Douglas; and $401.61 collected in a student-led fundraising initiative at First Lutheran School of Fort Smith.
The financial support announced Monday brings the total raised since a capital campaign was started in October 2011 to about 75 percent of the campaign’s $3 million goal, the news release stated. About $800,000 is still needed, mostly for information technology requirements.
Features of the training facility with include a two-story mock home, mock courtrooms, child forensic interview rooms, a practice medical room and a study lounge.
The center, which began operating in 2010, already has trained thousands of law enforcement personnel, prosecutors, social workers and other child-protection professionals in the latest techniques to identify and eliminate child abuse situations.
The regional center is part of the National Child Protection Training Center, which has a goal of eradicating child abuse in the U.S. within three generations.