2016 Spring Grants
The following grants were awarded as part of the Bob Woodruff Foundation’s 2016 Spring Cycle.
Arts in the Armed Forces
Arts in the Armed Forces 8th Annual Broadway Event
Location: New York City
Issue Area: Quality of Life
Arts in the Armed Forces (AITAF) bridges the cultural gap between the military and the performing arts communities by bringing the best modern American theater to the military, veterans and their families, free of charge. Co-founded by Marine-turned-actor Adam Driver, AITAF programming encourages dialogue between artists and the military/veteran audience. AITAF enlists artists of the highest quality from stage and screen, and chooses thought-provoking content with an eye to what might speak to a particular audience. Through its grant from the Bob Woodruff Foundation, AITAF will perform on Broadway during Veterans Week for an audience of 1,000 New York-area service members, veterans and their families.
Atlantic Council
Atlantic Council Take Point Initiative
Location: National
Issue Area: Education and Employment
The Atlantic Council promotes leadership and engagement in international affairs based on the Atlantic Council¹s central role in meeting global challenges. Through its grant from the Bob Woodruff Foundation, veterans selected for the Take Point Initiative will receive unparalleled networking, mentorship, and training opportunities to launch new careers as leaders in national security and international affairs. Take Point Fellows are paired with exemplary mentors, thought leaders and policy advisors who will guide them, help them refine their goals, identify sector gaps and, ultimately, help them compete for seed funding. Previous and current cohorts unite to build projects in a hands-on environment, while meeting with top national leaders such as former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright and former Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel.
Boston University
Strength at Home
Location: National
Issues Area: Quality of Life
The Strength at Home program, launched with backing from the Departments of Defense and Veterans Affairs eight years ago, is designed to reduce domestic violence in military families. Intimate partner violence has a severe negative impact not only on the recipients of such behavior but on the children and on the veterans as well. Strength at Home, which employs a cognitive behavioral intervention, is the first program shown to have effectively reduced intimate partner violence – both physical and psychological – in randomized, controlled-data trials. The Bob Woodruff Foundation funding will support the expansion of the Strength at Home program from 10 to 14 sites.
Bunker Labs
Bunker in a Box
Location: National
Issue Area: Education and Employment
Through a grant from the Bob Woodruff Foundation, Bunker Labs will continue to roll out its online training platform: Bunker In A Box. Many returning veterans desire to become self-employed/entrepreneurs and this Bob Woodruff Foundation investment contributes to veterans’ professional growth. This online platform complements Bunker Labs local chapters that provide veterans with a venue to innovate and collaborate.
GSW Foundation/Rosalynn Carter Institute for Caregiving
Operation Family Caregiver
Location: Washington State
Issue Area: Quality of Life
Operation Family Caregiver (OFC), a non-clinical, skill-building support program, helps caregivers manage the challenges inherent in their role. The program is tailored to the specific circumstances of an individual family. Caregiver coaches provide in-home, online and telephone consults. Coaches and caregivers work together to develop detailed notebooks with essential information that will be used long after the initial training sessions have ended. Funding from the Bob Woodruff Foundation will support recruiting, training and certifying coaches and connecting them with caregivers. OFC outcomes include decreased depression and health complaints, decreased sense of feeling burdened, and an increase in overall satisfaction of life. The Bob Woodruff Foundation chose the Rosalynn Carter Institute because of their emphasis on translating evidence-based caregiver support programs from randomized controlled trials into communities where families live.
Growing Veterans
Growing Veterans Sustainable Development
Location: Washington State
Issue Area: Rehabilitation and Recovery
Growing Veterans empowers veterans to connect with their communities and one another by growing food. Growing Veterans will use its grant from the Bob Woodruff Foundation, to strengthen its organizational infrastructure and enrich its impact on community reintegration by training veterans and community members on issues of peer-support and suicide intervention, and using leadership skills to strengthen the broader sustainable agriculture movement. The Growing Veterans model provides a holistic approach to a multitude of transition issues, while decreasing the stigma that the military veteran population tends to attach with seeking help.
Headstrong Project
Headstrong Project Treatment Program
Location: National
Issue Area: Rehabilitation and Recovery
Headstrong Project is an evidenced-based treatment program for post-9/11 veterans struggling with post-traumatic stress and related conditions. An individualized treatment plan is developed for each veteran based on the three tenants of trauma therapy: stabilization, memory processing and reintegration. Headstrong Project¹s model of free, unlimited access to the same clinical provider, leads to confidence in the program and positive outcomes that include better sleep, fewer flashbacks, improved mood, decrease in drug/alcohol use, and increase in the quality of relationships. Headstrong Project will utilize its Bob Woodruff Foundation grant to expand the treatment program to Houston and increase the number of veterans they serve.
Home Builders Institute
HBI PACT for Active Duty Service Members
Location: Ft. Stewart
Issue Area: Education and Employment
Home Builders Institute (HBI), the national leader of career training in the building industry, will offer its award-winning Pre-Apprenticeship Certificate Training (PACT) to soon-to-transition active duty military serving at the U.S. Army Garrison at Fort Stewart, GA, and to unemployed and under-employed veterans in the Greater Savannah area. HBI students learn marketable skills through classroom instruction and real work experience on community service construction projects. Funding from the Bob Woodruff Foundation will help 50 transitioning service members to gain vocational skills that are easily translatable and sustainable in the civilian world.
One Mind for Research, Inc.
Patients Like Me Portal
Location: National
Issue Area: Rehabilitation and Recovery
One Mind’s Supporting Veterans partnership with Patients Like Me (PLM) is an existing program established with Bob Woodruff Foundation funding in June 2014. As of April 2016, the PLM online portal has registered nearly 20,000 patients with post-traumatic stress, traumatic brain injury, or both. PLM provides patients and caregivers a supportive online community in which to share stories and resources; data in this anonymous format is also shared with researchers. This grant from the Bob Woodruff Foundation will continue to support the One Mind PLM platform.
Our Military Kids
Our Military Kids
Location: National
Issue Area: Quality of Life
Our Military Kids provides grants to the children of wounded service members to pay for extracurricular activities and tutoring programs that nurture and sustain children while helping to increase resilience and diminish symptoms of anxiety, depression, and fearfulness. Through this grant from the Bob Woodruff Foundation, Our Military Kids anticipates reaching 1200 family members in need of a positive outlet. Surveys show the children benefit by focusing their time and energy on an activity of importance to them, and the decreases the stress level of the injured military parent and the entire family.
Pat Tillman Foundation
Tillman Scholarship Program
Location: National
Issue Area: Education and Employment
The Pat Tillman Foundation invests in veterans and their spouses through academic scholarships, building a diverse community of leaders committed to service to others. The Pat Tillman Foundation seeks to enhance the academic success of veterans and military spouses by reducing their dependency on student loans and debt repayment and create a peer and professional community for career success. With the grant from the Bob Woodruff Foundation, the Pat Tillman Foundation will provide financial support to 11 Tillman Scholars pursuing degrees in health care and mental health services in order to serve veterans impacted by physical and emotional wounds of war.
Points of Light
Conference Forum: Service in support of our Hidden Heroes
Location: National
Issue Area: Quality of Life
The Bob Woodruff Foundation will sponsor a forum focused on serving military and veteran caregivers at the Points of Light (POL) annual conference for volunteers. Attendees will hear about the unique struggles of caregivers and, hopefully, will be inspired to address these issues in their communities by joining the many existing efforts that serve our country’s hidden heroes. This is an opportunity for 350 volunteers, and many more by remote video connection, to learn more about an exceptional population and how volunteers can provide responsible, effective support.
Project Healing Waters Fly Fishing
Nationwide Programs for Disabled Veterans
Location: National
Issue Area: Quality of Life
Project Healing Waters Fly-Fishing (PHWFF) has helped to give service members and veterans with a lifelong skill that promotes re-socialization and camaraderie, along with an avenue to heal physical and hidden wounds away from hospital stays and rehabilitation sessions. PHWFF has built a large volunteer network — in 2015, 3,500 volunteers donated over 200,000 hours serving 7,400 individuals nationwide. The Bob Woodruff Foundation grant funds the establishment of an alumni program, background checks on 545 new volunteers, and participation of 700 PHWFF alumni in a national fly rod building program. PHWFF’s strong engagement with their alumni aligns with the military ethos of never leaving a fallen comrade behind.
PsychArmor Institute
Bob Woodruff Foundation School for Volunteers
Location: National
Issue Area: Cultural Competency
The Bob Woodruff Foundation and PsychArmor Institute (PAI) will build a suite of free online courses that will make it possible for any civilian volunteer who works with veterans and their families to improve their level of military and veteran cultural competency at a time and pace that meets their needs. PAI’s volunteer-focused online trainings will range from foundational courses such as “Volunteering with Veterans with Invisible Wounds of War,” to those targeted to meet specific needs such as ”How to Interact with a Service Animal”. PAI’s national reach and its relationships with leading public and private sector subject matter experts led the Bob Woodruff Foundation to this investment.
Quality of Life Foundation
Wounded Veterans Family Care Program
Location: National
Issue Area: Quality of Life
The Quality of Life Foundation (QOL) Wounded Veterans Family Care Program provides up to $2,500 annually to caregivers in need who take care of severely wounded, ill or injured veterans. The Bob Woodruff Foundation investment in this program will provide 40+ caregivers quality of life improvements such as sewing machines for crafts, emergency car or dental repairs, and stress-relieving massage. This program, which is run by a caregiver of a service member, gives back to those who work tirelessly to ensure their veterans are cared for often at their personal expense.
REBOOT Combat Recovery
REBOOT Combat Trauma Healing Course Expansion
Location: National
Issue Area: Rehabilitation and Recovery
REBOOT Combat Recovery offers free, accessible programs in 17 locations across the country to help veterans and family members heal from moral and spiritual wounds of war. The 12-week combat healing course provides a structured curriculum focused on clinical and faith-based support, education and affirmation in an environment of trust. REBOOT “communities” are primarily veteran-led and are composed of a team of professionals. Childcare is provided weekly and participation of spouses and affected family members is highly encouraged. Additionally, REBOOT offers peer-to-peer mentoring and leadership training to equip caring citizens and program graduates to start REBOOT communities around the country. REBOOT will use the Bob Woodruff Foundation grant to leverage the faith-based community in six additional locations. Grant funds will be used to cover meals, childcare, one-on-one mentoring and course materials.
Returning Heroes Home, Inc.
Intensive Outpatient Program for the treatment of PTSD
Location: San Antonio, TX
Issue Area: Rehabilitation and Recovery
The Brooke Army Medical Center Intensive Outpatient Program (IOP) treatment protocol includes a narrative therapy component that uses poetry and journal writing to help patients process emotionally traumatic events. Led by a professional writer and co-facilitated by psychologists and social workers, this therapy helps patients process emotionally driven memories that present as flashbacks, nightmares and intrusive thoughts. Program participants report reduced post-traumatic stress symptoms, re-engagement with family members, improved occupational functioning, and a decrease in suicidal ideation and alcohol use. Narrative therapy has also been shown to facilitate emotional expression, increase engagement with the treatment protocol and reduce the IOP dropout rate. The Bob Woodruff Foundation grant will be used to hire a professional writer and support development of a ‘self-reporting’ questionnaire to assess this narrative therapy component. The Bob Woodruff Foundation is interested in finding non-traditional therapies that facilitate healing and may resonate with certain populations of military and veterans.
Rush Medical Center
Road Home Program
Location: National
Issue Area: Rehabilitation and Recovery
The Rush Road Home Program (RHP) is developing a new model of care for families of post-9/11 veterans suffering from military sexual trauma (MST). The evidenced-based program builds resiliency and equips parents and children with communications and problem-solving skills. With this investment by the Bob Woodruff Foundation, the Rush team will develop in-person and telemedicine versions of the MST curriculum. By the close of the 1-year grant, Rush anticipates that 30 families, comprising approximately 90 individuals, will complete the 8-session program. Of particular interest to the Bob Woodruff Foundation is the RHP scalability. The Rush team will train other providers throughout the Midwest and at peer academic medical centers across the country in the use of this first of-its-kind tool.
Solider and Families Embraced
Lazarus Project
Location: Fort Campbell
Issue Area: Rehabilitation and Recovery
The Lazarus Project of Soldiers and Families Embraced (SAFE) provides free private, professional counseling to service members, veterans and family members in the Fort Campbell area. Situated on the Kentucky and Tennessee border, Fort Campbell has one of the highest concentrations of soldiers in the country along with one of the highest suicide rates. The Bob Woodruff Foundation interest in the Lazarus Project lies in its continuity of services to service members and veterans (irrespective of their discharge status) and in the emphasis on care for the “whole family unit”. SAFE has provided service to more than 1,500 soldiers/veterans/family members since its inception in 2010. With funding from the Bob Woodruff Foundation, SAFE will provide an additional 880 individual counseling sessions.
Team Red, White and Blue
Eagle Leadership Development Program
Location: National
Issue Area: Quality of Life
Reintegrating into civilian life can be challenging for some post-9/11 veterans. Team Red, White & Blue (Team RWB) believes the best way to support these veterans is to spend time with them; interact with them in personal, meaningful ways; and connect them to their communities through exercise and social activities. Team RWB focuses on exercise and social activities that, over time, become part of a healthy lifestyle and will facilitate an authentic interaction with community residents. With a grant from the Bob Woodruff Foundation, Team RWB will build out its Eagle Leadership Development program to develop and strengthen local chapter leaders and military-civilian relationships, in over 200 communities nationwide.
Team Rubicon
Clay Hunt Fellowship Program
Location: National
Issue Area: Education and Employment
Team Rubicon unites the skills and experiences of veterans with first responders for disaster relief. With a grant from the Bob Woodruff Foundation, Team Rubicon will build upon its Clay Hunt Fellowship Program to provide 10 veterans with an opportunity for professional development in nonprofit management and leader development for disaster response. Marine veteran Clay Hunt served in the infantry alongside Team Rubicon cofounder Jake Wood in both Iraq and Afghanistan. Following his service, Clay helped establish Team Rubicon by deploying to Haiti and Chile. In 2011, Clay lost his battle with PTS, taking his own life. Family and friends agreed that at the core of Clay¹s trouble was his lack of mission, community and self-worth. This Bob Woodruff Foundation grant is in memory of Marine Clay Hunt and an investment in meaningful opportunities for his fellow veterans.
Team Rubicon Global, Ltd.
Team Rubicon Global
Location: International
Issue Area: International
Team Rubicon (TR) provides veterans around the world with opportunities to serve others in the wake of disasters. While conducting over 100 missions in a dozen countries, TR attracted veterans from numerous coalition countries to include Australia, the UK, Germany, Canada, and Norway and realized TR needed to become a global movement – exporting the idea that veterans all over the world are ideally suited to carry out difficult humanitarian missions in support of the common good. Team Rubicon Global (TRG) was launched in April 2015 and holds the worldwide brand license and operating standards. TRG will establish 2-3 new Team Rubicons per year. The Bob Woodruff Foundation will be recognized as a founding sponsor of Team Rubicon Global and is proud to support veterans around the world. We recognize that our veterans fought as a coalition and can thrive as one.
The Employment and Disability Institute (EDI) at Cornell University
Strategies for Gaining Insights to the Employment Challenges of Veterans with Disabilities
Location: National
Issue Area: Education and Employment
The Employment and Disability Institute (EDI) at Cornell University advances the knowledge, policies and practices that contribute to the development of inclusive workplaces and communities for people with disabilities, including veterans. Through its grant from the Bob Woodruff Foundation, EDI will solicit input from veterans with disabilities, their family members, and employers regarding the full integration and participation of wounded warriors in employment and community life. Results will be compiled into a report along with recommendations for interventions and current best practices to pave the way to productive employment.
Warrior-Scholar Project
Warrior-Scholar Project
Location: National
Issue Area: Education and Employment
Warrior-Scholar Project strives to build an academic bridge between military service and higher education for enlisted service members transitioning out of the military. The program hosts free, intensive, academic boot camps designed to hone critical thinking processes, sharpen oral and written communication skills, and increase academic confidence. Boot camps currently exist on 12 university campuses and the Warrior-Scholar Project will expand to five additional campuses in 2017. Approximately 100 veterans will attend the boot camp with funding from the Bob Woodruff Foundation. This is an investment in veteran academic success and in military cultural competency for prep course professors.
Worklife Institute
Veterans Worklife Transition and Sustainability Program
Location: Houston, TX
Issue Area: Education and Employment
Houston is home to one of the largest post-9/11 veteran populations in the country. Finding employment is a top priority, and often a struggle, for many returning veterans. The Veterans Worklife Transition Program helps veterans find employment through a portfolio of integrated services that includes career training, job hunting skills, personal transition counseling, trauma and family counseling, legal and financial advice, family life workshops, and information on veterans benefits. The Bob Woodruff Foundation grant will cover counseling and consultation services, childcare, and program expenses.
