The Center Foundation, a Central Oregon nonprofit dedicated to providing sports medicine services to high school students, has been awarded a $45,000 matching grant to increase philanthropy in support of its high school sports medicine program in Central Oregon’s communities. The grant is funded by the Maybelle Clark MacDonald Fund, a nonprofit foundation established in 1970 by Maybelle Clark MacDonald and Fred MacDonald with the mission of easing the hardships and improving the well-being of humanity.
“This support from Maybelle Clark MacDonald Fund resulted in increased participation in our internal workplace giving campaign and enabled us to leverage donations for our online paddle raise,” said Sonja Donohue, Executive Director of The Center Foundation. “Due to COVID-19 this past spring, we canceled our largest fundraising event of the year and replaced it with an online paddle raise. These funds are vital to continue our mission to provide highly trained medical professionals to manage sports injuries and concussions in high schools across Central Oregon. We are honored to receive this award, and proud of the work we do to keep youth in our communities safe and healthy.”
Funding from the grant will help The Center Foundation increase support for its sports medicine program in Oregon’s high schools in Sisters, La Pine, Madras and Prineville. The Center Foundation provides certified athletic trainers to these high schools to deliver medical services to young athletes at no cost to students or their families. The sports medicine program ensures that students receive immediate and ongoing injury care, concussion baseline testing, onsite concussion evaluation and post-concussion care, referrals to appropriate medical professionals as needed and injury prevention education. Funding from the Maybelle Clark MacDonald Fund and the gifts it stimulates will directly benefit more than 5,000 children in these communities annually.
