News & Events – Page 18 – The Wege Foundation

NEW BLANDFORD LEADER HITS THE GROUND RUNNING

February 2, 2010September 2, 2014Education, Environment

Come see Brian Goblik's Top 75 Art Prize Piece: "Drawing of the Sun" — Come see Brian Goblik’s Top 75
Art Prize Piece:
“Drawing of the Sun”

Blandford Nature Center is an environmental, wildlife nature center and school in northwest Grand Rapids created in the 1960s. Several years ago Blandford’s chief funder, the Grand Rapids Public Museum Board, realized they could no longer afford to pay the bills. They turned to the Grand Rapids Public Schools, but the city’s schools were already fighting their own cash crisis.

With no other source of income, GRPS superintendent at the time, Bert Bleke, knew closing Blandford would be a huge loss to kids and the community. No longer could the thousands of visitors and school children come through to learn about wildlife, tap maple trees for syrup, learn zoology, study botany, and walk the nature trails.

Superintendent Bleke knew of only one person he could turn to. Today the staff and volunteers at the Nature Center are quick to tell you their doors would have closed without Peter Wege and The Wege Foundation. As Bleke put it, “In my mind, no Peter Wege—no Blandford Nature Center.”

Because Wege refused to let the nature school close down, every year all the 3rd, 6th, and 9th-grade students in the GRPS get to spend a school day at Blandford. “For many of these urban children,” Bleke said, “they never have the opportunity to be in nature.” In 2008, over 40,000 students from area school districts participated in field days and programs at Blandford.

In 2009, the 143-acre Blandford Nature Center went from being a city-county entity to becoming a non-profit supported by private donations. Peter Wege made a five-year commitment to help fund Blandford until 2014.

Annoesjka Steinman became the first executive director of Blandford in its non-profit status in the fall of 2009. Her background perfectly fits the newly evolved Blandford as a premier nature center that is paid for by community donations. With a background in environmental science and a history working for the Community Foundation of Muskegon County, Steinman understands both the natural science of Blandford Nature Center and the need to raise money for its ongoing support.

Steinman is already hard at work bringing in sixth-graders to help solve erosion problems on a stream bed near the Center’s main building. She also is moving forward with Blandford’s long-time leader Mary Jane Dockeray to fulfill Dockeray’s dream of creating an Ameuasian Meadow. The blooming meadow would be grown on Blandford land that was once a working farm.

Steinman is also pursuing an assessment of the former farm’s water quality hoping the ground water is clean enough to use if they expand the farm in the future. That would allow them to use their own free water.

By collaborating with the Center for Sustainability at Aquinas College and the Mixed Greens area gardeners and students, Steinman is continuing to keep Blandford, in its new non-profit status, the thriving community asset that Mary Jane Dockeray helped create.

The Kids Take on : TAKE BACK THE TAP

January 2, 2010September 2, 2014Education, Environment

Peter M. Wege has forever said that if this planet is to be saved, “The kids must do it.” He’s counting on the children pictured here at Ada Christian School in Grand Rapids to help promote the Take Back The Tap campaign The Wege Foundation has launched to end the sale of bottled water. These middle-schoolers saw photos where a colony of plastic bottles covers the ocean floor off the California coast.

The Wege Foundation gave each of these middle-school students the refillable water bottles they are holding emblazoned with the logo: Take Back The Tap. As part of their lesson they memorized the five reasons for taking back tap water as CHESS: Cheaper. Healthier. Earth-friendlier. Safer. Smarter.

Also read about -Vancouver Promotes Tap Water During Olympic Games

From the left: Lauren Bowman, Maria Betten, Elizabeth Schellenberg, volunteer teacher Laurie Sprague, Sam Van Hoven, Jessa Vander Weide, Megan Heynen, Lauren Postma, Adrianne France, Mackenzie Renner, and Allyson Korhorn.

Wege Foundation Sends Students to Inauguration

February 15, 2009September 3, 2014Education

Despite 1.9 million people squeezed together for hours in freezing weather on Inauguration Day, Tuesday, January 20, City High School senior Britany Benson said “everyone was in such good spirits…people of all ages and backgrounds, across the board—it didn’t matter. We all felt united.”

Britany and her classmate Bernard Schaefer II were part of that excited throng packed in front of the United States Capitol to watch former Senator Barack Obama place his hand on the Lincoln Bible. They needed to jump a fence to get close enough, but they heard the words that made Barack Obama the 44th President—and the first African-American.

The Wege Foundation sponsored the two high school seniors for the Inauguration, accompanied by the Foundation’s senior staff members Ellen Satterlee and Terri McCarthy. Mark VanPutten, an environmental consultant to the Foundation who lives in the Washington area, made arrangements for the four Grand Rapids visitors. Van Putten, named to one of President Obama’s environmental transition teams, rounded up tickets to the Inauguration, the Midwest Ball, and a meeting with Governor Jennifer Granholm complete with a picture of Britany and Bernard with the Michigan governor.

Besides the Inauguration itself, it was the students’ luncheon seminar with some of the nation’s leading environmentalists that had the most impact.

“Before I went to Washington,” Bernard Schaefer said, “I wanted to be a patent lawyer and maybe go to engineering school.” But after he heard national environmental figures like Jerome Ringo and Van Jones speak with such eloquence, Bernard changed his future on the spot. “They were so passionate about what they are doing.

“Now I want to be an environmental lawyer,” Bernard says with clear commitment. And not surprisingly, since his escort and friend Mark Van Putten teaches a class in that very subject at the University of Michigan, Bernard has his sights set on law school in Ann Arbor after either Michigan or Michigan State undergraduate school.

Britany Benson loves design, and she’s considering both architecture and becoming a clothes designer. But one thing for sure after her three days of Inauguration events, whatever she chooses, her career will be focused on preserving and protecting the environment.

Britany and Bernard spoke about the pride that all African-Americans, like themselves, expressed and celebrated together on Inauguration Day. Both of them knew from their grandparents the pain and suffering of racism. They fully understood the monumental significance of watching the son of a native Kenyan become the most powerful leader in the world.

They also understood how lucky they were to be part of that moment in history.

The above photo shows seniors Bernard and Britany poseing with Michigan’s Governor Jennifer Granholm at a Washington D.C. reception during Inauguration week.

britandbern — Bernard Schaefer II and Britany Benson are pictured with Peter Wege in The Wege Foundation conference room. The two seniors at City High/Middle School were bringing flowers to Mr. Wege thanking him for his gift of their once-in-a-lifetime experience in Washington D.C. to see the Inauguration of President Barack Obama January 20, 2009.

City High/Middle School Students Hit Economicology Turf

February 3, 2009September 3, 2014Education

Students are never too young to start learning how to compost!

To say the first economicology curriculum in town is up and running after one semester is not exactly true. Students at City High/Middle School have raced out of the gate to implement the principles of balancing the economy with the ecology. Peter Wege has advocated this philosophy since starting The Wege Foundation over 40 years ago, and he coined the term economicology to summarize it. The Wege Foundation is now sponsoring a premier Grand Rapids Public School to pioneer this environmental-financial approach to education.

And, to be precise, the first students whose classes are infused with economicology values actually jumped the starting gate before the doors opened in the fall of 2008. As school let out last spring, City High students in the Environmental Club decided they’d had enough of watching everyone’s lunch leftovers fill up trash bags. They needed to do something about it, and September was too far away.

Some of the E Club students actually followed garbage trucks and saw all their school’s food refuse end up in the dump. They recognized this as negative economicology. Pay for dumping and damage the environment. Their solution? Composting.

Over the summer they interviewed the food-service people at San Chez and the Grand Plaza Hotel knowing those restaurants both composted. They found out that environmental haulers named SPURT were the ones who did the composting. They also found out how strict SPURT’s rules are to ensure only food waste gets into the composting containers.

When school opened last fall, composting was in place at City High/Middle . No extra staff time (cost!) was needed because student volunteers did it all. Principal Dale Hovenkamp noted there was “a learning curve for a while.” Faculty and students had to learn how to sort and separate foods and dishware into the correct recycle bins.

By second semester 2009, after-lunch sorting was second nature. According to Principle Hovenkamp, the composting project has raised awareness for all the 620 seventh-through-twelfth grade students at the school on Fuller. “This is a very smart group of kids,” Hovenkamp makes clear. “They understand why we need to do these things.”

The ripple effect of this economicology transformation is already happening. East Grand Rapids High School students heard their friends from City High talking about it, and they wanted in. East students have now checked out how City’s composting program works…they plan to go therefore and do likewise at their own school.

Yet more to come at City High/Middle? A wind turbine. Boycotting the sale of bottled water. Using their compost on apple trees started in the school science labs to be planted on school property. Selling CFL (compact fluorescent Light bulbs) to save energy and raise money for more economicology projects.

No, the kids who jumped the gun last summer using economicology to make theirs a better world haven’t even made the first post around their track.

Brandie Perry from The Wege Foundation is shown with Dale Hovenkamp, principal of City High/Middle School–part of the Grand Rapids Public School System. The poster behind them represents the new economicology curriculum that started in the fall of 2008 and is being taught across the curriculum in all six grades, 7th-12th. Funded by The Wege Foundation, the curriculum is based on Peter Wege’s economicology principles that advocate a balance between the economy and the environment.

The Ray and Joan Kroc Corps Community Centers: How they came to be

November 8, 2008September 8, 2014Education, Environment

Majors Roger and Joy Ross, chief administrators of the Kroc Center, and Jaylen Jennings, a Kroc Leadership Academy student, are seen at the groundbreaking ceremonies for the new family center. Neighborhood children like Jaylen are already attending Kroc programs taking place in their nearby grade schools: New Branches and Brookside.

In 2002 when Joan Kroc, the widow of McDonald’s founder Ray Kroc, built a world-class family recreation center in a blighted part of San Diego, no crystal ball could have foreseen the impact of her gift. That original Kroc Community Center elevated the neighborhood and the endless streams of families who came there.

The transformation Joan Kroc saw happening in the lives of those San Diego residents, especially the children, moved her to rewrite her will. She wanted inner-city families across the country to have the same opportunity for sports, recreation, education, the arts, and worship. The only organization she knew that could make such a big dream happen was the Salvation Army.

When Joan Kroc died in October, 2003, her largest single bequest was $1.7 billion to the Salvation Army. The generosity of this historic donation stunned the Army. It also challenged them unlike any gift ever had. Her terms were strict. The money had only one purpose: to build 38 Kroc Community Centers from California to the East Coast.

She also made sure the Centers would be maintained as world-class operations. To guarantee that future quality, she stipulated all grants must go half toward construction and half for an endowment to operate the Centers. In addition, each community awarded a grant had to raise local dollars equal to half the endowment bequest.

Every penny of her $1.7 billion had to go toward the new Kroc Centers—none of it could be spent on any existing operations. In the same month of her death five years later, the first shovel of dirt was dug at 2500 South Division in Grand Rapids, Michigan, to start the $56 million Ray and Joan Kroc Corps Community Center.

Additional article – The Money Trail: Grand Rapids Kroc Center

Additional article – Wege Foundation Contributed to GREEN Kroc

Read more about Ray and Joan Kroc Center at www.kroccenter.org

Wege Foundation’s Areas of Interests

Environment
Education
The Arts
Human Services
Health Care

Ray and Joan Kroc Center’s Programs

LEED Certified/Geo-Thermal
Classrooms/Tutoring/Computer Labs
Performing Arts Auditorium: Music
Safe Playgrounds/Recreation/Mentoring
Fitness Center/Sports/Medical Clinic

Wisconsin Governor Shares Good News on Saving the Lakes

October 30, 2008September 22, 2014Environment

Seven representatives of The Wege Foundation, including Trustees Mary Nelson, Peter Wege II, and Ellen Satterlee, attended the 4th Annual Great Lakes Restoration Conference in Milwaukee September 10-12. Most appropriately, the seven Wege Foundation delegates traveled from Grand Rapids to Milwaukee by crossing Lake Michigan on the Lake Express ferry.

Wisconsin Governor Jim Doyle welcomed the over 300 attendees, all members of organizations collaborating to save the Lakes. The conference was sponsored by The Healing Our Waters – Great Lakes Coalition. The HOW-GL Coalition was a direct result of the first Great Lakes Conference held in Grand Rapids in 2004 and called together by Peter Wege and The Wege Foundation. Wege’s advocacy has been consistent ever since. “We must do something for the Great Lakes while there’s still time.”

In thanking Wege and the Foundation, Governor Doyle told the crowd that without Peter’s vision, the remarkable strides that have been made in four years could never have happened. “Real progress has been made,” Doyle said. “HOW focused national attention on this issue.” In the tight Presidential race, the Wisconsin governor noted, “We are pivotal states in this election.”

Speaking of the rapid progress the Great Lakes-St. Lawrence River Basin Water Resources Compact has made moving through Congress, Governor Doyle said, “The Compact has gained real momentum. The flow is now in our direction!”

Calling the Great Lakes “part of who we are,” Doyle, who also chairs the Council of Great Lakes Governors, told the audience that Wisconsin has tripled the amount of money it is spending to fight invasive species. The state has allocated $7.7 million to clean up sediment.

Governor Doyle pointed out some the Lakes’ economic impact for Wisconsin. Over $6 billion in revenue is connected to the Lakes, with as much as $2.3 Billion in Milwaukee alone. Eleven thousand jobs in the state are tied to the Lakes. Governor Doyle predicted even higher financial gains as the high costs of oil have spurred a resurgence of Great Lakes shipping.

He said that in any photo of the Earth from outer space, the Great Lakes always stand out. Governor James Doyle closed by saying of the five Lakes, “They are a special gift from God.”

Peter M. Wege Once More Honors His Parents

October 8, 2008September 8, 2014Community Service

As the only child of Peter Martin and Sophia Dubridge Wege, Peter M. Wege began honoring their memory half a century ago. Because of his mother’s strong Catholic faith, her son often used his gifts to church causes as an opportunity to memorialize his parents. His first major gift in 1959 went to help build Alburtus Magnus Hall of Science for Aquinas College.

At the ceremonies opening the new science hall on October 22, 1960, Wege dedicated the building to his parents. A memorial plaque at the entrance to the science building commemorates both Peter Martin, who died in 1947, and Sophia Dubridge Wege, who died August 17, 1959. Almost fifty years later, on September 23, 2008, Peter again paid tribute to his parents and, again, it was through the Catholic Church. This most recent gift was an act of spontaneous generosity and for the most personal of reasons. Seated outdoors in the new Cathedral Square during the dedication of the Catholic Diocese headquarters at 360 S. Division, Peter went back in time as he gazed across the Square. He was looking at a renovated office building on the northwest corner of Division and Wealthy.

In 1911, his father moved into the upstairs apartment in that building when he came to Grand Rapids from Ohio to start Metal Office Furniture. After he married Grand Rapids native Sophia Dubridge, it was their first home. It became the first home of their only child Peter M. Wege when he was born in Februrary 1920.

Now that original Wege home overlooks the newly dedicated Cathedral Square, anchored by the $22 million, 100,000 square-foot Cathedral Square Center building. The new Center is, of course, LEED certified as all Peter Wege’s capital donations must be.

The Most Reverend Walter A. Hurley, Bishop of Grand Rapids was as stunned as the 600 people in the audience were at Peter’s additional, surprise gift. When he had time to reflect on what Peter Martin and Sophia Wege’s son had done for the church, Bishop Hurley wrote:

I am grateful to Peter Wege for his extraordinary gift to the diocesan Cathedral Square project. This recent gift reflects a tradition of support for the Diocese of Grand Rapids, its parishes, schools, and institutions as well as many local, national, and international programs and organizations. Time and again, through his unwavering generosity, Mr. Wege has demonstrated his commitment to and passion for the church, the community, education, healthcare, and the environment.

GRAM’S FIRST REPORT CARD

September 8, 2008September 8, 2014Arts & Culture

After one year in operation as the world’s first art museum to win a Gold LEED medal from the United States Green Building Council, the Grand Rapids Art Museum has doubled its attendance. The new GRAM welcomed twice as many people to its galleries in one year as the number of those who visited GRAM in its last year in the former federal building.

Over those twelve months, the 70,000 viewers to the old GRAM have grown to 140,000 people who came through the doors of the new “green” art museum. Even more significant for the future is that 1,000 new people have signed on to become members of GRAM. Another sign of success in its first year is that 185 tour groups, including visitors from Germany, visited the art museum this year.

GRAM earned national recognition when Newsweek Magazine named the 125,000 square-feet new art museum one of the “Six Most Important Buildings of 2007.” Its location in the heart of Grand Rapids overlooking the Rosa Parks ice rink—the city’s own Rockefeller Plaza—has made GRAM a popular destination. After walking through the galleries, visitors browse the gift shop and watch the skaters over lunch in the cafeteria.

Peter Wege, President of The Wege Foundation, donated the lead gift that initiated the campaign to give his hometown a world-class new building to house its only art museum. His one stipulation: “I want it to be the first LEED-certified museum in the world.” The U.S. Green Building Council’s historic announcement that GRAM had earned the first Gold rating ever awarded to a museum honored Peter’s request—and fulfilled his dream.

Read more on the history and wonderful gift given by Peter M. Wege @ Fast Company Magazine

Economicology Principles Move into Grand Rapids’ Classrooms

August 8, 2008September 8, 2014Education, Environment

Thanks to The Wege Foundation, the Grand Rapids Public Schools are infusing Peter Wege’s concept of economicology into the curriculum. Wege coined the word economicology to define the balance needed between the economy and the ecology. The word summarizes Wege’s advocacy for educating the public on the reality that a prosperous economy depends on maintaining a healthy environment.

The first two GRPS schools that will begin teaching economicology in the fall of 2008 are the seventh graders at City High-Middle School and the sixth graders at the Southeast Academic Center. The environmental principles The Wege Foundation has promoted for forty years will be worked into all subjects for those pioneering students. Each school year a new grade will be added.

City High-Middle School Principal Dale Hovenkamp and his staff have been preparing this program for over a year. A committed environmentalist himself, Hovenkamp is excited that his school is one of the two pilots for economicology. City High-Middle School is the top performing high school in the area, the third best in the state of Michigan.

Along with introducing economicology into the schools, the GRPS is moving toward offering the International Baccalaureate Program. The IB Middle Years Programme is the most recognized pre-university educational program in the world. As its name suggests, the curriculum is based on global learning with 125 countries already participating.

Principal Dale Hovenkamp told a press conference. “The International Baccalaureate program and the Economicology program offer great potential for new and more powerful learnin. The faculty at Grand Rapids City High-Middle is eager to meet this challenge.”