This month’s Jennie Day meal consisted of Chicken Parmesan with a side of spaghetti, and homemade chicken nuggets. The Ronald McDonald House guests also had pizza bread, salad and homemade sour cream pound cake, while the hospital enjoyed homemade oatmeal cookies with dried cherries and white chocolate chips. Many thanks to Adams Fairarce Farms of Wappingers Falls, NY, for helping with this month’s meal.

We were pleased to make distributions to both the Maria Fareri Childrens Hospital Family Resource Center and the Greater Hudson Valley Ronald McDonald House this month. Details can be found on our Giving Back page.

In other Foundation news, we are moving forward with the first three Jennie Foundation scholarships. The Board met with representatives at the Culinary Institute of America to discuss awarding the Jennie Foundation Scholarship for Culinary Arts. Even though our scholarship amount is small compared to the cost of attending, we were given first-class treatment, a tour of the facility, and were introduced to several chef-instructors. We observed students making chocolate, and enjoyed the sights and aromas of fine restaurants. We were told about several scholarship award opportunities we could participate in. We have chosen one (more details on that in a separate post), but will consider a second culinary scholarship in the fall, which is awarded during the school’s Homecoming.

The Jennie Foundation Scholarships for Music and Nursing are being awarded through Jen’s high School, Roy C. Ketcham, in Wappingers Falls, NY. We have been in touch with administrators there and have submitted our criteria, which are:

• Student has overcome significant challenges or adversity in their personal and/or scholastic life
• Student wishes to pursue studies in Music or Nursing, and has been accepted into a 2 or 4-year college
• Student has a final Grade Point Average of 3.0 or higher (on a 4.0 scale)

The school staff will select winners for these awards, and they will be presented at the RCK Awards Ceremony in early June.

Finally, we submitted our initial Federal and New York State filings for 2016. These documents are available for public inspection and are posted on our Disclosures page.

All this is possible because of your support of The Jennie Foundation. Thank you for your help, and for keeping Jen’s spirit alive.