| Welcome to the Sheila
Fortune Foundation |
The Sheila Fortune Foundation (SFF) is a non-profit organization dedicated to helping
at-risk youths gain access to, and expression through, the performing
arts. Our mission is to further the interests of abused and at-risk
youths by providing them exposure to educational activities in the arts.
Our goal is to provide and encourage these youths to explore their
opportunities.
Our hope is that this will lead to more productive, healthy lives.
Although raw talent is honored, the most important issue for the SFF and
its grantees is the participation and the effort of the targeted youths.
We began our search for qualified grantees by engaging in discussions
with people who work with youths in troubled situations. We then asked
them how to find and help our mission-defined target groups. What we
rapidly discovered was that in order to reach these youths effectively
we would have to go to where they are.
In different communities, both rural and urban, the same ills reoccur in
different shapes. These are the ills of low self-esteem, and
hopelessness; anger and isolation. These are the trenches, and that is
where you will find us and our grantees. In a report issued by the
President's Committee on Arts and Humanities, it is stated that "arts
and humanities provide youths with a different perspective on their
own lives--a chance to imagine a different outcome and develop a
critical distance from everyday life." There is a full spectrum of
benefits that involvement in the arts in general has to offer at-risk
youths.
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