Empowering Central Florida Youth
The Latino population in Central Florida has grown tremendously since Hurricane Maria’s devastation of Puerto Rico in September of 2017. As a result, thousands of individuals need support services to restart their lives. To help them, the Hispanic Federation, and the Ford Motor Company Fund partnered to launch the Central Florida Empowerment Initiative, which will address six key areas: transportation, employment, health care, housing, hunger relief and social services. This new initiative continues the Ford Motor Company’s support of the Hispanic Federation’s work in Puerto Rico and the mainland to help individuals recover from the impact that Hurricane Maria had on their lives. The initiative was announced this past October.
As part of the initiative Ford Driving Dreams presented two new vehicles, a cargo van and passenger van, to the Hispanic Federation at the launch of the initiative. The Ford vans will be used to transport thousands of individuals without a car to help them find work, find housing, or address their health needs. After the presentation, representatives from both Ford and Hispanic Federation drove the new vans to Riverside Elementary School to deliver school supply donations to students and faculty.
The initiative also includes participation in the Ford Driving Dreams scholarship program. In October of this year, the Federation joined Ford at Acacia Florida Puerto Rican Center for a motivational pep rally with more than 300 students and announced the “What Drives your Dream?” essay contest for a chance to win 50 scholarships. The contest asked graduating high school seniors from four participating schools to submit an essay describing what drives their dream and how their dream will positively impact others in their community. The contest will award 50 winners grants of $2,000, for a total of $100,000 in scholarships. Winners will be announced in the spring of 2019 during a Ford Driving Dreams celebration. Empowerment speaker Ronni Rodriguez, from NASA, shared his inspiring story and invited two of his team members to join him on stage for a Q&A to encourage students at the rally to follow their dreams and continue their education. The rally for students also included career and financial literacy training, an Instagram contest, and arts and cultural activities with traditional dances and music from Latin American and the Caribbean.
These partnership with the Hispanic Federation is part of a long-term investment to expand the Ford Driving Dreams program to Kissimmee and Orlando high schools and to inspire and motivate youth from underrepresented households to dream big.
