About the Project

Community Health Connect

250 W Center St. Ste 111

Provo, UT 84604

November 6, 2006

Dear Family, Friends, and Businesses,

I am a Care Coordinator at Community Health Connect where we work to increase health care access to residents of Utah County. We serve under-insured and uninsured families, individuals with affective disorders, and minority populations. (For more information on Community Health Connect please visit our website at http://www.communityhealthconnect.org/.) As a Care Coordinator I have the opportunity to be involved in various outreach programs which have opened my eyes to the many needs in our community. One of these needs is good dental care for children.

In an effort to advocate this cause I have decided to organize an independent service project focusing on pediatric oral health. The purpose of this project is three-fold. The first goal is to provide oral health education to elementary school children at various Title I (low-income and underprivileged) schools in Utah and Salt Lake Counties. We will go into the classrooms and teach them how to take care of their teeth and also provide them with oral hygiene kits.

The second goal is to provide these children with an opportunity to give back. During the summer I spent a weekend volunteering at some orphanages in Mexico. We organized an activity to take some of the older children out into the community and have them give beans and rice to families who really needed help. These kids felt like they could help even though they didn’t have much to give on their own and they loved it. We want to provide this same opportunity to the children participating in our service project. To do this we will bring enough dental hygiene supplies to the classrooms here for the children to assemble an extra kit. They will write a note and have their picture taken to go along with the kit. The first week of December these oral hygiene kits will be delivered to an elementary school in Jayuya, Puerto Rico. Shortly thereafter we will return to the schools and give a follow-up report to the children.

The third goal is to involve the entire community. This goal involves you. During recruiting efforts for other programs I have found that people are willing and want to get involved in service but don’t know where to go to help out. We want to provide this opportunity to you. Here is a list of what we need in order for this project to be successful. I encourage you to look through the list and see which area you could support.

· Dental supplies- We need toothbrushes, toothpaste, dental floss, etc. to fill the dental hygiene kits.

· Monetary donations- We need funding to help cover the cost of photo developing, paper, small bags for the kits, and a plane ticket to Puerto Rico. You’re donation of $5, $10, $20, $50, or whatever you are able to give will help meet the cost. Every little bit counts.

·Prizes- We need gift certificates, coupons, and other prizes to be used for fundraising at a benefit concert scheduled for November 17, 2006.

I hope that you have been able to see the vision of this project and how you are needed for it to be a success. We hope to hear back from you as soon as possible.

Gratefully yours,

Kirsti Vogeler

Care Coordinator

Community Health Connect

801.818.3015

P.S. To insure that as many children as possible can be helped in this project, please have all items to us by November 30 so that it can have maximum impact. Thank you in advance for your kind support! To see the progress of the project, view photos, and read updates, please see our blog at http://www.kidsteeth.blogspot.com/ beginning around Thanksgiving.