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Region #5: Denver, CO

Mount Saint Vincent offers programs and services for children facing various behavioral or emotional problems that prohibit them from fulfilling their potential in school, home or the community. They provide short-term care for kids who are in crisis due to abuse, neglect or mental illness. With their unique programs and hands-on approach, they try to reach these troubled children by valuing dignity, humor, justice and responsibility.

Winning Regional Essay

"Begun as an orphanage in 1883, the same year Denver got electric lights, Mount St. Vincent has always shone brightly for kids. 44 kids ages 5-12 live here, and another 50 3-13 year olds come for school every day. How do our kids get here? They come through hell -- abuse, neglect, or a childhood mental illness. Their families and first schools struggle to help, but when they've bounced from one foster home or classroom to the next, Mount St. Vincent is the next good choice. Kids stay an average of 320 days. Our mission: Partner with families and children to strengthen their ability to take part emotionally and socially in their communities. Kids each have their own room in cottages of 12, completed in 2000, and attend a cutting-edge school built in 2004."

"Kids who face trauma, drama and chaos in their young lives, as their brain is organizing and developing, can't always feel and reason their way through -- they need body involvement, play, massage, whatever works for their present brain maturity. Each classroom of 12 has a master's-level teacher and a full time behavioral specialist, plus a "flying squad" of 4 intervention specialists that can be called upon. 64 percent of the children improved last year in reading, 89 percent in math. We want kids to return home safe, secure and well, ready for neighborhood school. One exercise in the cottages this week was "Draw a picture of the most wonderful thing that can happen to you this year," and a child drew herself and her counselor with the caption, "I WILL BE LOVED!" You can count on it, child, as were the 18.000 children before you. We will be Home for you as long as you need us, and we will love you forever as a child of Mount Saint Vincent Home."

If They Won the $100,000 National Award ...

"We would improve our therapeutic pre-school and kindergarden readiness facilities, with a new playground surface, new playground equipment, and a combination soccer/football field, graded and new surface installed, for use of the 200 children that pass through our doors each year."

Mission Statement

Rooted in the tradition of the Sisters of Charity of Leavenworth, responding to the needs of the time, Mount Saint Vincent Home partners with families and children to strengthen their ability to participate, emotionally and socially, in their community.

Values

Mount Saint Vincent supports families and children without being a substitute for families, valuing relationships that promote: dignity, humor, individual responsibility, justice, learning, personal safety, respect, sense of community and spiritual growth.