The 2018 Community Investment Fund ($2000) award will be shared by two recipients, Flathead High School in Kalispell and Quality Life Concepts in Great Falls.

Flathead High School will use the money to help purchase supplies for their Braves Coffee Company School-based Enterprise. This new business will feature students with and without disabilities working side-by-side to plan, market and operate the coffee company. Several community partners are collaborating with the high school to provide personnel training, discounted supplies, and mentoring. 

Quality Life Concepts will apply their award toward expenses for their Community Recreation Co-ed Softball Team. The 40-person team includes clients with disabilities served by QLC, staff, and community members. All team members play, rotating throughout the game so that everyone has a turn at defense and at batting. They also have a team photographer who takes pictures for the team’s Facebook page.

Learn More about the Community Investment Fund

University of Montana Rural Institute for Inclusive Communities

Joins NIH in Launching the All of Us Research Program to Advance Precision Medicine

On May 6^th, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) will open national enrollment for the All of Us Research Program - a momentous effort to advance individualized prevention, treatment and care for people of all backgrounds, including people with disabilities. The All of us Research Program is a historic effort to gather data from one (1) million or more people living in the United States to accelerate research and improve health.

After working for several years as a research assistant for the Montana Disability and Health program at the Rural Institute for Inclusive Communities, and completing her Master’s in Public Health at UM, Helen Russette went to work for the Missoula City-County Health Department (MCCHD). There, she aided in the development of a community health needs assessment (CHA) process that fully includes representatives of marginalized populations. She recently shared this work in February 2018 article published with co-author, Robin Nielson-Cerquone, MJ, MCCHD Accreditation Specialist, on the National Association of County and City Health Officials (NACCHO) website.  

The article, “An Inclusive Community Health Assessment Process,” details steps taken to ensure inclusive and meaningful participation in the process. Recruitment strategies to increase the diversity of participants and the positive outcomes are described. In fall 2018, Helen, who grew up on the Rocky Boy Reservation (Chippewa-Cree Tribe), returned to UM as a doctoral student in the School of Public and Community Health Sciences.

Congratulations to Molly Kimmel, a 2017-2018 URLEND Graduate! Molly will stay on next year to coordinate URLEND training, research and clinical service opportunities for Montana trainees in various locations across the state.

Molly completed over 300 hours of didactic, clinical and research hours. She is an occupational therapist at St. Patrick Hospital in Missoula, MT. We are DELIGHTED to have Molly join the Rural Institute family.

For more information about URLEND, visit: www.urlend.org