Founders Award
The Washington Area Villages Exchange created a new award to honor its founders, Virginia Hodgkinson, Miriam Kelty, and Andy Mollison. The award recognizes villages for programs and/or services that are outstanding examples of villages’ contributions to the well-being of older adults in their communities and reflect the founders’ values of inclusivity; collaboration; creative problem-solving; and positive impact on villages, their communities, and the larger village movement. There is one award for a village with an annual operating budget of under $25,000 and one award for a village with an annual operating budget of $25,000 or more. Each award comes with a $1,000 prize and opportunities to share lessons learned with other villages and organizations serving older adults.
Eligibility. All WAVE member villages are eligible to apply. A village may only submit one application. A village may also be nominated by a person not associated with that village. The village program (social, educational, cultural, health, etc.) or service may be a long-term/permanent activity or may be a special time-limited activity. Nominations for collaborative efforts should be submitted by or on behalf of the lead village and include all villages that contributed to the project.
Judges. The six impartial judges represent a range of experience: county village coordinators, a university professor, representatives from the national Village to Village Network and a regional village, and a hospital community outreach program that actively engages with local villages. WAVE leadership does not vote on the awards.
2024 Awards
LOWLINC Village (Lake of the Woods, VA), Cleveland & Woodley Park Village (Washington, DC) and Rapp at Home Village (Washington, VA) were the winners of the third annual Founders Award for Village Excellence.
LOWLINC Village ($25,000 and Over Budget Category) won for its Regional Transportation Partnership Program.
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Through collaboration with the Regional Transportation Collaborative (RTC), Encompass Community Supports (ECS – the local Area Agency on Aging), and the Lake of the Woods Church, this LOWLINC program has made a tremendous impact by expanding transportation resources in the community, helping reduce social isolation, and increasing access to food and health care among older adults.
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Click here for more information about this program.
Cleveland & Woodley Park Village ($25,000 and Over Budget Category) won second place for its Sunday Suppers Program.
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Through this collaboration with All Souls Episcopal Church, the two organizations pooled funding and volunteer resources to offer Sunday Suppers, free monthly meals available to all in the community, prepared by local caterers. This popular program has created a greater sense of community and connection, reduced isolation and become an engine for village membership growth.
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Click here for more information about this program.
Rapp at Home Village ($25,000 and Over Budget Category) also won second place for its Driving Success Program.
WAVE congratulates the winners for their outstanding projects and encourages others to learn more about them to gain ideas for new programs and services.
2023 Awards
Bradley Hills Village (Bethesda, MD) and Kingdom Care Senior Village (Washington, DC) were the winners of the second annual Founders Award for Village Excellence.
Bradley Hills Village won the under $25,000 budget category award for its Everything Green Project. This innovative project used the out-of-doors as an organizing theme to increase member engagement, attract new members, reduce social isolation and bring the community together. Click here for a description of the project.
Kingdom Care Senior Village won the $25,000 and over budget category award for its
Age-In-Place DC Senior Services Pilot Program. The village partnered with the faith community for an Outreach/Awareness Campaign to inform the African American community of the Village model as a means of additional support for older adults.
Click here for a video that describes the project and
click here for a slide deck on the project.
2022 Awards
Hyattsville Aging in Place Village (MD) and
Little Falls Village (Bethesda, MD) were the winners of the first annual Founders Award For Village Excellence.
Hyattsville Aging in Place (HAP, Hyattsville, MD) won the under $25,000 budget category award for its project “Route 1 Food Security.” Funded by a grant from the Greater Washington Community Foundation, HAP partnered with area organizations, including Central Kenilworth Area Revitalization CDC, food pantries, restaurants, farmers markets, and Meals on Wheels, and its volunteers delivered food to those in need in their community and those nearby along Route 1 during the pandemic. The project served 1,435 meals and made additional deliveries, including care packages, to 95 isolated older adults. To learn more about this project, visit
https://hyattsvilleaginginplace.org or contact Kris Aulenbach, HAP Board Chair,
aulenbach2@aol.com.
Little Falls Village (LFV, Bethesda, MD) won the $25,000 and over budget category award for its project “COVID Vaccine and Booster Clinics.” LFV created a collaborative initiative to run five COVID vaccination clinics in 2021, giving a total of more than one thousand shots to village members, volunteers, and neighbors. Giant Pharmacy brought the vaccines and pharmacists; Sumner Village donated the space; LFV organized an army of volunteers; Glen Echo Fire Department sent their EMTs to stand-by for any medical issues; and friends of LFV staffed the clinic waiting room with refreshments for clients. To learn more about this project, visit
https://www.littlefallsvillage.org or contact Ann Humphrey, LFV Board Chair,
aghumphrey@gmail.com.
WAVE also presented a Special Appreciation Award to Silver Spring Village, for creating and managing the website for “Washington Area Village Shared Events.” This website transformed the way in which Villages across the region shared programming resources. WAVE assumed responsibility for the Shared Calendar of Events in late 2022 and the calendar can now be found on WAVE's website.