FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact:
Libby Raiford, 423-648-6054, lfr@cdmfun.org or
Carla Campbell, 423-648-6054, cbc@cdmfun.org
Helping Hands Shares More than Just Fun
Children Who Visited Creative Discovery Museum’s
Helping Hands Exhibit Show Giving is Fun
(April 29, 2009) - St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital in Memphis and Bunny, a resident of The Elephant Sanctuary of Tennessee in Hohenwald, will be the recipients of donations made by children and families who learned valuable lessons about philanthropy through the Helping Hands exhibit at Creative Discovery Museum.
Last holiday season, Creative Discovery Museum opened a brand new exhibit -- created locally by its own staff -- dedicated to giving and helping others. The Helping Hands exhibit was designed to give children and families fun, hands-on opportunities to help others -- locally, nationally, and globally -- while teaching children about the importance of giving and showing that every gift can make a difference.
Selecting a Cause
An exhibit component titled “The Choices We Make” encouraged visitors to play the role of donor and select one of three causes they would most like to support: stop global warming, cure diseases, and helping injured and neglected animals.
Helping injured and neglected animals won the visitor vote receiving a total of 1,153 votes. Per a Kids’ Advisory Board of children age 9 to 12 years, funds will be donated to the endowment fund for Bunny, a rescued elephant currently in care at The Elephant Sanctuary of Tennessee in Hohenwald. The endowment funds will be used to provide daily feed and medical care for Bunny throughout her life.
Local Inspiration
Donations to St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital are the result of guests riding stationary bikes as an activity within the Helping Hands exhibit. For each mile ridden, a designated amount of money was donated. The idea was inspired by a former Creative Discovery Museum teen volunteer, Samantha Gilley.
Samantha, who is blind and is also a cancer survivor, completed a bike ride from Chattanooga to Memphis in 2007 to raise funds for the hospital that had given her care. This area of the exhibit gave guests a chance to ride stationary bicycles to help raise money for St. Jude just as Samantha had done.
“Giving doesn’t just happen. It has to be modeled and taught,” said Dr. Jayne Griffin, Director of Education for the Museum. “We need to teach children about the joy of giving. When they learn to meet the needs of others, they learn more about themselves, too. That’s one way they gain self esteem.”
Thanks to the participation of Museum visitors, a total of $1,000.00 will be given to St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital to help other children overcome critical illness and have a better chance at living healthy, productive lives.
The Helping Hands exhibit was made possible through funding from Benwood Foundation, Lyndhurst Foundation, United Way of Greater Chattanooga, Community Foundation of Greater Chattanooga and The Maclellan Foundation.
About Creative Discovery Museum
Creative Discovery Museum is recognized as one of the top children’s museums in the nation. It is a non-profit educational organization dedicated to educational enrichment for children ages 4-months to 12-years-old through interactive, hands-on experiences that foster creative and critical thinking. The Museum focuses on a broad range of areas encompassed by Visual Arts, Performing Arts, Technology and the Sciences. In addition to its exhibits, Creative Discovery Museum provides local residents and visitors with special events, educational programming, teacher resources for the classroom, field trips, after school programming, early childhood education classes, artist residencies, camps, art lessons, science demonstrations, and a branch of the local library. Creative Discovery Museum is a funded agency of Allied Arts and Tennessee Arts Commission.
The Museum is open Monday through Saturday 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., Sunday noon to 5 p.m. Tickets for 2009 are $9.95 for children and adults. Creative Discovery Museum is located at 321 Chestnut Street in downtown Chattanooga. For more information, call (423) 756-2738.
About The Elephant Sanctuary in Tennessee
Operating on 2,700 acres in Hohenwald, Tennessee, The Elephant Sanctuary in Tennessee has been developed specifically to provide a place for traumatized elephants to recover from the debilitating experience of captivity. The nonprofit organization, accredited by The Association of Sanctuaries and licensed by the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency, is designed specifically for old, sick or needy elephants that have been retired from zoos and circuses. To find out more about the plight of captive elephants, and to monitor the progress of the residents of The Elephant Sanctuary in Tennessee please visit their website at www.elephants.com.
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