Arms of Grace dba Center of Grace

Our mission at the Center of Grace is offer a safe space of hospitality for all; attend to basic, health, and educational needs; an provide opportunities to share, learn, and grow into self-sufficiency.
We help with basic needs by providing free community meals, a community garden, clothing, free shoes, underwear and socks in partnership with the Olathe Mayor's Children's Fund, hygiene items, and assistance with rent and utilities.
We offer free dental screenings, x-rays and cleaning services in partnership with Johnson County Community College (JCCC), as well as a medical equipment loaning program, for patients to borrow walkers, wheelchairs, commodes, shower chairs, and hospital beds.
We provide a free English Language Learner Preschool, where children can learn English and prepare for kindergarten. We partner with Olathe Parents as Teachers to provide a parent educator who shares parenting and child development resources with the immigrant/refugee parents. We partner with the Boys & Girls Club to offer before, after school and summer educational opportunities for K-12 students. The goal is for each student to graduate from high school with post-secondary plans in place. We also partner with JCCC to offer English classes for adult immigrants four mornings and four evenings a week. We also offer free basic computer skills classes.
We recently began a partnership with KC Scholars to provide certificate and career training opportunities for low-to-modest income individuals, with the goal of increasing their earning power and become more self-sufficient.

In order to continue offering our basic services we continue to build our volunteer base and our partnerships with local businesses, civic organizations, and communities of faith. Our food program, clothing closet, hygiene item distribution, and medical equipment are all lead by volunteers.
We continue to look for grants to fund our ELL Preschool, where we currently serve 25 children.
Last spring we completed a $6 million addition and renovation project, doubling the area for the Boys & Girls Club. This allowed us to go from 125 to 252 children and youth enrolled last summer.
We also secured a grant from the Kansas Health Foundation to provide a fully operational technology center where we are offering free computer classes.
We recognize that in order for people to transform their lives and become self-sufficient they need opportunities to grow and learn so we will be applying for grants to have a work development center, where people can look for jobs, work on their resumes, and apply for jobs.