The Mountain Eagle
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Appalshop Innovation Lab receives grant




The Berea College Appalachian Fund has given a $10,000 grant to support the Appalshop Innovation Lab. The Innovation Lab is an arts and social entrepreneurship project that works with communities in Central Appalachia to explore new solutions to longstanding challenges.

This award inaugurates the second year of operations for the Innovation Lab, one in which the Lab will serve a larger number of community organizations in the region.

“Community organizations in Central Appalachia are working daily to confront longstanding problems in the region,” explains project director Nick Szuberla. “ They play a vital role in helping low-income individuals find employment, earn higher wages, obtain better quality jobs, and foster social entrepreneurship.”

Szuberla continues, “We want the Innovation Lab to be a place where young people in particular can become invested in developing wise solutions to the economic and social challenges facing their communities.”

Appalshop began in 1969 as a War on Poverty program to provide youth in Central Appalachia with job skills, and has grown into an award-winning production, training, and community cultural center producing the largest body of media about, for, and by Appalachians.

The Berea College Appalachian Fund was established through a gift from Herbert Faber and Ruth McGurk Faber. Since 1950, the Fund has supported nonprofits working to improve the general education, health, and physical well being of people living in the Appalachian Mountains and surrounding areas.



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