The Victory Train is a nonprofit organization based in Greensboro that assists children from birth to age five. The early childhood education program officially began as a nonprofit in 2020 and has since expanded from 58 children to 400.
Within the organization, volunteers contribute to the cause by assembling and delivering “education packets” to children each week. The packets are assembled in a box containing books and school supplies, which the volunteers leave on recipients’ doorsteps.
Frank Cassara, a Lake Oconee resident for six years, often enjoys his retirement by painting as a hobby and eventually began taking commissions. Over the summer, he came across The Victory Train during an event, and immediately wanted to get involved.
“I was exposed to the Victory Train, and my heart went out to that, because of the thought that there are children who have never seen a book until they start school,” Cassara said. “I began the volunteer work of preparing the packages for the children once or twice a month, but I wanted to do something a little bit more.”
With a desire to give more to Victory Train, Cassara had an idea to host an art sale, with some of the proceeds benefiting the nonprofit. He then brought the concept to Theresa Kemp, Victory Train’s president and founder.
Cassara also collaborated with ‘Bend the Trend’, a Lake Oconee interior design Company, to make his art show possible. After finalizing plans, Cassara held his art sale at Bend the Trend’s location at 2101 Reynolds Walk Trail, where he exhibited 25 original pieces.
The artwork began to be displayed on Dec. 1 with an opening reception and was available for purchase until the end of the week.
“We thought the timing would be good, because people are starting to think about Christmas,” Cassara said. “It’s to help out these children, and I’m very happy that I can do that.”
Cassara says that he is open to running another art sale for a similar cause in the near future.
Theresa Kemp says she expects Victory Train to grow even larger in the next year and therefore finds Cassara’s contributions significant.
“[The art sale was such a wonderful event; we appreciate his generosity to us and his support,” Kemp said. “[The sales] will help us immensely because we don’t want to have to turn children away, and so these funds will help us to grow the number of children that we can serve.”
Overall, Kemp says that Victory Train has many volunteers but only two official employees: parent coaches who work directly with families in need. She therefore hopes to use the proceeds from the art sale to hire more employees for the expanding program.
“With 450 children, we know we need more coaches, and so we’re trying to raise more money and awareness,” Kemp said. “That way, every family can have access to a parent coach to help guide them along the way.”