Neighborhood House: Inspiring life dreams in Portland

One of our founding visions is to bring hands-on, life-changing education to predominately low-income neighborhoods. Since its foundation in 1896, Neighborhood House has brought arts and education opportunities to the Portland neighborhood of Louisville, where family and childhood poverty far exceed national averages. It is our privilege to witness and to support its work.

The Neighborhood House provides local children and youth with opportunities to enhance the quality of their lives. Since 2004 the Norton Foundation specifically supports its Youth Development Program, which serves approximately 300 children and teens every year. The goal of this educationally focused program is to prepare our youth for success in college, work and life through education in the arts.

Our funding has provided cultural enrichment to hundreds of children, exposing them to a wide array of different art media including literacy-based arts, musical performance, performing arts, music, and theatrical programming. We also support Neighborhood House’s museum and theater visiting program, creating lifelong personal growth and cultural awareness experiences.

The Norton Foundation provides artistic opportunities and programs to Portland children in ways that broaden and enhance their understanding of themselves and their world. The Foundation’s continuing support of literacy-based arts, visual arts, music and theater for low-income children creates opportunity where none would otherwise exist.

For almost 120 years, Neighborhood House has given Portland’s low-income youth a tremendous gift — an enlightened vision of the world and life’s possibilities. We look forward to many more years of support and collaboration with an organization whose goals so closely align with our own.