At the recent Virginia PTA Conference, Conexus had the distinct pleasure of helping to recognize Sharlene Stovall as the PTA’s selection for School Nurse of the Year.  Ms. Stovall is the school nurse at Shelton Elementary in Virginia Beach, where she is adored by her students and their families.  

After the PTA officers presented Ms. Stovall with her award, Conexus was invited to make the presentation of a gift certificate for our VisioCheck program to support the state mandated vision screenings for Kindergarten and 3rd grade students in her school.  The program will be offered to preschool students as well.  The gift certificate, valued at over $2,000, will provide services to over 200 students at Shelton Elementary and will offer Ms. Stovall the tremendous time savings afforded through the program as well as the peace of mind of knowing that the highly sensitive technology based screening will be able to pick up on potential vision problems that can’t often be detected through traditional screenings.  Congratulations Nurse Stovall – we look forward to serving you and your students in the coming school year!  Click here to learn more about VisioCheck.

Conexus President and CEO, Tim Gresham, provided a brief overview of the Conexus transition to many of the organization’s long-time friends and supporters at their annual conference in Northern VA.  Tim shared the many organizational benefits of the transition from Prevent Blindness Mid-Atlantic to Conexus, as well as some service-oriented highlights.  As part of this discussion, Mr. Gresham introduced VSEPS to the newly formed scholarship fund and encouraged a monthly giving option to help secure the longevity and renewability of the fund.  To learn more about the Conexus Scholarship Fund and how to support this important initiative, please contact Tim Gresham at Tim@ConexusVision.org or Robin Mead at Robin@ConexusVision.org.  

As Conexus continues our transition and expansion plans, we seek to finalize Phase I of our more than $1.3 million launch campaign.  The campaign is divided into 4 major categories and with this award will become 79% complete!  The challenge grant from Cabell addresses the remaining capital expenses of the campaign, which are primarily dedicated to program expansion.  This award from Cabell will provide the necessary equipment for both program delivery and back end support to meet the organization’s projected 3-5 year service growth.  The challenge is a 1:1 match award; securing the full match will complete the capital portion of the launch!  To learn more about how to support the match, please contact Robin Mead at Robin@ConexusVision.org or Tim Gresham at Tim@ConexusVision.org.

VisioCheck, Conexus' technology-based comprehensive vision program, has been delivered to a variety of Virginia Head Start programs for the last five years.  Hard data collected from those programs shows a consistent referral rate of 33% in the Head Start population, which is well over the 25% national average.  Conexus has been working with leaders in Virginia Head Start to create a system of comprehensive, consistent, and effective vision programming for students with a data collection component to help support reporting standards and validate the critical need of VisioCheck programming for our most at risk population.  Conexus attended the May Head Start Health Advisory meeting as an introduction to advancing program accessibility statewide.  Click here to learn more about VisioCheck.