Community Hornets Community Impact Challenge

The Community Impact Challenge aims to inspire students to make an impact for the common good in our local community through a grant competition. Specifically, the CIC invites ESU students to work collaboratively in teams of 3-5 to identify creative and meaningful solutions to challenges facing the campus and/or greater Emporia community.

Past winners include Hygienic Hornets, a campaign to collect supplies and compile hygiene kits for students in need in USD 253, and Bag-A-Birthday, an initiative focused on providing low-income families in Emporia with supplies to celebrate a child’s birthday. This year’s winners were members of KDP who were inspired to create Mask Trees, offering free masks to students at ESU and in the Emporia community.

This year the third annual CIC was open to current ESU graduate and undergraduate students of all majors. Teams of students were invited to submit preliminary proposals and finalists presented their proposals through a video presentation evaluated by a panel of judges. The videos aired on Hornet Live along with the announcement of the winners. The CIC Fall 2020 winning team was awarded a $500 grant to carry out its proposed solution. The solution must be carried out by May 2021.

The CIC represents an opportunity for students to learn more about the local community, network with other students as well as community members, and enhance their skills (e.g., critical and creative thinking, problem solving, teamwork, public speaking, and adaptive leadership). The Fall 2020 winning team was sponsored by Community Hornets, the Department of Communication & Theatre, and the Honors College.