Hearts 4 Progress is a nonprofit organization dedicated to promoting, empowering and supporting our community through service and financial support, with an emphasis in providing medical students at EVMS with much-needed scholarship funds.
History
Hearts 4 Progress, Inc. was founded in January of 2020 and evolved out of a need to address the issue of health disparities in the Hampton Roads community and the dwindling number of Minority Physicians. It had always been a dream of Pat King, M.D. to assist medical students at Eastern Virginia Medical School (where she trained) by minimizing the financial burden of obtaining a medical degree.
The dream became a reality when she was joined by five amazing, like-minded ladies, three of whom were also physicians. To date, these ladies have started an endowment at E.V.M.S. and have provided $200,000 in scholarships to medical students in training.
The mission of this organization has resonated with community leaders and support is growing. Since most of our board members are medical professionals, we have been afforded an opportunity to network and share our mission among the community. The growing needs of the under-served community have provided us the opportunity to address the issues facing us.
COVID-19 presented challenges for our new organization, making us unable to have in-person fundraising opportunities. The instability of the economy added to the strain of fundraising and we became very creative in our attempts to raise money for scholarships. Thinking outside the box, we continued to grow our scholarship fund, such as creating online fundraisers (dinners and popcorn sales). Through these efforts, we were able to increase our giving.
The opportunities for growth have been immense and the community has been generous with its donations.
