Q&A: How does support for United Way improve Centre County?

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — For decades, Penn State has partnered with Centre County United Way for a joint campaign to raise funds for agencies who provide resources to Centre County. With broad focuses that include housing, food access and health, among other areas, United Way’s agencies work to better the local community as a whole by assisting those in need. 

The annual Penn State United Way campaign contributes roughly 40% of Centre County United Way’s funds each year. Penn State News spoke with Chris Calkins, teaching professor and executive director of the master of health administration program in the College of Health and Human Development, on how those funds go on to improve the lives of Centre County residents. 

Q: What type of work do you do with United Way? 

Calkins: My spouse Pam and I have been involved in the community with United Way partner agencies, like the State College Food Bank or Centre Safe. I currently serve on the board of Centre Volunteers in Medicine (CVIM), and we have historically worked with the Centre County Historical Society at the Centre Furnace Mansion during the United Way Day of Caring. 

The Day of Caring is probably the most visible thing, because we're all out in the community and engaged. Sometimes it's raking leaves and mowing the grass, or sometimes it's planting things. We've also worked with the food bank helping to get ready for Thanksgiving. 

Q: What is the focus of the Centre Volunteers in Medicine, and how do they impact local residents? 

Calkins: CVIM serves Centre County residents who are uninsured with medical care and dental care, which has been a huge need, alongside behavioral health and mental health needs. Those needs were significant even before the pandemic, but post-pandemic, they’ve gone way up. 

Broadly, United Way agencies meet a critical need that is often not served by government agencies or other formal actors. People without insurance, there's a stigma associated with it. And many people, because of the cost of health care, delay seeking care. We tend to see them when they're at a place where their illness or how they're feeling can't be ignored anymore, when they're pretty sick or need ongoing support managing their illness. 

Those of us at CVIM see patients with acute exacerbation because their diabetes is not being closely managed, for example. If a person needed emergency care, they might show up at CVIM or call and we would refer them to the closest emergency room. If someone is uninsured and can't afford to go to the dentist, then they might need an extraction or an infection treated that would have been caught earlier if they had regular dental care. We are not in a position where we're judging people or anything like that. We’re getting the work done. 

Q: What is the importance of providing those resources to the uninsured residents within Centre County? Is there a ripple effect or a broader impact? 

Calkins: It's a lot more complicated than it seems on the surface. Without CVIM, the folks who use our services would go without care for dental, mental and physical health. All those things have really devastating consequences. Life expectancy goes down if you don't have access to health care, and the quality of life declines pretty rapidly. 

United Way agencies look at the social determinants of health — adequate housing, access to healthy food — and sometimes recognize that there's a problem. These are often just episodic, really low points in people's lives. United Way agencies help them get over that period of intense need, get aid and stabilize that situation. By making a financial contribution that gets extended outward, United Way agencies help us get over barriers to actually identifying and serving the needs of communities. 

Q: What kind of impact are you seeing in the community from the work of these agencies? 

Calkins: The 2013 community health needs assessment that Mount Nittany Health completed identified dental care as a real glaring hole in the community. At the time, almost 2,000 people were on a waiting list for dental care. CVIM was able to hire a dentist and dental hygienist and scale up our dental services. We don’t currently have a waiting list, which is a remarkable response in a short period of time. 

Being able to get oral health and dental care enables people to smile more. And often, what they will say to me is, ‘It helped me get a job because I was embarrassed by my teeth or lack of teeth and I didn't want to engage with the public.’ Getting that very basic care opened economic opportunities. 

The same is true for medical care. Folks with diabetes or chronic health issues who receive help can move from spending a huge chunk of their day trying to figure out how to take care of their illness, to stabilizing their illness and moving into the workforce or into school.

Q: The work United Way does helps 1 in 3 Centre County residents each year. There is a clear need for the resources they offer. Is there one geographic area in particular that receives more attention? 

Calkins: State College, as a population center with a more urban demographic, masks a lot of need in more rural parts of the county, like Philipsburg and Milesburg, and up on the mountain in Snow Shoe. That rurality magnifies isolation. There are so many families who are tied to their land and their place that they don't have a lot of options. 

The United Way agencies are really playing a critical role in outreach to communities that are not usually visible to us and helping more rural communities stay intact. If you lose a school, lose a hospital — when those anchors start to go away, the town starts to die. United Way agencies are what enable some of our smaller communities to remain intact and vibrant, not only from an economic perspective, but through stabilizing the population. 

Q: Which demographics are the focus of these agencies and the work you’re doing?  

Calkins: I would think of it as three demographic layers: Early childhood; families, adults and adolescents; and older adults. 

Multiple early-childhood United Way agencies serve folks with developmental delays, like Easterseals or Strawberry Fields — there really isn't anybody else. Government services for folks who have developmental delays are tied to their age, and they age out of services. But these agencies working in early childhood, those investments earn huge dividends across the lifespan. 

The middle group is adults and adolescent kids who find themselves in a situation where they need food assistance, housing assistance, or support to get away from a domestic violence situation. The Crisis Hotline is a crucial resource for youth and others in the county when they have nowhere else to turn.  

The last demographic group is older adults. The surgeon general in the U.S. just issued a report saying that loneliness is an epidemic in the United States. That is particularly problematic for older adults. There are challenges that come from isolation — not only depression, but self-care and caretaking. Volunteer efforts to assist that demographic help to maintain the community.

Q: What are some of the challenges of this work? 

Calkins: There's always more need than United Way can meet. Their challenge is prioritizing and figuring out how best to have the biggest impact with the dollars that come through the annual campaign, and how to make the tradeoffs between equally critical needs and what alternatives exist beyond the agencies they're funding. 

We're not Philadelphia or Pittsburgh or New York City, where there are government agencies that are set up to engage around these issues without local nonprofits. [Without Centre County United Way] these things just wouldn't happen. Not having that support would change the dynamic of the community. 

Without those actors, I think we'd have more challenges in the emergency room at the hospital. We'd have more challenges in the schools. And we've had more active policing because of domestic violence issues. Centre Safe, Housing Transitions, Strawberry Fields — all those factors together provide a critical respite. 

Q: Why is it important to contribute to United Way through this campaign? 

Calkins: Collectively, United Way agencies are setting a foundation for community service and outreach through the Penn State United Way campaign. United Way wouldn't have the capacity to deliver those kinds of services on a consistent basis without community partners. These partners are a critically important safety net for the health of the community overall. 

When you meet a need like this, what you don't hear is the tragic story of not meeting that need. Those stories are compelling, but terrible: domestic violence, child neglect, folks with developmental needs that go unmet and the burden that that places on their family. If you have a child with special needs and they're aging through their teenage years, the weight of trying to figure out what kind of services are going to be available to them when they become adults can be crushing. 

It really takes a toll. United Way agencies provide opportunities for families and individuals to take a deep breath and know that they're not going to have to navigate some of these things alone. That, in and of itself, is a major benefit. 

Making a difference

Each year, 1 in 3 Centre County residents access the services provided by the Centre County United Way’s network of partner agencies. And each year, donations from the Penn State community make up approximately 40% of the total dollars raised for the United Way, representing Penn State’s commitment to creating a positive community impact as a 21st century land-grant institution. Members of the University community are encouraged to visit unitedway.psu.edu to learn more, and to consider supporting the Centre County United Way through a monthly payroll contribution.