Grant Request Elevate Navajo
Hermanowski Family Foundation Initial Request Form
Organization Name: Elevate Navajo
Legal Name (if Different):
Also Known As:
Mailing Address: PO Box 679
City: Ft Defiance
State: Arizona
Postal Code: 86504
Main Phone: 6024213486
Main Fax:
Organization Website: ElevateNavajo.org
Employer ID Number: 86-1644925
Organization Tax Status: 501c3
Proposal Information
Today’s Date: 01/12/2026
Requested Amount: 10000
Project Title: Elevating Navajo Youth
Project Description:
In Window Rock, Arizona, the heart of the Navajo Nation, Navajo youth grow up carrying both deep cultural strength and the heavy weight of isolation, poverty, and intergenerational trauma. Many students travel long distances to school, lack access to consistent adult support, and struggle to imagine a future beyond survival. Elevate Navajo exists to change that story.
Elevate Navajo partners directly with local public schools to embed full-time, salaried Teacher-Mentors inside the school day and far beyond it. These Teacher-Mentors are not visitors or short-term program staff. They are trusted adults, often from the same communities as the students they serve, who teach accredited classes focused on leadership, character, and employability skills while building multi-year mentoring relationships that extend after school, on weekends, and through the summer.
In the classroom, students develop confidence, communication skills, goal-setting habits, and a sense of purpose. Outside the classroom, Teacher-Mentors show up consistently, helping students navigate academic challenges, family responsibilities, grief, and self-doubt. They attend games and ceremonies, meet families, take students on outdoor adventures, and guide them through post-secondary planning, job readiness, and career exploration.
A unique component of Elevate Navajo is Little Elevate, where high school students practice leadership by mentoring younger students, strengthening responsibility, empathy, and pride in their own community.
The results are real and measurable. Before Elevate Navajo’s partnership, only 55% of participating students were on track to graduate. After three semesters, 91% are now on track, because someone noticed them, believed in them, and stayed.
General operating support allows Elevate Navajo to sustain these life-changing relationships, respond flexibly to student needs, and remain a steady presence in a place where consistency can change everything.
Total Project Budget: 462,000
Other Funding
Sources For The Project (Committed & Potential): Individual major donors – committed $120,000; Marathon Petroleum $40,000; New York Life $50,000, Fiesta Bowl Charities $25,000; AZ Diamondbacks $5,000; Daniels Fund $75,000, AmeriCorps $20,000
Project Duration: 1 year
Geographical Area Served: Navajo Nation – Window Rock, AZ
Age Group To Be Served: 11-19 years (4th – 12th grades and one year post-graduation)
Contact Information
Contact Prefix (Mr,Mrs etc.): Ms
Contact First Name: Debbi
Contact Last Name: Speck
Contact Title: President Emeritus, Elevate USA
Contact Phone: 6024213486
Contact Email: dspeck@ElevateTheUSA.org