Cupcake Button Campaign

Support the Family Reading Partnership!

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The Sophie Fund’s 2026 Cupcake Button fundraiser is live! Each October, we coordinate with college student organizations to collect donations for local nonprofits focused on community well-being.

This year’s campaign is raising funds for the Family Reading Partnership, which connects families with young children to the joy of books and read-aloud experiences to expand their horizons and support their literacy journey. It strives to develop in all children a love of books and strong language skills before beginning school.

Bevi Wallenstein, Outreach Coordinator, and Amber Smith, Executive Director

The organization’s home base is The Nook in the Shops at Ithaca Mall. It operates several programs that together reach all families with children under age 5 in Tompkins County.

“We believe, and research confirms, that literacy skills begin growing before birth,” said Partnership Executive Director Amber Smith. “As with all early childhood development, literacy is best built through early and frequent interactions with responsive adults.”

Smith said that playful games of peek-a-boo and itsy-bitsy spider do more to grow the young brain than flash cards and memorizing the names of colors. “Reading together is an incredible tool for introducing vocabulary, growing a broad worldview, and bonding with a loving adult,” she explained.

DONATE TO THE FAMILY READING PARTNERSHIP

FRP provides families with quality children’s books free of charge to build their own home libraries, a tool for frequent interaction between young children and their caregivers in building literacy skills. The books are available at The Nook’s Bright Red Bookshelf as well as in dozens of other community locations within easy reach.

The Nook is a community hub of activity and resources where local families engage with their infants and toddlers and with each other. The tech-free space is designed to encourage imaginative play, physical development, and emotional regulation via exploration with toys, books, and art materials.

Parents can also take their kids on Story Walks through Tompkins County parks hosted by FRP.

The Partnership runs a weekly New Parent Support Group with a perinatal mental health specialist to build confidence and community, and to combat the common isolation and depression that many infant caregivers experience in the first year of a baby’s life.

The space hosts Early Intervention therapy sessions, which provides supports and services for infants and young children who have developmental delays or disabilities. The Nook is also a space for parents lacking custodial rights to spend time with their children in a supervised setting.

FRP was founded in the late 1990’s as a coalition of individuals and agencies who cared deeply about ensuring that all children in our community were exposed to books and read aloud to from the very beginning. Originally housed under the Boards of Cooperative Educational Services (BOCES) umbrella, FRP received nonprofit status in 2001 and has given away over half a million books to children over the last 25 years.

The Partnership is funded by hundreds of generous community members, corporate sponsors, and foundations such as the Community Foundation of Tompkins County, Triad Foundation, and the United Way of Tompkins County.

Volunteer with FRP: Fill out an online form here.

Donate Books to FRP: Go to: https://www.familyreading.org/get-involved/give-books/

For the Cupcake Button fundraising campaign, The Sophie Fund coordinates with college students to raise money through various in-person activities (and provide donors with Cupcake Buttons) on campus and in the community.

Community members may also contribute to the campaign directly through the Family Reading Partnership’s donation page here.

Since 2017 the Cupcake Button campaigns have raised about $9,000 for organizations including: Suicide Prevention & Crisis Service; Mental Health Association in Tompkins County; Advocacy Center of Tompkins County; Village at Ithaca; The Learning Web; National Alliance on Mental Illness–Finger Lakes; Family & Children’s Service of Ithaca; Ithaca Free Clinic; and Ithaca Welcomes Refugees.

This year’s Cupcake Button campaign is supported by many student organizations, including Cornell University’s Cornell Circle K, Pre-Professional Association Toward Careers in Health (PATCH), Alpha Phi Omega–Gamma Chapter, Realizing Integration, Support, and Support for Underserved Populations at Cornell (RISEUP), and the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention.

Donors receive a Cupcake Button featuring the image of a cupcake created by Sophie Hack MacLeod, a Cornell art student who died by suicide in 2016 for whom The Sophie Fund is named.

For more information about The Sophie Fund, go to: www.thesophiefund.org

Supporting Newcomers to Ithaca

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The Sophie Fund’s 2025 “Cupcake Button” fundraising campaign collected $1,119.00 for the Ithaca Welcomes Refugees (IWR) organization. The campaign was spearheaded by several Cornell University student organizations: RISEUP Cornell; Cornell Circle K; Pre-Professional Association Towards Careers in Health (PATCH); Alpha Phi Omega Gamma Chapter, and Hotel Graduate Student Organization. Student leaders presented the donation check to IWR Executive Director Casey Verderosa at a luncheon at the Statler Hotel on February 20.

IWR Executive Director Casey Verderosa receives the “Cupcake Button” fundraising check

“RISEUP volunteered to support IWR because any help towards organizations that support refugees is crucial in this current political climate,” said Harmony Guan, RISEUP’s mental health committee lead.

“It is a great cause and a way to get the community together to collectively support and spread awareness,” she added. RISEUP stands for Realizing Integration, Support, and Education for Underserved Populations.

Click here to make a donation to Ithaca Welcomes Refugees

“We really appreciate everything that you all are doing,” Verderosa told the gathering. “Thank you for highlighting this issue and giving it attention. It’s really needed at this time.”

In the past 10 years, Verderosa said, IWR has aided more than 250 refugees from more than 15 countries. The organization helps them find housing and provides them with furniture collected in donation drives, linens and other housewares, and a two-week supply of basic groceries.

IWR operates “response projects” to assist refugees in their self-stated resettlement goals, most commonly finding jobs, enrolling children in school, taking English classes and driving lessons, and locating medical care.

IWR runs the Global Roots Play School to provide a nurturing environment for preschool age children while caregivers work, go to English classes, and perform other resettlement tasks.

IWR was established in December 2015 as an all-volunteer organization responding to the global displacement crisis in support of Catholic Charities of Tompkins/Tioga, a federally designated refugee resettlement agency. IWR then increased its operations in 2021 after Catholic Charities closed its resettlement effort due to reduced refugee flows during the first Trump administration and the Covid-19 pandemic.

IWR holds new volunteer orientation sessions two to three times per year for needs ranging from supporting home move-ins, organizing donations drives, driving and/or accompanying newcomers to appointments, childcare, and interpreting. Volunteers are also sought for helping with events, communications, and fundraising.

Volunteer with IWR: Fill out an online form here and be contacted about future orientation sessions.

Donate items to IWR: Contact IWR donations team at welcome.home@ithacawelcomesrefugees.org.

Cornell students supporting Ithaca Welcomes Refugees

Scott MacLeod, co-founder of The Sophie Fund, thanked Verderosa for IWR’s work and expressed appreciation for the student organizations’ efforts to support IWR’s mission.

“The federal government’s crackdown on immigration has created fear and anxiety even for people who are legally in the United States,” said MacLeod. “Ithaca Welcomes Refugees provides practical support to new arrivals, but just as important it sends them a message of solidarity and compassion. Acts of kindness large and small benefit the mental health of the greater community.”

The Sophie Fund organizes the Cupcake Button campaign and the related Annual Ithaca Cupcake Baking Contest each fall to promote mental health awareness and raise monies for local nonprofits supporting community mental health. Donors receive a Cupcake Button featuring the image of a cupcake created by Sophie Hack MacLeod, a Cornell art student who died by suicide in 2016 for whom The Sophie Fund is named.

Since 2017, the Cupcake Button campaigns have raised a total of $8,786.66 for nine local nonprofits supporting mental health: Suicide Prevention & Crisis Service of Tompkins County; Mental Health Association in Tompkins County; Advocacy Center of Tompkins County; the Village at Ithaca; The Learning Web; NAMI-Finger Lakes; Family & Children’s Service of Ithaca; Ithaca Free Clinic; and Ithaca Welcomes Refugees.

Support the Ithaca Free Clinic!

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The Sophie Fund’s 2024 Cupcake Button fundraiser is live! Each October, we coordinate with college student organizations to raise monies for a local nonprofit focused on community well-being.

This year’s campaign is collecting donations for the Ithaca Free Clinic, helmed by Executive Director Norbert McCloskey. As its name indicates, the Free Clinic provides medical and other health services to clients regardless of their ability to pay. It primarily serves individuals who are without health insurance, or whose health insurance does not cover the services they need.

“Health care as a human right”

According to McCloskey, the Free Clinic provides healthcare services to people who earn too much to be eligible for Medicaid, are too young to be eligible for Medicare, and do not earn nearly enough to afford usable, low copay and low deductible health insurance plans available through the Affordable Care Act’s Market Place.

“These are good people stuck in a bad place. The Ithaca Free Clinic provides no-cost healthcare services for these individuals that they can find nowhere else in our region,” he said.

In the first eight months of 2024, the Free Clinic provided free health care services to 671 individuals (438 female patients and 233 male patients) in 1,269 scheduled appointments.

The Free Clinic uses an Integrative Health Care model, which mixes conventional medical methods with complementary methods in a coordinated manner. It provides the following free services for uninsured and under-insured individuals by licensed, certified, and trained community volunteers:

Medical Clinics. Free primary health care, medical testing, women’s health services, and employment physicals for the uninsured.

Chronic Care Program. Targeting at-risk individuals who need help managing persistent pain, diabetes, asthma, high blood pressure and other chronic conditions.

Financial Advocacy. Helping find creative solutions to relieving financial debt for those struggling to keep up with medical bills.

Ithaca Health Fund. Offering grants to those needing help affording diagnostic tests, treatments and prescriptions.

Insurance Navigation. Help in qualifying and enrolling uninsured individuals in various Medicaid plans.

Holistic Health Care Services. That include chiropractic, therapeutic massage, herbal therapy, and acupuncture.

Occupational Therapy. Creating healthy self-care routines, building connections with others, using technology for managing health, learning about supports in the community.

Food Pharmacy. Registered dietician services and free healthy food items.

Prescription Medication Support. Assistance in obtaining free or low-cost prescription medications like insulin.

Optometry Clinic and Optician Services. Free dilated eye exams and glaucoma screenings and free prescription eye glasses.

Health Education. Conducting free community chronic disease health screenings, educational seminars, lectures and open houses to deliver crucial health information to our community.

The by-appointment-only clinic does not provide primary care for individuals with health insurance (Medicaid, Medicare, employer-based, etc.). It does not provide emergency care or narcotics prescriptions.

McCloskey said that the Free Clinic receives no federal or state financial funding, completely relying on community support in the form of monetary donations, in-kind donations, and the generous donation of the time and talent of its volunteers.

The Ithaca Free Clinic opened in 2006 as one of the first to offer both primary medical and holistic care through an integrated model. The Ithaca Health Alliance is a 501(c)3 organization that sponsors and operates the Ithaca Free Clinic. The Alliance has been dedicated to seeking solutions to local healthcare challenges since 1997.

This year’s Cupcake Button campaign for the Ithaca Free Clinic is supported by many student organizations, including Cornell University’s Cornell Circle K, Pre-Professional Association Toward Careers in Health (PATCH), Alpha Phi Omega–Gamma Chapter, and Cornell Minds Matter.

Students raise money through various in-person activities (and provide donors with Cupcake Buttons) on campus and in the community.

Community members may also contribute to the campaign directly through The Sophie Fund’s DONATE button.

Since 2017 the Cupcake Button campaigns have raised more than $7,000 for organizations including: Suicide Prevention & Crisis Service; Mental Health Association in Tompkins County; Advocacy Center of Tompkins County; Village at Ithaca; The Learning Web; National Alliance on Mental Illness–Finger Lakes; and Family & Children’s Service of Ithaca.

The symbol of the campaign is a Cupcake Button, because the fundraising takes place in the runup to the Annual Ithaca Cupcake Baking Contest hosted by The Sophie Fund. To enter this year’s cupcake contest held on October 19, click here.

For more information about The Sophie Fund, go to: www.thesophiefund.org