What does your contribution support?
Noah’s Army was established in October of 2017 after our son passed away. He was slated to attend the Polk County Sheriff’s Academy of Florida in 2018. Becoming an officer was something which meant a great deal to him. The majority of his life he was interested in being either military, police force or both. After weighing all of his options in conjunction with other goals he wished to pursue he opted for the sheriff’s department. It was something in which he had great pride and excitement.
Noah first met Sheriff Grady Judd when at the age of 13, he was the high-overall winner at a sporting clays competition. Sheriff Judd was distributing the awards that day and Noah was elated to meet one of his heroes. Fast forward to age 21 when he was the Sporting Clays manager for Florida Wildlife Commission at the state’s Tenoroc range and park – Noah worked closely with and became friends with many officers from both the Polk Sheriff’s office as well as Lakeland Police Department.
Sheriff Judd spoke at Noah’s memorial service on October 12, 2017 and at that time, posthumously swore him into office as a Polk County Sheriff’s Deputy. It was something that had never been done in Florida state history. We were deeply honored to accept it on Noah’s behalf.
Noah will never have the opportunity to realize this dream and be to his community what he hoped. We felt a way for us to help continue his legacy of commitment and dedication to others was to establish a scholarship available to cadets of our county’s public services division of Polk State College and now Ridge Fire Academy. Our goal is to cover the full tuition of one cadet per class rotation per year. Our long-term goal is to be able to make this available to other counties state-wide.
Candidates eligible to apply for the scholarship are based on demonstration of exemplary character, community service, their future goals and letters of recommendation. Currently your conrtribution will go towards the cost of tuition for the recipients.
Our other plans involve bringing music lessons to children in long-term care as well as a senior assistance program for senior citizens on fixed incomes. We will post more as these programs develop.
As of October 2022 – Noah’s Army Foundation has awarded scholarships to 19 cadets across Polk State College and Ridge Fire Academy. We have donated 10 K-9 ballistic vests to Polk Sheriff’s Office canine deputies. We have assisted families of children in long term healthcare, supported Polk county veterans, assisted in raising funds for specialty wheelchairs for children with permanent physical challenges, assisted women leaving domestic violence and given aid to seniors in-need.
We do not have any paid positions within our foundation, it is volunteer-only. We rely heavily upon our sponsors to cover the costs of our fundraising events and overhead.
