About Us
Our Mission
When Kids Unlimited CEO and founder Tom Cole created Kids Unlimited in 1998 with a grassroots pilot program at a low-income elementary school, it was to do one thing: empower kids to believe. Our belief is that all kids, despite their backgrounds and economic limitations, deserved accessibility to opportunities. Driven by the belief that, through education, we could empower children and their families, Kids Unlimited became a conduit to hope, and today our mission has become a community norm.
Meet Our Director
Tom Cole moved to Oregon in 1995. He graduated from Missouri State University with degrees in Sociology and Psychology. Tom, a former program director of a nationally recognized Boys & Girls Club in Missouri, moved to Oregon to develop the region’s first Boys & Girls Club. Tom soon realized the efforts to reach children needed to acknowledge the challenges of the local Southern Oregon community, rather than replicate a national model. In 1998, Tom established Kids Unlimited’s first afterschool program, designed to meet the needs of children of poverty with purposeful integration of Latino families.
Today, Kids Unlimited programs have been recognized for outstanding outcomes that continue to change the lives of kids, families and our community.
Our Story
It’s been 26 years since our first afterschool program opened its doors at Oak Grove Elementary for children of poverty in Medford. With the vision to ensure all children could find opportunity through education, Kids Unlimited was founded. Since our inception, Kids Unlimited has become more than a program; it’s become a movement capable of transcending barriers while transforming lives of our participants and our community.
Our greatest organizational asset continues to be our ability to grow and respond to immediate and emergent needs. Our programs and services have been a quarter-century learning journey, and the successes have been remarkable. Since the beginning, the foundation of our work has been the relationship to our kids and families. Together, we have shared, learned and evolved our programs to be responsive and conscious of overcoming the barriers of poverty.
As our programs grew, our children and their families grew with us, and their successes became a living testament to what can happen when opportunities for children are created. The successes of the mission have lifted spirits, inspired hope and changed norms.
Ours is a holistic solution for supporting children and families with integrated services that bridge school, afterschool and summer at a campus that provides education, afterschool programs, social-emotional supports, parent and family resources, early learning programs and community recreation. More than services, the expansion of our facilities and campus provide a greater capacity for children to learn, eat freshly prepared meals, play and dance, explore, dream and, ultimately, imagine their Unlimited futures.