Fundamentally Awesome INC

Fundamentally Awesome Inc is not an organization that serves the disability community from the outside. We are the disability community. We were founded by Alicea Townsend, a Houston area mother raising a child with a genetic disorder, autism, ADHD, intellectual and developmental disabilities, and language disorders. After experiencing firsthand the long wait lists, lost insurance coverage, insurance exclusions, and the profound isolation that follows a child's diagnosis, she refused to accept that her family and thousands of families like hers had nowhere to turn. She built Fundamentally Awesome so no family would ever have to figure this out alone. Every volunteer who shows up at our events is a parent who has sat in the same waiting rooms. Every workshop topic we teach came from a gap one of our families faced. Every program we built was born from a need our community told us was not being met anywhere else. We do not guess what our community needs. We lived it. We are living it. And we built something from that experience that is changing lives every single day. We are entirely volunteer led with no paid staff. Our founder, our advisory board, our volunteers, and our leadership are all parents and family members raising children with disabilities. Our organization is governed by a dedicated board of directors including our Founder and President Alicea Townsend, Treasurer Angela Penton, Secretary Zoe Seber, and advisory board members Maverik Talbert serving as Director of Development and Corporate Partnerships, Ashley Bedford serving as Recording Secretary and Board Operations Specialist, and Kandess Ronning serving as Program Committee Chair. We serve children with autism, Down syndrome, intellectual and developmental disabilities, genetic disorders, ADHD, sensory processing challenges, and complex medical needs as well as their siblings, caregivers, and extended family members across the greater Houston metropolitan area and throughout Texas. We currently serve over 2,500 families annually and reach over 70,000 people monthly through our events, social media platforms, and community networks. We have built meaningful and sustained partnerships with Dave and Busters Friendswood, Chicken N Pickle Webster, Mattress Firm, the Sheriff"s Office, HPD, HFD, Webster Police and Fire, the City of Kemah, Kemah PD, Kemah Fire Department, Alpaca Health, Texas ABA, and Walmart Spark Good. Our motto has never changed. Helping us help each other. That is who we are. That is why we exist. And that is what we will never stop working toward.

Fundamentally Awesome Inc is a Houston based 501(c)(3) nonprofit built by families for families. We are dedicated to empowering children with disabilities and their families through inclusive experiences, safety education, and genuine community connection. We remove barriers, build confidence, and ensure that no family ever has to navigate this journey alone. We are entirely volunteer led and run by families who live this experience every single day. Our founder, leadership, and volunteers are all parents and family members raising children with disabilities. We do not guess what our community needs. We are our community. We currently serve over 2,500 families annually and reach over 70,000 people monthly through our events, social media platforms, and community networks across the greater Houston metropolitan area and throughout Texas. Our programs focus on four core areas: Safety Education and Emergency Preparedness through our Ready to Respond program where families, caregivers, and community members receive hands on CPR certification, seizure response training, choking and abdominal thrust response, urgent care basics, elopement prevention, and drowning prevention. Children with autism are 160 times more likely to drown than their peers and Ready to Respond directly addresses that reality one community at a time. Educational Programming covering the real life topics families desperately need and almost never receive anywhere else including SSI and SSDI navigation, insurance advocacy and denial appeals, IEP and special education rights, speech language therapy strategies, occupational therapy education, feeding therapy awareness, financial planning for disability families, and transitioning to adulthood. Recreation and Inclusion through our monthly Sensory Sundays and Birthday Club at Dave and Busters Friendswood serving over 100 children monthly, our annual Adaptive Water park Day at Big Rivers Water park and Adventures serving hundreds of families, and our Disability Awareness and community education events bringing families and partners together throughout the year. Community and Entrepreneurship through our Inspired Abilities Market, a first of its kind community celebration where every vendor is either a person with a disability selling something they created or a business dedicated to serving the disability community. We are also actively developing our Adaptive Swimming Program to address the drowning crisis facing children with disabilities and our Mental Health Support Program for Caregivers to support the parents and caregivers who carry an extraordinary weight every single day. All programs are free or low cost to ensure that financial barriers never stand between a family and the support they need. Helping us help each other is not just our motto. It is everything we do.