Get involved: Care Portal

The Niskayuna Reformed Church has been filling needs in our community by participating in the Care Portal platform with Justice for Orphans.

Niskayuna Reformed Church joined Care Portal through Justice for Orphans in November of 2024. As of March 2026 the NRC team has responded to 17 requests that served 42 children and translates to an economic impact of over $14,855!!

“We have provided alarm clocks to schools to be distributed to help strengthen student attendance. We’ve provided lice kits to schools for families that cannot afford them. We’ve provided bed frames, mattresses, furniture, bedding, linens, cleaning products, and medicine lock boxes to help keep kids in safe homes. Often times these requests have helped kids stay with various family members and out of the foster care system. A team delivered and assembled a crib for a toddler so he wasn’t sleeping on the floor. Most recently, we provided a bus ticket for a homeless mother during dangerous temperatures here to travel to Georgia to be with her extended family and daughter.”

All of the requests on the Care Portal come from agencies that have already vetted the cases and sometimes assisted to the best of their ability. Case workers, school counselors, or other social workers noted additional needs not covered by other agencies still exist for their clients and put the request in the Care Portal. Niskayuna Reformed has a small group of volunteers that sees the requests and decides which ones we are able to fulfill. We started sharing with the congregation some of the common items we have seen on the care portal, and congregation members began donating items. We created space in one of our storage closets for such items, which now makes it even easier for volunteers to respond to requests as we know what we already have on hand.

This picture is of Lizbeth Amorelli, one of our Care Portal team members and the Chair of our Mission and Service committee. Lizbeth recently shared with the congregation the impact of participating in Care Portal in a “Moment for Mission” on a Sunday morning. In addition to sharing the specifics above, Lizbeth reported, “The teams making deliveries are not just bringing physical items, they are also delivering hope and making meaningful connections in our community. Mission and Service thanks you for your continued generosity and we plan to answer many more requests in the coming years. “

Other churches, such as Kinderhook and Germantown, have been participating in Care Portal for even longer than Niskayuna Reformed and have wonderful stories to tell. Care Portal is a national platform to connect churches with their community. It is administered by a local non-profit organization. Justice for Orphans is that non-profit for

the Capital Region.