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Hansen receives U.S. Marketing Star Award
Bartlesville Examiner-Enterprise
April 28, 2016
Clint Hansen, Bartlesville resident and president of the local non-profit PlayForBurk Foundation Inc., was honored by Phillips 66 with the U.S. Marketing Community Service STAR award on April 14.
This annual award is given to a marketing employee who “sets a standard for service and inspires others to make service a central part of their lives.” The event was held at the Hotel Granduca in Houston with an audience of approximately 60 people, including management and other STAR award winners.
In Hansen’s acceptance speech, he shared that his 13-year-old son Burk “had his tomorrows cut short” due to an ATV accident in April 2015. After the devastating loss, Hansen, along with several other founders including Randy John, Tyler Vaclaw and Jeremy Pryor, decided to start a non-profit foundation in Burk’s honor focusing on service, something that had been a passion for Burk.
“He was a mix of extraordinary and typical in one beautiful package,” said Hansen. “In Burk’s last journal entry about a month before he passed away, he wrote, ‘Focus on other people. SERVICE.’ Burk truly focused on other people.”
The foundation has adopted the tagline, “Play hard, Serve harder,” which can be seen throughout the Bartlesville community on many yard signs at residential homes.
Hansen said that he and the other founders wanted to create something to involve the youth in the community “to help them through the healing process.” Therefore, a key component of the foundation’s mission is to partner with local youth in doing service for others “to better themselves and the community.”
And better the community they have.
Hansen said that in just one year, the foundation has raised more than $38,000 and has given more than $11,000 back to the Bartlesville community in various ways, with more giving projects planned for the coming year.
Last August, the foundation hosted a benefit concert in the Bartlesville Community Center with more than 1,200 people in attendance, a back-to-school charity bowling event for kids, a public inflatable 5K run, PlayForBurk service clubs at both middle schools in town, a service campaign using garden gnomes to nominate others to serve, a renovation project at Lee Lake in Bartlesville, and made several donations to local schools.
In the coming weeks, the foundation plans to award its first annual $1,000 scholarship to a graduating senior as well as the annual Burk Hansen Service Award to a Madison Middle School student. In July, it will hold its first annual leadership conference to develop leadership skills in local youth. And in December, the foundation will host a non-denominational nativity showcase at the Bartlesville Community Center.
Hansen said, “We will continue to focus on other people and promote service and giving back to the community along with the youth of Bartlesville.”
“Life is short,” Hansen said in closing his speech. “Live each day to the fullest … and remember to always ‘Play Hard. Serve Harder.’”
The PlayForBurk Foundation is a Bartlesville nonprofit organization created to carry on the legacy of Hansen’s son Burk after he passed away in 2015 at age 13. The foundation partners with local youth to promote service, faith, personal development, and recreational opportunities for the betterment of themselves and their community.
– See more at: http://examiner-enterprise.com/living/agriculture/playforburk-president-honored-phillips-66-award-ceremony#sthash.UAGZLgHP.dpuf