December 16, 2010

December Provisional Recap: Past Community Projects

By Kristina Alvarez

The December Provisional meeting was definitely one to be remembered. First, we started off with a recap of the Provisional socials from the past month. Many attended the Mani/Pedi party this past Sunday and the pictures looked like so much fun! Judging by the few hands I saw, a deep, festive red was definitely the color of choice.

After the fun of reliving the socials, we jumped into the theme for the night: past Community Projects and appreciation. Our first speaker was Sister Trinitas Hernandez, or more affectionately known as Sister T. Sister T spoke about how great her experience with the Junior League was with helping the East Palo Alto community learn English as their second language. The Junior League Committee helped with teaching an English speaking class during the day and at night, while also watching the attendees’ small children in a playroom next door. I thought the program was a great opportunity to really enable the community to be able to learn English. Sister T was so engaging and you could tell she appreciated the help so much!

We then took a quick break to hear about Membership Outreach and do our Done in a Meeting project for the Shelter Network. Valarie Dennis from the Membership Outreach Committee was so excited to share her competition with us…to have the Provisionals bring 50 new member prospects and be entered to win champagne! Spread the word and see if there are a few people you can bring to the March 17 meeting! The Done in a Meeting task this week was to write inspirational thoughts or quotes for the Shelter Network. The Shelter Network project for this year is teaching the homeless community in San Mateo County about life skills they need. It was a fun challenge to see what we can come up with and was a great opportunity for our tables to share with each other these encouraging sentiments!

The last speaker of the evening was definitely my favorite part from the meeting. Mike Berman works at the East Palo Alto Phoenix Academy helping children in the East Palo Alto community stay in school and achieve admittance to a four-year college or university. He had just come from a dinner with the seniors at his school and you could feel the emotions he brought with him. He was so proud of his students and the message definitely made the entire audience so inspired. He was also so thankful for the Junior League’s help during our tenure there for giving the students someone to confide in and trust. He really thought it had a great, positive impact on the students and he couldn’t be more proud of how his students accepted our help and lived up to their potential. I don’t know how you could walk out of the room without wanting to conquer the world! He was a great speaker and I think we all benefited from hearing his great story.

Lastly, mark your calendars for our Community Project for the upcoming year…Kids in the Kitchen, Wednesday, April 20! Happy Holidays to everyone!

No comments:

Post a Comment