Ode to My Alma Mater ~ aka Bentley College Rocks

Having not looked over my blog in a while (hey, I’ve been busy!), I decided to tweak my About Me and My Mission Page… Before I knew it, I had added quite the extended “Shout Out” to my Alma Mater, Bentley College. There’s simply a great deal to say about this already exceptional, and growing stronger all the time, “business” college.

So, I decided to move my “Bentley tribute” to the daily blog entries. How’s that for being resourceful?  BTW, that’s “entrepreneur speak” for working on the fly and finding the most efficient way to use what you have available to reach a goal or deadline. In this case, by creating a blog post from my extended comments about Bentley which I started to put on my About Me page, I can get off the laptop and head outside to prepare some “salvaged” items to bring to my “office” (still adjusting  to the sound of that!)…

Here’s the description as I wrote it, just a glimpse of why I am so jazzed about good ol’ Bentley College…

“Shout Out” to my Alma Mater! Bentley truly is an amazing business college (just north of Boston) and, in fact, a recent recipient of a prestigious globally-recognized accreditation (EQUIS)  held by only one other United States higher institution of business education. Led by “new” president Gloria Cordes Larsen (an accomplished business attorney, poised now to make her mark on Academia), Bentley is highly invested in “teaching the talk” and “walking the walk” of corporate social responsibility.

I was honored to briefly meet the new president this past spring at an alumni event where it was my pleasure to hear her rapid-fire and energetic description of her first year on the job. I thoroughly enjoyed Gloria’s honest (and exhausting) description of a whirlwind year during which she seemingly didn’t stop to even cook dinner for her husband (ah, a kindred spirit!)… Truly, I share her excitement as Bentley moves forward with an incredible program that only seems to get better.

I mean, the place has its own trading room, a well-established international center , an active service-learning center , and many more state-of-the-art facilities and programs. Particularly exciting to me, Bentley is the first business college to offer its undergraduates a double major linking liberal arts with business specializations in a meaningful, integrated approach that reflects, and will surely continue to further strengthen, Bentley’s proven commitment to socially-responsible, morally-ethical and environmentally-conscious business practices.

Do you have a teen thinking about colleges? (Shocking (to me ), I do…) Check out Bentley’s website. Better yet, plan a campus visit. You’ll be glad you did!

Oh, to be headed to college again … I am so reminded of the line from It’s A Wonderful Life (Remember when George kept talking to Mary instead of kissing her and the old man on the porch declared with disgust, “Youth is wasted on the Wrong People”…) Of course, that’s not altogether true when one considers the accomplishments of many truly inspirational young people today. Reminds me of another Bentley highlight, The Tomorrow 25, and I didn’t even mean to toot Bentley’s horn again in this post! The Tomorrow 25 and other motivated teens aside, I think there is a considerable opportunity and incredible potential to empower all youth to live their own authentic life of purpose. Indeed that’s yet another goal of mine and yet another post topic for another day…

Until Next Time, N.

Echoing Green Luncheon Was Time Well Spent

After a busy weekend of getting my youngest off to dance camp in VT (shout out to ReNew Salvage in Brattleboro), I left a messy house (oh well) and unpaid bills (oops)  to make it to a luncheon in Boston…

The event was led by Echoing Green, an absolutely amazing organization that has sponsored over 450 social entrepreneurs in their 20 year history… Echoing Green’s president Cheryl Dorsey was warm and authentic in her welcome to the filled-to-capacity luncheon, sponsored by State Street Foundation, Inc., the charitable arm of State Street Corporation. The group of socially-conscious attendees represented a diversity of backgrounds and experience, from bankers to educators to social entrepreneurial alumni of Echoing Green’s fellowship program ~ all gathered together with the common goal of advancing sustainable social change by supporting social entrepreneurs with all kinds of bold new ideas, using their inspired concepts toward that same common goal of positive and lasting social and environmental change.

Echoing Green’s statistics are impressive. Their approach is one of support and collaboration with somewhat unproven, but incredibly driven, social entrepreneurs. The combination of their hearts and minds, with a belief in bold determination and a sense of obligation, is absolutely inspiring. As I sat among them, on the 36th floor of the State Street Financial Center overlooking all of Boston, I was both humbled and emboldened to be in a room filled with like-minded people, living their lives and pursuing their careers in a way that is mindful of the needs of others and embodies a “take action” mentality toward meaningful change.

The three speakers were fabulous (have I used that adjective yet?). All past Echoing Green fellows, their passion for their mission was fresh and moving. Their proven ability to make a difference through their efforts seemed to inspire them to do more. For all of their amazing accomplishments, each is driven to continue to pursue their efforts, strengthened in their knowledge that they have helped so many yet aware of the need to continue their efforts.

The three speakers were:

• Katya Fels Smyth, Founder of On the Rise, Inc. (1995 Echoing Green Fellow)

From the On The Rise website’s About Us Page:

On The Rise’s mission is to support the initiative and strength of women living in crisis or homelessness. In a physically and psychologically safe environment, we build the relationships and provide the tools that each woman needs to rise to her potential.

On The Rise annually reaches and assists nearly 300 of the most highly marginalized and socially isolated women. We use a relational model designed to offer respect, dignity, connection, information, guidance and hope to women who have fallen through the cracks of our social service system. We meet each woman where she is, help her build on her strengths, and partner with her on her journey from surviving, to living, to thriving.

•  Eric Dawson, Co-Founder and President of Peace Games (1996 Echoing Green Fellow)

The Peace Games site’s ”About Us Page” includes a wonderful overview of Peace Games vision, mission and goals. Here’s just a portion from the page: 

Our Mission
Peace Games empowers students to create their own safe classrooms and communities by forming partnerships with elementary schools, families, and young adult volunteers.

Our Goals

• To empower children with the skills, knowledge, relationships and opportunities to be peacemakers.
• To engage all community members (students, families, teachers, volunteers, organizations and businesses) to support children as peacemakers.
• To inspire a new generation of educators and activists.
• To change how society thinks about violence and young people.

• Michael Brown, Co-Founder and CEO of City Year, Inc. (1991 Echoing Green Fellow)

From City Year’s ”Purpose” Page:

City Year was founded in 1988 on the belief that young people can change the world.By giving corps members the skills and opportunities to serve in schools and neighborhoods across the country, City Year seeks to:

• Help children succeed
• Build stronger communities
• Break down social barriers
• Develop young leaders
• Foster active citizenship

City Year’s vision is that one day the most commonly asked question of a young person will be, “Where are you going to do your service year?”

I could go on and on about each of the impressive speakers but I’m not going to! Rather, I’ll focus my attention on the business at hand ~ making my vision for a better world through increased awareness (of self, others, and the environment ~ whether locally, nationally and/or globally) and empowerment to live a purposeful life, starting right here on the North Shore. 

And, you know what? I think the speakers would approve! I encourage you to visit their sites through the links provided while you choose how to spend your time online. Warning! Set the timer or you may just find yourself on the keyboard hours from now still following the stories of these fantastic organizations and the incredible people behind them!

Already spent enough time online today? Just a suggestion ~ You could always do some DeCluttering For Good in your house, freeing up your space and inspiring yourself to make the best of the day, for yourself and for others! Carpe Diem ~ Seize the Day… N.

 

The Pettengill House ~ For Local People By Local People

Like the Jeanne Geiger Crisis Center, today’s highlighted social service organization serves the northern-most towns of Boston’s North Shore.  Self-described through their catch-phrase “For Local People, By Local People,” The Pettengill House is yet another organization providing support and services to those in need, in an effort to assist them as they work toward a more secure, self-sufficient situation.

From their homepage:

History

 

The Pettengill House, Inc. is a non profit community social service agency established in 1994 which receives its funding through grants and private donations.  The Pettengill House, Inc. staff oversee operation and provide programming services and community outreach.  The Pettengill House, Inc. was originally owned by Salisbury’s Pettengill Family and is currently on loan to us from the East Parish Standing Committee.  This white Victorian home is located in the north section of Salisbury Square and is the main site of The Pettengill House.  Today’s professional staff led by Deborah Smith is supported by a dedicated group of volunteers and community collaborators who donate their time, energy and resources to maintain and operate The Pettengill House, Inc. and provide services to individuals, children and families in need.   

The Jeanne Geiger Crisis Center ~ “services to take a person from helplessness to hopefulness”

While the local social service organizations I’ve highlighted thus far all have dealt with homelessness and the needs that relate to helping those who have fallen on hard times, this post focuses on an especially devastating area of suffering and need that exists even here on the North Shore of Boston.  The nationally-recognized organization is The Jeanne Geiger Crisis Center and is named in memory of a victim of domestic violence. To those who knew and loved this woman, this person named Jeanne, her name must stir such emotions, of sadness, loss, anger and even guilt… Sadly the name could be replaced with any number of other victims, all who died at the hands of someone whom they had once loved and trusted, all who left behind families and friends whose lives were forever changed by their tragic and violent death… Through the efforts of The Jeanne Geiger Crisis Center, Jeanne Geiger’s name is also a symbol of hope, of choices, of change.

From the site’s About Us Page:

 

Transition To Summer ~ The Balancing Act Between my new Social Enterprise and my Family Just Got More Challenging!

My kids  (12, 15 and 17) are home for the summer and I’m going to try not to feel guilty about the stress that brings to me… Transition Time… Hoping to make the summer a happy one including some family time as well as some time spent sharing my vision with them… This while dealing with the reality in my family that matches the stereotype – the kids have a negative reaction to anything I suggest. Their friends think my business concept is cool. Shout out to Bridee who knows more about the concept than most of my family!

So, this week, in the interest of getting more work done on my end while still sharing opportunities to help others where the need might be ~ starting locally ~ I’m going to keep sharing info on some local groups and local organizations doing good.

First, I want to thank the Moms of the Ipswich Pop Warner Cheerleaders! This past weekend, the group held a yard sale in front of the grammar school as a fundraiser… Shout out to the Ipswich School System for that great cooperative relationship and to Kathy Mc for letting me know about the yard sale… Anyway, at the end of the yard sale, after they had made some cash to support their efforts (being cheerleaders to the cheerleaders – go team!), they let me take what seemed to fit my needs for creative repurposing of stuff…

Here are some examples of the yard sale leftovers I took:  

Summarizing This Week ~ From Donating Your Stuff to Giving of Your Time & Yourself ~ It’s All Good

Well, I started out this week describing one of the cornerstones of my new mission-driven business ~ monthly donation opportunities announced the first of the month and culminating in a scheduled  weekend to drop-off the stated donation of the month. It’s a great way to organize our collective clutter and give it to a source that has a need for just such stuff. It’s along the “one man’s trash is another man’s treasure” mindset. Read my post all about it: Clutter for a Cause – Donation Opportunities Abound.

 

Since I’m not up and running (YET), I set out to share local organizations in need of your stuff that doesn’t qualify for repurposing into functional art and the like. Stuff that’s need is far more serious. Opportunities to help now because the need is out there… Read my posts about Wellspring House and Horizons for Homeless Children for more details.

 

 

Perhaps most important, I shared a fabulous find in VolunteerMatch.org, a website that could streamline the process for organizations working to do good who will benefit from an effective platform from which to share their needs and opportunities. Likewise, from the perspective of the would-be volunteer, VolunteerMatch.org puts all the choices at your fingertips, within geographic locations, areas of interest, even age group of prospective volunteers.

  

It does strike me that some of my friends and family following and supporting my pre-launch process might wonder how I got from donating stuff to volunteering of time, self and services. Here’s an entry from my special email update announcing the details of my move (and my donation needs) for my temporary office/work space:

 

Amazing Find for Volunteer WannaBees and Organizations in Need

Oh My Goodness… I have found a gem of a website that provides listings of volunteer opportunities that can be searched by zipcode, interest area, volunteer age group, and the like, and then sorted by distance…  The website is VolunteerMatch.org. Go to their site and enter your zipcode and remember to SORT BY DISTANCE. You can add your area of interest as well…Here’s the link to their Getting Started Page for Volunteers.

And, that’s just the beginning, they have great information about volunteering including success stories that start with a photo and summary, followed by a wonderful write-up about the volunteer’s experience and about the organization where the individual volunteered. Here’s one summary:

Volunteer Spotlight

Amanda McGlothlin, Heart House Austin

For advertising major Amanda McGlothlin, volunteering for a photography project at Heart House, a free after-school program, has been good for her future and good for the community. “I like teaching the kids new things, and learning things from them that I didn’t know,” she said. “I always forget how smart children are!”

Here’s the link to the Spotlight page where you can read the rest of Amanda’s story as well as those of many other happy volunteers.

Wellspring House – Helping People in Need on the North Shore

While I’m sharing donation and volunteer opportunities this week, I thought I’d stay focused on helping the homeless on the North Shore for another day, particularly given the staggering statistics reflecting the reality that there most certainly are people, in fact whole families, who are homeless, ( discussed in my post about Horizons For Homeless ).

It didn’t take long to find Wellspring House once I started looking. From their website, here’s what Wellspring House is all about (emphasis added):

For 25 years, Wellspring House has been helping families move out of poverty to achieve more secure and fulfilling lives.  An advocate for social justice, Wellspring House is a non-profit organization that annually provides education, emergency shelter, affordable housing, job training, family support and mentoring programs to hundreds of families on Boston’s North Shore.  Wellspring House is rooted in the vision of a just society in which people live interdependently and all have access to homes, education, and community support.  The organization has grown organically, sprouting new programs and projects as needs are revealed.

Today Wellspring provides shelter for homeless families, owns and manages its own stock of affordable housing, offers education programs to both families and individuals, and provides leadership in the development of local affordable housing. The geographic area that we serve includes the Cape Ann communities of Gloucester, Essex, Ipswich, Manchester and Rockport, and extends outward into the North Shore of Massachusetts. http://www.wellspringhouse.org/about/historyofwellspring.html

Horizons For Homeless Children

I am ashamed to admit that, until last year, I didn’t realize that there were homeless families on the North Shore, not that I really gave it much thought (shameful, as well). Unexpectedly, some time last year, I happened to notice a listing in the newspaper for volunteers. As I read on, I was taken aback to learn that the volunteers were needed specifically to play with homeless children in Peabody. Peabody, Massachusetts? I know Peabody is bigger than Ipswich and has the challenges that go along with that, some rough neighborhoods and teens that grow up a bit faster than most (I knew a girl from Peabody when I was a kid and she was smoking cigs at age 13 ~ I was aghast!)…  Still, I was really struck by this image of homeless children just down Route 1, a short drive from home, in the town where my parents live in a lovely retirement community.

Let’s face it, in our relatively sheltered community (hey, I’m not knocking it, just stating the reality), the only times I’ve seen homeless people have been in Boston and NYC (and only a handful at that), and more so only last summer, in Baltimore, where there were many homeless people, all men as I recall, who were referred to in the hotel pamphlet as “pan-handlers” (this in a section devoted to educating the tourists with “how to” information regarding appropriate behavior should one be approached by one of these people). To be blunt, these homeless men frightened me and my “mother bear” instinct was in overdrive as I hurried the kids past them. And, that’s the image “homeless” conjures up for me ~ mostly men, down and out, likely emotionally unstable or addicted to drugs or booze. I’ve not thought of them as lazy or stereotypical “bad guys.” I’m sympathetic. But, then I get on with my busy life. To stop and consider that there are homeless families? That must be really rare. Or is it?

The following stats are quoted on the Horizons for Homeless Children website (the site of the organization that I had read about in the newspaper, the group that was looking for volunteers to play with the homeless children). Here are some sobering stats from their site:

JULY 2007: New data suggest that there are at least 96,000 homeless children in Massachusetts. Read more.

Nationally approximately 500,000 children aged 0-5 years
old experience homelessness in the course of a year.
(Source: Urban Institute, 2000).

Tonight over 1,200 families will be staying in publicly funded family shelters in Massachusetts. Within these families, there are 1,200 children under the age of five.
(Source: Massachusetts Department of Transitional Assistance).

Compared with low-income housed children, homeless children experience more health problems, developmental delays, increased anxiety, depression, behavioral problems, and lower educational achievement.
(Source: National Center on Family Homelessness, 1999).

Here’s the link to these statistics: http://www.horizonsforhomelesschildren.org/Statistics.asp

Clutter for a Cause – Donation Opportunities Abound

In addition to using repurposed clutter in the trash-to-treasure manner that we are planning, regularly scheduled donation opportunities will be a cornerstone of our calendar.

Our donation opportunities will provide an organized way to contribute to those in need for those of us who live busy lives but would like to help, if only we could find the time and felt sure of where to donate our worthwhile, but no longer needed, extra stuff (clutter). By working together, (doing a little research ahead of time and planning out some basic logistics) we can get the items right to where they are needed. And, all you will have to do is drop by with your donations on the designated collection weekend. Not to get ahead of myself, but it will be the third weekend of the month, each month, once I secure a permanent location, start-up funding, build out the space, get all the legalities in place… (Okay, so I like to get ahead of myself, it’s part of my master plan!)

As we move forward, we will give where the need exists in our community. And, by ”community,” I am including every interpretation of the term, starting right here on the North Shore, to the community within the borders of Masssachusetts, New England and beyond. With online connections today redefining our concept of community and with needs existing in any number of places ~ some constant, some suddenly precipitated by natural or man-made disaster ~ our donation drives could include the broader communities of our entire nation and continent, our soldiers abroad and, indeed, our fellow man (and woman and child) wherever the need might be greatest and most urgent within the world-wide community.

When it comes to old clothes, toys, games, discarded tools, appliances and the like, some of the larger organizations collecting items do certainly provide a service. Yet, I also think it is worthwhile to donate items directly where needed. In this way, we are filling a specific need and the recipient gets the donation without having to pay for it at a second-hand shop, along with the knowledge that someone cared enough to help them during hard times. I eagerly look forward to the day that my vision of a monthly donation collection is a reality. For now, I will begin to provide information on organizations that could use your in-good-condition items that you no longer need and that don’t suit our repurposing needs. Watch for posts this week for some of the organizations I am planning to research as potential recipients of our donation drives.