Bustling Brooke

In honor of the Fourth of July, I thought it best that my last post before the start of the weekend festivities was one that was on a positive note.   I loved the article about Brooke Briggance of the Alameda Education Foundation that ran in the most recent Alameda Magazine.  (Next week, we’ll talk about the Measure A article, but not before a three day weekend!)

Highlights:

…Briggance organized several AEF summits, assembling school district officials and board members, teachers, staff, PTA members, city council members and parents. “I told them, ‘I want to know everything you can think of to raise revenue,’ ” she says.

They came up with a 20-item list of ideas, including funding reform for schools, possible legal action and requiring the state to fully fund state-mandated programs such as special education. But community education and awareness of the school district’s budget crisis emerged as the top priority, so she began making the rounds of community organizations and groups.

…

Briggance has drawn up a strategic plan for AEF and hired a development director to go after larger sums of money in a more systematic way and transform the foundation from an event-driven culture to a professional fundraising organization. She has commissioned an external audit, which, once completed, along with an annual report, will allow the AEF to compete for large corporate and foundation grants. In 2005-06, AEF contributed almost $400,000 to Alameda’s schools through, but it will give much more in the future if Briggance gets her way.

“When education foundations are working well, they’re taking the stressors off of the school district,” she says. AEF’s seven main targets for fundraising include teacher support, after-school enrichment classes, athletics, the arts, classroom innovation and technology, going green at all schools and environmentally sound schools.

…

Briggance believes Alamedans have a moral obligation to educate all children equally and is proud to work for an organization that supports the 10,000 students in Alameda’s public schools, and says, “That’s what gets me up in the morning.”

Personally, I think it is awesome and awe-inspiring that we are blessed to have folks like Brooke B. in our community.   It’s folks like her that make Alameda a better place and despite all the rumor-mongering before the election about AEF, it’s pieces like this that show the community at large a tiny glimpse at the work being done by folks like Brooke B.  

And not to leave out the other notable woman who was profiled by Alameda Magazine, Cristi Hegranes, who leads her Clark Kent life as a bartender at the West End Fireside Lounge and her Superman life as president and founder of a non profit committed to educating women in developing countries how to be journalists and cover the issues in their own country.   And while the article mentions that Cristi H.’s non profit is based out of Oakland, according to her website, the NPO now has an Alameda address.   Some of the articles on the website are really very eye-opening, touching on topics that generally aren’t reported in mainstream media.   Cristi H.’s really goes beyond mere summary, you have to read the stories (and read her story) to understand the impact she is having.

On that cheerful note, have a Happy Fourth of July everyone, remember the big “Clean and Green” Parade will be happening tomorrow!