Tuesday, March 29, 2011

Future Leaders - In Development

Below are two videos posted to the Internet this week. The first shows how students are building leadership and fund raising skills by their participation in the Cabrini Madness and other events that help us keep Cabrini Connections available to them and future students. As with other Cabrini Madness videos our students are the actors which helps them develop confidence in themselves. It also shows them how to use video to communicate ideas and motivate people to respond.

Encouragement Promo from Cabrini Connections on Vimeo.



The second is a new video created by Dan Bassill, that shows how Cabrini Connections is a "collective effort" of many people, over many years, to help inner city youth go through school and on into adult lives. In this video Dan shows how the the leaders and past volunteers in Cabrini Connections created the Tutor/Mentor Connection, which is a larger scale collective effort intended to draw needed operating resources to all tutor/mentor programs in the city on a more consistent basis, thus helping Cabrini Connections get more of the resources it needs, too.



This second video is also the result of a collective effort. We first learned about CamStudio from a volunteer based in the UK who used it to create these videos to show her network how one of the T/MC web sites works. She learned about us when George Siemmens, who is in Canada, wrote this blog article about the T/MC on his web site.

In both of these videos we're focusing on raising visibility, connecting leaders from different tutor/mentor programs with each other, and finding donors and philanthropic investors who will provide the capital needed to support the on-going efforts of our students and volunteers. We're also demonstrating how easy it is for any of our students, volunteers, leaders and friends to create videos that help others understand what we're doing so that they are more motivated to use their own time, talent and dollars to help us.

If our teens (and volunteers) practice this form of learning, leadership and communications over many years they will have tools, skills and habits that enable them to mobilize help from many sectors to help them solve any problem they ever face in the future.

Tuesday, March 22, 2011

Talent Show - This Saturday, March 26

Cabrini's Got Talent" will be held this Saturday, March 26th, at 5pm at Cabrini Connections.

Tickets are only $2. Pay at the door. Cash, check, or credit card. Performers get in free.

Food will be provided potluck-style by parents. Please bring a dish for the crowd! It will be much appreciated :

Food will be served at 5pm. *Performances begin at 5:30pm* and should last about an hour.

We have 10 students and volunteers scheduled to perform, but there is still time to join them.* "Last chance" performance reviews are this week* at Cabrini Connections: Wednesday 4-6pm and Thursday 5-6pm.

*URGENT NEED:* We could really benefit from the use of a stage and a microphone and amplifier. Please call the office at 312-492-9614 if you have any leads. Thank you!

*SPECIAL NOTE:* Support one another! This is a great, cheap, convenient, student-led event - a perfect opportunity to showcase the program to your family and friends. These talented students and volunteers deserve a full house! See you there!

Monday, March 14, 2011

It's March...LET THE MADNESS BEGIN!!!


Monday 3/14 - Happy Hour - Please join The Free Agents http://www.giveforward.com/thefreeagents for happy hour on Monday, March 14 from 6:30-8:30 at Redmond's Ale House [http://www.redmondsalehouse.com] (3358 N Sheffield Ave.) and enjoy FREE domestic drafts for the duration. If you are so moved to make a donation in support of Cabrini Connections in return, that'd be awesome! No minimum donation required. For more info or to RSVP, visit the Facebook event page
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=140528656014990

Tuesday 3/15 - Wing Eating Contest - On Tuesday, March 15th, The Green Team http://www.giveforward.com/thegreenteam is hosting a wing-eating contest at Cabrini Connections. Come as an individual or group and pay $10 for 10 wings per person. Teams compete in groups of 2 or 4 and the fastest two teams will face off in a bonus round for a chance to win the inaugural "Wing Bling" trophy! For more info or to RSVP, visit the Facebook event page
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=169207923129834

Thursday 3/17 - Chili Sale - Running for Cabrini [http://www.giveforward.com/runningforcabrini] will be
selling chili for only $1/bowl during the session from 6-7:45pm.

Friday 3/18 - Midnight Bowling for Cabrini Connections Event - Boom Goes The Dynamite http://www.boomgoesthedynamite.org/ is hosting a bowling charity event at Timber Lanes [http://www.timberlanesbowl.com/] (1851 W Irving Park Rd.) on March 18, 2011 from 10pm-2am. A $30 suggested starting
donation gets you unlimited bowling, shoes and loads of fun for 4 hours. Cash bar. For more info or to RSVP, visit the Evite page http://new.evite.com/services/links/3JLBICZIKG

Ongoing
Team High5ive [http://www.giveforward.com/high5ive] is selling candy and snacks and The Golden Stars [http://www.giveforward.com/goldenstars] are selling candy bars