Murray Hill Institute
Newsletter
November 2005
Volume 2, Number 3

Service to others is an important part of Murray Hill Institute’s mission. Our partnership with Rosedale Achievement Center, helping with the activities of the Institute itself, and personal initiatives of service are all critical components to fulfilling this mission. These activities afford opportunities for women to give back to society, to extend their own talents beyond their current professional sphere, and to meet others who share their vision of transforming culture.

Rosedale Achievement Center

Rosedale, a small brick town house on Rosedale Avenue in the Bronx, provides a home away from home for girls from the South Bronx and other locations. Rosedale offers supplementary after-school and Saturday programs during the school year, as well as summer enrichment programs that encompass both academic classes and job training. A unique characteristic of Rosedale is its emphasis on nurturing the whole person. Girls are not only given substantive help in improving their grades, applying for scholarships, college admission, and cultural development, they are also offered individual mentoring to help them develop into strong, ethics-focused young women who are capable of independent action and of resisting unhealthy pressures from their peers and from society at large. Yareni Sanchez sums up this sense of true empowerment very well in an essay she wrote describing her job training experience at the Spain-U.S. Chamber of Commerce during the summer of 2004: “Above all, Rosedale has taught me a new motto. I can reach my goals; I can build my cathedral out of the monotony of carving stone; I can break the stereotype of a typical teenager; I can. This is the motto I preach to my friends….” Yareni is currently a freshman at Columbia University and loves it.

Rosedale’s small full-time staff depends on a large team of dedicated volunteers for its programs to grow. In a recent telephone interview, Vicky Ticzon, Director of Rosedale, described a wide range of needs that can fit almost anyone’s interests, resources, and available time. For women able to commit to a couple of hours a week on Saturdays for the 2005-2006 academic year, Rosedale still needs tutors, especially for the 9-to-13-year- old age group. Tutors work one-on-one with students to bolster study skills, reinforce content knowledge, and help them prepare for tests and exams.

Are you an apartment-dweller looking for a gardening opportunity? Are you handy with a hammer and screwdriver? Rosedale is looking for a team to come once or twice a month to tidy up and care for its small garden, as well as take care of simple repairs.

Do you have an interesting career, or an unusual trip, adventure, or experience you would like to share? The high school club is always looking for speakers. Do you have a special skill such as photography or dance? The tweens and young teenagers in the fourth-to- eighth-grade group would love to hear about it. These special events require only a one-time visit and are invaluable to the girls in expanding their horizons and opening their minds to a wide range of experiences and skills. Warning: the “Rosedale effect” is highly contagious. You may experience a strong urge to return for a repeat engagement after your first visit.

Help with fundraising and development is an ongoing need, as Rosedale depends on contributions to meet its program and operating expenses. In addition to financial help, contacts with the professional community are critical to Rosedale’s development. Does your company have a summer internship program for high school girls? Is your place of employment willing to host a group of well-chaperoned teenagers for a tour? Identifying companies for summer internships, sites for field trips, and those who might be willing to help financially are important ways of giving substantive help to Rosedale without a large time commitment. For those who wish an ongoing relationship, Rosedale’s Women’s Council welcomes new members. The Council is comprised of women from a variety of professional backgrounds who collectively pool their skills, contacts, and ideas to help on an ongoing basis.

Currently Rosedale is engaged in a special fund-raising effort to renovate their chapel. They have achieved over 50% towards their goal, and the work is well under way. Thanks to a Murray Hill Institute contact, the organizers of a recent luncheon and “Elegance in Style” seminar held on Long Island contributed a portion of the proceeds from the event to Rosedale.

The South Bronx Educational Foundation, Rosedale’s non-profit parent, hosts an annual fund-raising dinner each fall. The 2005 dinner is scheduled for Thursday, November 17, and help is always appreciated with the wide variety of tasks associated with such an event.

For more information on Rosedale, visit the South Bronx Educational Foundation website at www.sbef.org

Murray Hill Institute

As a young and rapidly growing non-profit, Murray Hill Institute has an ongoing need for volunteers. To expand and improve our communications and outreach, we need help with website design, graphic design, photography, writing, and editing for our website, for our bi-annual newsletter, and for conference print materials. We also need ideas! If you have an idea for a discussion group, website feature, newsletter article, book or movie review, lecture or other event, just email us at info@murrayhillinstitute.org.

Women who are well established in their careers can help their younger colleagues by joining Murray Hill Institute’s mentoring program. In today’s challenging work environment, where many development programs have fallen prey to budget cuts, this type of help is particularly needed. Mentors enjoy the satisfaction of using their experiences to help others, while expanding their own professional contacts.

Volunteering in various ways at the MHI conferences offers unparalleled opportunities for networking. Three young women from our team of high school volunteers, assembled for the “Woman, Beauty, and Image” conference last spring were inspired to take the message of the conference to their peers. They have formed Fashion Forum, a group of young women who aim to make a difference in today’s society by promoting a dignified image of women. They achieve this through activism and through monthly events such as discussions, guest speakers, and hands-on workshops for their peers in the 16-to-24-year age group.

At the same conference, we met a number of women who have begun innovative and creative service projects on their own. For example, among the attendees was Rachel Doyle, Founder and President of GlamourGals Foundation. GlamourGals is a nonprofit organization that connects young volunteers to elderly women in nursing homes and assisted living facilities throughout the country. The teens treat the older women to facials and makeovers, a rewarding experience for both that creates opportunities for forging new friendships across the generations. For more information on GlamourGals, visit their website at www.glamourgals.org

Also present at the spring conference was Ngozi Agbim, former head of the library at LaGuardia Community College. Ngozi has spearheaded Books for Enugu, a project involving collecting, cataloguing, and preparing for shipment over 1,000 books for a community library in Enugu, Nigeria. These two initiatives are examples of many wide-ranging projects taking place across the country.

Both through its formal programs and informal networking, Murray Hill Institute serves as a clearing house for many opportunities to help women share their expertise, cultural interests, and experience. We welcome any new ideas, and particularly, new volunteers, for this exciting journey.
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Alice Trimmer is Editorial Director, Music, for Macmillan/McGraw-Hill, an
educational publishing company.