Eileen Li

The San Francisco Food Bank exists to provide food to nearly 150,000 people in San Francisco who live with the threat of hunger. Since October 2006, Eileen has volunteered over 200 hours. Rain or shine, she has been coming to the Food Bank week after week. Eileen’s responsibilities include supplying volunteer break room with drinks, moving pallets to accommodate other volunteer work space, packing boxes full of cereal, milk, vegetable, juice, pasta, and tuna for senior citizens and packing tomatoes, egg rolls, rice, breads, cans, apples, and corns.

In 2003, the San Francisco Commission on the Status of Women released the groundbreaking study “A Report on Girls in San Francisco: Benchmarks for the Future,” representing a committed effort by the Commission on the Status of Women to conduct analysis as the first step to advancing sound public policy that meets the needs of women and girls. To support those first steps, the Commission on the Status of Women formed a Girls Committee in 2006. Eileen Li was selected from hundreds of applicants from San Francisco schools to become a founding member of the City and County of San Francisco Commission on the Status of Women’s Girls Committee.

Since then, Eileen has been leading youth programs and initiatives in the City of San Francisco. These initiatives include supporting events related to girls’ issues. For example, Eileen gave an open talk to encourage young people to express themselves at the UC San Francisco’s Youth Women’s Health Summit, in addition to her heavy involvement with organizing and publicizing the event. At the Marin Institute Press Conference against Alcopops, an alcohol drink deceitfully advertised to under-aged girls, Eileen spoke passionately about the cost of Alcopops to Youth and California to raise awareness against Alcopops. As a result of her advocacy and widely recognized efforts of the Girls Committee, the Act to Restrict Youth Access to Youth-Friendly Alcohol Drinks was passed. The result is clearer labeling and larger warnings.

Eileen is charismatic, thoughtful, intelligent, thorough, and detail-oriented. She is active in every aspect of the Commission on the Status of Women’s Girls committee. She has chaired monthly meetings, writes resolutions, and researches girls’ issues. She makes phone calls and writes emails regarding meetings and reaching out to S.A.C. Executive Board for further outreach to schools in the city. Eileen has influenced and inspired young people from elementary to high schools to affect positive changes. For the Girls Committee’s first ever Youth Service Directory, Eileen demonstrated her multiple talents most ably—as the cover designer, graphic artist, poet, game creator, and title page designer. She and others on the Committee even got Fiona Ma, a California State Assemblywoman, to sponsor the printing of over 5,000 copies in full color. When the Directory is completed in February 2008, it will be distributed to all schools in the City of San Francisco as a service and resource book.

Justin Ferrari

Justin Ferrari, now 17 years old, saw a need in his community, especially the area high schools, to reach out to other young people who were in need of direction in life. He decided that they too could be a part of the Fire Explorer program in Daytona Beach, FL, where he has been a member for 5 years. During this time, Justin has earned the rank of lieutenant/training officer for the post. He has devoted countless hours volunteering to mentor, train and organize the members of this program. This was accomplished by visiting the high schools, giving speeches about the program and setting up information booths at local events to give young people a hope at becoming medics and firefighters. It should also be mentioned that Mr. Ferrari has a birth defect of a bilateral cleft lip and palate. This may play a role in his empathy for others, but it sure makes giving speeches and talking with the public difficult due to his speech impediment!

All the while, he has also been donating his time and resources to local events which highlights hands on experience for small children in the area of fire safety. Through the “smoke house”, a small trailer simulating a house fire that children physically climb through in order to learn how to remain calm and get out fast in the event of a fire, he has devoted many weekends teaching children the lifelong strategies of fire survival. This is his favorite activity. Justin has spent countless evenings developing ideas for the fire safety programs, fund-raising and the explorer program. He has made many recommendations to his advisor, Mr. Fred Godawa, such as a lottery style fund raiser to pay for the needed equipment for the group, a search and rescue operation which would help the entire community in the event of a disaster, a bicycle patrol for medics/explorers to utilize during special events in this city (of which they have many in Daytona Beach) and much more.

He has participated in many drills with local departments such as a terrorist attack, plane crashes and mass casualties. He has also been a member of the Daytona Beach police explorers for 8 months and was actually injured in a “hostage” drill with them, joking with the paramedics about how much worse it could have been (he was injured during a “take down” and was pushed through a thick plate glass window, cutting his back). After getting treated, Mr. Ferrari went back to the drill without looking back. He always gets volunteers to join drills so that they can see how much fun firefighting/police activities can be for them. Mr. Ferrari also likes to show the community that police and fire personnel are not the enemy and are there to help them. He enjoys his leadership responsibilities and takes them as seriously as any adult getting paid for this work would.

Justin has helped many teens in his area by getting them into a structured environment and away from some of the trouble they may have gotten into without that structure. He is a role model for other teenagers. Through his encouragement, shy and isolated teens have joined this volunteer activity and will go on to a career. Although Mr. Ferrari’s future is already set as a medic/firefighter, he sees a vital need to reach out to others, not just for a career in firefighting, but to help in any way he can. He has helped many vehicle crash victims, injured people and even performed CPR to save lives.

Manuela DeOliveira

Manuela has served the community 918 hours through her senior year at Immaculata High School. The 41 different events include shopping for the senior citizens and going to Appalachia, West Virginia Wayne County work camp Christmas Mission. She has been to West Virginia on five different occasions three times during the summer to fix homes and two times to bring Christmas to the children. She plans to continue to go to West Virginia.

In addition, Manuela has given her time to Urban Plunge, a 30-hour weekend in Camden, NJ. She also participates in Justiceworx, a camp for volunteering in Trenton. She has served on the Joseph Conrad as a sailing assistant at Mystic Museum and seaport, Mystic, CT. Here she aided the counselors and worked closely with the children as a guide, waking them up in the morning, participating in daily activities with them, putting them to bed at night and even at times staying up with them the whole night because someone was feeling ill.

Manuela has also served by helping the senior citizens at the Senior Center in Gillette, NJ and donated her hair to Locks of Love. She does not focus on one area of volunteering but has broadened her horizons by working with so many different people: the homeless, elderly, handicapped, mentally challenged, poor and children. All of her experiences have given her an opportunity to learn.

Manuela has learned what it truly it means to be a leader through serving. When she works at the Seaport, she takes on responsibilities and care of the children. When she serves the elderly or handicapped, Manuela has to make sure everyone is safe and enjoying their time.

Dina Maugeri

Dina Maugeri has been volunteering at Pine Trail Elementary for 13 years. She began when her first son attended kindergarten there. She was an enormous help to her son’s teachers. As he moved into different grades and classrooms, she was always there. She has been there ever since and her other three children have been through the school.

Although Dina has never been a PTA President, she has been a very active member and a leading force in the success of the PT A. As a longtime member, she knows how to make things happen. She has chaired many school events and each one was a huge success due to her energy and dedication.

Some of her activities have included mobilizing parents for homeroom volunteering, organizing class activities and recognitions, single-handedly organizing the Holiday Gift Shoppe for the past 7 years, organizing the School Silent Auction, chairing the Fifth Grade End of the Year Committee three times and helping teachers plan special activities in their classrooms.

Dina doesn’t know how to say no. She always has a full plate. She is a cancer survivor who enjoys helping others. She is very special, dedicated and energetic mom and volunteer.

Jack Lewis

Holly Community Inc.’s (HCI) mission is to promote access to community resources and support for people with disabilities and their families by offering choices which preserve dignity and increase independence for an improved quality of life. Jack Lewis strives every day of his life to enhance the lives of others. This is evident through the work he does in the community.

Jack has supported HCI with his time as a volunteer for more than 30 years. He claims that he “just likes to help people” that are less fortunate than himself. He realizes how lucky he is to have two healthy children and says it makes him stop and think about how fortunate we are when you work with people who are disabled. Jack has helped with the coordination of HCI’s many fundraising and special activities. He is influential in securing in-kind gifts, volunteers and cash donations. He expresses very compassionately his commitment to people with disabilities and it shines in his one-on-one relationships.

In addition to his volunteer work with HCI, Jack currently holds many volunteer positions within the VFW. As the Chairman of the Military Assistance Program, he works to ensure our military personnel and their families are aware of the program and ask for assistance when they need it. Jack believes it is all about the soldiers knowing their families are being cared for. Also, Jack‘s service on the Wicomico County War memorial Commission helps to ensure the veterans receive the proper respect and services they deserve. Because of his dedicated and outstanding service with the National Guard, he was recognized by the White House with an invitation to meet with President Bush regarding the Iraq war issues and veterans concerns.

Jack assisted his local Easter Seals with their Annual Softball Challenge Tournament and has participated in the March of Dimes Walk America for more than 25 years. He is always looking for ways to promote the organization through his endeavors.

Jack is a well-rounded volunteer with many resources at his fingertips. Many people have said, “If there’s a way, Jack will find it.” He has offered his talents of networking and getting the job done to many organizations over the years outside of his commitment to HCI. Jack received the 2007 Frank H. Morris Humanitarian Award from the Community Foundation of the Eastern Shore in Salisbury, Maryland for his more than 30 years of championing the cause of improving the quality of life for people with disabilities and their families.

Teens in Action-Patuxent Area

Today is Camp Fire USA’s Absolutely Incredible Kids Day—a day when Camp Fire USA encourages adults to recognize the accomplishments of young people in their lives. There is no better way that to recognize the Camp Fire USA’s Teens in Action Program in Prince Georges County, MD for their commitment to service and strengthening the community. During the past three years, the Camp Fire USA Teens in Action, Patuxent Area Council have completed service projects that have served the poor, the homeless, the elderly and the environment. In addition, they have looked for areas of the community that were in need of advocacy and they have prepared advocacy projects. In the past two years, our teens have committed 20,642 hours of service. Most of them have earned Presidential Service Award for their service.

They have served Habitat for Humanity, Catholic Charities, Camp programs for Children, tutored children in Public and Private Schools, baking for troops overseas, written valentines to Veterans, helped Red Cross with disaster readiness, Planted gardens for the elderly as well as developing and advocating for the homeless, and developing a teen driving safety program to educate their peers on Teen Driving safety.

Their projects have had a huge impact on those they serve. The soldiers wrote and told them that they made their day, that the cookies that they sent were a touch from home. The Commanding Officer reported that young men who were having a rough time lit up when they saw the cookies and told stories of home. When the teens built for Habitat for Humanity, they touched the lives of a family with four children. The got to know the family and remembered them at Christmas and on Holidays for then next year. Tutoring at the public school was a high point for the teens and the elementary school children. The teens felt well about helping little children are successful and the children looked up to the “big kids.” Seniors who had their gardens prepared for spring welcomed the teens and gave them such wonderful feedback. Most reported that they would not have been able to have spring and summer gardens without the help of the teens. The teens have created a puppet show that tells kids how to stay safe and are presenting this to schools across the region. Over the past year, the teens have written grants to support a program for homeless children and reach out to them weekly with a Camp Fire USA Children’s Club and are planning second year of a summer camp program.

Their most recent advocacy program, that of working on issues around teen driving safety, has had a major impact on the students, their school community including parents and faculty, and on the larger community around the school. The teens realized that you have to start early to get the message of driving safety to the people so they created a bike rodeo for children and taught the rules of the road thorough practice. Teens from the project were recently invited to participate in the first National Teen Driving Safety Summit in Washington DC where they joined 90 youth from across the nation in addressing this number one killer of youth. During the summit, the teens were interviewed by reporters, participated in a roundtable for the press, and developed strategies to implement a regional driving safety forum in the spring of 2008. They created a dramatic presentation which has received great reviews from the State Police, Maryland Parks and Planning, State Farm Insurance participants in the NBC 4 Health Fair, and earned the a place on “Good Morning America”. Based on their research of the needs of the community, they are presently translating the presentation to other languages so as to get their message to non-English speaking youth. After 17 teens were killed in a two week period in their community, they decided to take all they know and to host a Teen Driving Safety Conference on April 26, 2008 (Global Youth Service Day) to help other teens from schools and non-profit agencies plan and implement driving and community safety projects. For their effort they have been selected as one of ten groups who are finalist in the Project Ignition Driving Safety Project.

On a recent Saturday, the teens volunteered to share their message with Emergency Managers from across the region and were hailed with a standing ovation for their message and the method of delivery. One individual—a state trooper said he did not eat his fast food in the car but rather waited until he arrived to follow the teen’s message of not being distracted while driving. The teens have created commercials, reenacted a crash scenario, and learned from experts about the hazards of distractions. They are appearing on XM Satellite Radio to share their message and on a local ABC affiliate to encourage teens and parents to take teen driving safety and emergency readiness seriously. Their message is timeless and will continue as part of their service project. For this project alone, the teens have committed over 4500 hours of service. More information about these amazing young people can be found at www.campfireusa-patuxent.org .

Saunder & Joy Primack

Saunder and Joy Primack have made a conscious decision to give back to their community. They believe education is important, so they volunteer within the school system.

Once a week, Sandy and Joy do a 2-hour reading block with on-level readers, freeing the teacher to work with below-level students. They prepare the lesson, guide the reading, ask questions and bring in additional information to support the story. On Fridays they do another 2-hour block conducting a Center Activity which all 5 groups rotate to for 20-minutes each. At the center they teach a math or science skill with a fun reinforcement or they help with research.

In the spring, they present the fifth-grade Junior Achievement program to students from 1-3 classes. They also do individualized tutoring in math. They are a part of the Mentoring team; help with the book fair each year, and much more.

The students consider it a special treat for the couple to join them for lunch in the cafeteria 2 days a week. The sharing time is just as valuable as the volunteer time in the classroom. The couple also joins in for holiday parties.

The students learn much more from this couple than classroom lessons. Joy is in a wheelchair from a stroke. Sandy’s care and devotion to her shows them a beautiful example of how to treat handicapped people. Even though her speech is slowed, Joy’s intelligence shows through and the children stop and respectfully listen when she talks to them.

Teresa Mitchell

Aetna has been recognized for the integrated approach to helping members with diabetes manage their condition. The Healthy Outlook Program® Caring for Diabetes provides various outreach services to members with diabetes. Aetna employees in the Jacksonville Florida location recognizes that funds are needed to continue the research by the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation so that one day a cure could be found. Employees participate in the Annual Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation fund raising activity titled Walk to Cure Diabetes.

Teresa Mitchell, National Project Manager for Provider Services Center has for several years volunteered to lead the fundraising activities around this initiative. What is especially noteworthy is that each year Teresa has lead the efforts, the contributions to the event have increased each year. In 2005 a total of $35,789 was raised. In 2006, she exceeded the $37,500 goal. It was in 2007; Teresa took a deep breath, rolled up her sleeves and began the journey to coordinate the largest fund raising local event at the Aetna Jacksonville Florida location. She exceeded the goal and raised $56,256.13.

To begin the fundraiser, Teresa recruited team captains to represent the various business units to ensure each employee could be given the opportunity to donate/and participate in the walk. Once she sent the note to the Jacksonville site to recruit for team captains, 19 employees responded; 4 more than in the prior year. Teresa provided valuable coaching to all captains. She created a list of 24 items Team Captains must attend to – in order to be successful. Various activities to raise money occurred. For instance, Panera Bagels were a big hit. Teresa would be at the bakery at 5 am to pick up hundreds of bagels and have the display ready for employees arriving at 6 am. Teresa placed many outreach calls to local companies to support the fund raisers. You would see Teresa coming to work with hundreds of cookies donated that were placed in with BBQ lunches being sold so the employees would have a dessert with their purchase. Teresa’s energy and enthusiasm began to spread. Eventually, individual teams within the business units would challenge each other with fund raising activities.

While Teresa devoted many hours to this great cause, she still remained active as a Middle School Parent Teach Student Association Treasurer, Honorary Team Mom for the Middle School Basket Ball team, and serves on the finance committee at her church. Also noteworthy was right after the Juvenile Diabetes Campaign; Teresa coordinated efforts for a very successful Sickle Cell Foundation Campaign rising over $9,000.

Mark LaBorde, General Manager Aetna Insurance Company said, “The countless hours of personal dedication by Teresa, and for others in Jacksonville that worked to make this fund raiser a success, the Jacksonville Aetna location donated $56,256.13 to the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation.”

Sharron Kanter

Sharron L. Kanter is a volunteer in the Lakewood WA Police Department Crime Analysis Unit (CAU). Sharron volunteered to help build a Crime Analysis Unit when Lakewood formed its own police department in late 2004. Sharron and the staff crime analyst have modified, automated and streamlined all required reports.

Sharron’s real specialties are twofold. First, she is an Excel guru. If it can be done in Excel, she will figure out how to do it. She introduced the Pivot Table option, which made previously weeklong reports take less than three hours. Another report which previously took two months to plan, execute and finish now takes a day for Sharron to do with the system she has created.

Sharron’s other specialty is her tenacity. Failure has never been an option for her. It is this specialty that has made the CAU a success and respected for its accomplishments by other CAU’s in the county. A crime analyst recently asked Sharron if she would like to move into her city, so she could volunteer in their CAU.

Sharron dedicated about 20 hours per week to the CAU and has provided 2,400 volunteer hours of support to the department. She has helped create a process for all routine work that the CAU produces. She actually produces the lion’s share of routine work making her completely invaluable to the police department. Her CAU staff member has told the Chief that without Sharron’s dedication to this department, loyalty to her community, superior intelligence, analytical mind and tenacious problem solving ability, it would be very difficult to do all that they are tasked to do every week.

Sharron has also recently taken on the responsibility of performing criminal history checks on new department volunteers, in addition to her CAU duties.

In addition, Sharron has also been the co-coordinator for Lakewood’s annual National Night Out Against Crime (NNO) for the past ten years. During this period, NNO events in Lakewood have increased from fewer than ten with a few hundred participants to 48 events this year and almost 4,000 participants. NNO efforts include securing donations, coordinating event visits by police and fire departments, information sharing, public speaking, and frequent communication with neighborhood NNO coordinators. Her NNO efforts for Lakewood were recognized in 2002, when the city council proclaimed August 6, 2002 as Mike and Sharron Kanter Day in the city of Lakewood, WA.

Sharron is the recipient of the “Police Chief’s Citizen Commendation” award, which was in recognition of her service to the department and the community. It is the highest award that the chief can give to a community member. If this weren’t enough, Sharron also edits the quarterly and annual Communities in Schools of Lakewood newsletter.

Nicholas Truso

Nicholas Truso’s volunteerism on behalf of women and infants at the Women’s Life Care Center of Maplewood, MN began about six years ago, when he was a candidate for Eagle Scout. Nick’s efforts help give infants born of crisis pregnancies the healthy starts they need for healthy futures.

Women in crisis pregnancies in the Twin Cities urban areas, especially those who are new immigrants, need basic childcare items to make their situations manageable. These items include car seats, strollers, diapers, baby wipes, clothing, baby formula and more. The women in crisis pregnancies often are disconnected from the community. Through an innovative project that he devised at the Women’s Life Care Center, Nick collects donations of such items and assembles them into packages for women experiencing crisis pregnancies. Thus, the Women’s Life Care Center fills a social gap for these women and allows them to give their babies a healthy start.

Nick devised a program in which he puts up Christmas trees at churches and decorates them with ornaments for people to take home. Each ornament lists an item needed by women in crisis pregnancies and the people who take ornaments donate the items listed on their ornaments. Nick’s initiative has served the purpose of providing for the needs of women and infants and of connecting people at area Catholic churches with those in need.

This program could have been a one-time effort, to satisfy his Eagle project requirements, yet Nick continued the initiative, even after entering college. Indeed, Nick has expanded the program by getting more volunteers involved. The coordination of this effort and its successful execution are monumental tasks that result in the accumulation of all the goods and some of the money that the Life Care Center needs to serve its clientele for the entire year. To date, the initiative has resulted in the distribution of over 12,000 items. Indeed, Nick’s initiative has been so successful that the Center has been able to double the number of women it serves. Hundreds of young women and their babies have benefited directly from Nick’s efforts.

In addition, Nick has been seriously involved with the volunteer initiatives of the Vadnais Heights Rotary Club. In 2004, Nick coordinated a group of 30 people from his high school to raise funds to pay for orphans in India to receive cataract surgeries. Also that year, in the aftermath of Hurricane Ivan, he oversaw a school-wide relief effort to gather supplies to aid victims in Jamaica. The following spring, Nick coordinated the collection of over 5,000 books to establish a library in Africa. As a college student, Nick continues his work with the Rotary Club by mentoring and inspiring other young people at the Rotary Youth Leadership Camp. At St. John’s University, Nick is a student senator and the sole student member of the university’s board of regents.