Emerging Leaders Expansion Year Ends with DC and NYC Celebrations In This Issue: 1 - 2 Spotlight: Rainah Berlowitz ’97 1 & 3 Emerging Leaders Celebrate 4 A Fellow’s Experience 5 Listening to Our Partner Organizations 6-7 Regional Updates Volume 16, Number 1 Winter 2013 Emerging Leaders is Now Accepting Applications! (continued on page 3) In January, members of the nonprofit community gathered in Washington, DC and New York City to congratulate the newly graduated Emerging Leaders Class of 2013. AlumniCorps Board and staff members, participants, employers, mentors, family members, and other supporters helped to celebrate the success of the program. The receptions on January 11th and 17th culminated the second year of the program in Washington, DC and the first year in New York. Beginning in June 2012, participants gathered for monthly sessions featuring skill development activities, peer and facilitator coaching, and discussions with nonprofit executives who shared their expertise and insights. Emerging Leaders participants implemented their learned skills and leadership competencies through stretch projects designed in collaboration with their employers. The program’s goal is to build the capacity of the nonprofit sector to address complex public issues by equipping talented young managers with training, experiences, and relationships that will launch them into leadership roles. Addressing the attendees of both the New York and DC celebrations, Princeton AlumniCorps President Kathy Miller ’77 detailed the goals of the program. “We help very talented young nonprofit managers grow into confident, skillful, and resilient leaders with more support, tools and practical knowledge than is available on the job, and with access to insights and connections they couldn’t easily reach.” She noted that the program’s emphasis on collaboration and networking within each cohort generates connections and partnerships that continue to serve participants and prevent isolation after they leave the program. In discussing what she gained from (continued on page 2) Aspen Institute Honors Rainah Berlowitz ’97 for Arts Education Work Rainah Berlowitz ’97 has been working with Education Through Music (ETM) since his Project 55 fellowship placement in 1997. He now serves as the Director of Operations and last year he was awarded a prestigious Fellowship for Emerging Nonprofit Leaders from the Aspen Institute. We recently talked to him about his work, AlumniCorps, and the Aspen Institute fellowship. You have been working with ETM for more than 15 years, beginning as a PP55 fellow. What has motivated you to continue you work for social change through ETM? I believe that education - which to me includes music and arts education - is critical to helping all people reach their full potential. I was fortunate to have music class in elementary school, but it was always presented as “extra- curricular.” It didn’t bother me so much at the time, but in high school my questions about how the world worked were less about what and how and more about why. Then music and art became much more important. I began studying them more or less independently, because in high school they were deemed even less “curricular” than in elementary school. After a while, I stopped seeing music and art as being divided from other subjects. Seeing connections helped me learn things more quickly and made everything I learned more useful and meaningful. At the heart of ETM’s mission is the idea that learning in music supports learning in general, and that it provides the most transferable benefits when taught as a core discipline. It was the right fit. I continue my nonprofit work in part because I believe our vision is achievable, that all children in the US can have access to a high-quality music education, and I want to see it through to the best of my ability. It’s challenging work that I enjoy. And to be honest, I also continue here because of the leadership of our Executive Director Katherine Damkohler, who has been here since I started; the support of our
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Transcript
Emerging Leaders Expansion Year Ends with DC and NYC Celebrations
In This Issue:
1 - 2 Spotlight: Rainah Berlowitz ’97
1 & 3 Emerging Leaders Celebrate
4 A Fellow’s Experience
5 Listening to Our Partner Organizations
6-7 Regional Updates
Volume 16, Number 1 Winter 2013
Emerging Leaders
is Now Accepting
Applications!
(continued on page 3)
In January, members of the nonprofit
community gathered in Washington, DC and
New York City to congratulate the newly
graduated Emerging Leaders Class of 2013.
AlumniCorps Board and staff members,
participants, employers, mentors, family
members, and other supporters helped to
celebrate the success of the program.
The receptions on January 11th and 17th
culminated the second year of the program in
Washington, DC and the first year in New
York. Beginning in June 2012, participants
gathered for monthly sessions featuring skill
development activities, peer and facilitator
coaching, and discussions with nonprofit
executives who shared their expertise and
insights. Emerging Leaders participants
implemented their learned skills and
leadership competencies through stretch
projects designed in collaboration with their
employers. The program’s goal is to build the
capacity of the nonprofit sector to address
complex public issues by equipping talented
young managers with training, experiences,
and relationships that will launch them into
leadership roles.
Addressing the attendees of both the New
York and DC celebrations, Princeton
AlumniCorps President Kathy Miller ’77
detailed the goals of the program. “We help
very talented young nonprofit managers grow
into confident, skillful, and resilient leaders
with more support, tools and practical
knowledge than is available on the job, and
with access to insights and connections they
couldn’t easily reach.” She noted that the
program’s emphasis on collaboration and
networking within each cohort generates
connections and partnerships that continue to
serve participants and prevent isolation after
they leave the program.
In discussing what she gained from
(continued on page 2)
Aspen Institute Honors Rainah Berlowitz ’97 for Arts Education Work
Rainah Berlowitz ’97 has been working with Education Through Music (ETM)
since his Project 55 fellowship placement in 1997. He now serves as the Director of Operations and last year he
was awarded a prestigious Fellowship for Emerging Nonprofit Leaders from the Aspen Institute. We recently talked to
him about his work, AlumniCorps, and the Aspen Institute fellowship.
You have been working with ETM for
more than 15 years, beginning as a
PP55 fellow. What has motivated you
to continue you work for social change
through ETM?
I believe that education - which to me includes music and arts education - is
critical to helping all people reach their full potential. I was fortunate to have
music class in elementary school, but it was always presented as “extra-
curricular.” It didn’t bother me so much at the time, but in high school my questions about how the world worked
were less about what and how and more about why. Then music and art became much more important. I began studying
them more or less independently, because in high school they were deemed even less “curricular” than in
elementary school. After a while, I stopped seeing music and art as being
divided from other subjects. Seeing connections helped me learn things more quickly and made everything I learned
more useful and meaningful. At the heart of ETM’s mission is the idea that learning in music supports learning in
general, and that it provides the most transferable benefits when taught as a
core discipline. It was the right fit. I continue my nonprofit work in part
because I believe our vision is achievable, that all children in the US
can have access to a high-quality music education, and I want to see it through to the best of my ability. It’s challenging
work that I enjoy. And to be honest, I also continue here because of the leadership of our Executive Director
Katherine Damkohler, who has been here since I started; the support of our
Page 2 Shared Effort
Spotlight: Rainah Berlowitz ’97
board; and the sense of shared effort and achievement I felt with my co-workers,
including those who have come and gone over the past 15 years. I’ve had a somewhat rare opportunity to build the
rungs on my career ladder, to be entrepreneurial in my work right out of college. That experience gives me a
sense of ownership and belonging that I’d say have been their own rewards. I also would be remiss if I didn’t say
something about Giving Opportunities to Others, (GOTO). In 2001, my
AlumniCorps mentee Cameron Snaith ‘00 founded GOTO to engage young professional volunteers in raising money
for summer arts camp scholarships for kids who otherwise wouldn’t be able to go. My volunteer work with GOTO
provided me with innumerable opportunities to develop leadership skills
and further reinforced the strong feeling I had about the virtue and importance of the sector. Over ten years later, I’m still
an active GOTO volunteer, currently serving as board chair.
Can you speak about your experience
in helping grow ETM? What have
been some milestones of your work?
Helping to grow ETM has been an
adventure. Getting major funding, getting rejected for major funding, going through growing pains, and especially
seeing teammates come and go formed the basis for many emotional ups and downs. There have more than a few
times that I’ve felt like Charlie Brown trying to kick the football, only to have it
yanked away. I think the best part has been working on developing a team that can do what we set out to accomplish
most of the time. One of the milestones in ETM’s growth was an $800,000+ US
Department of Education award we received from 2005 to 2008 to evaluate,
define, and disseminate our music education model. It was a unique accomplishment because it was
incredibly selective. An enormous amount of work went into that proposal, but we pursued it despite the likelihood
of rejection. Credit for that also needs to be shared with AlumniCorps Project 55
fellows Katherine Canning ’97 and Amy Muehlbauer ‘05. The other big milestone was the start
of our Licensed Affiliate organizations in other parts of the US, starting in Los Angeles with ETM-LA in 2006, led by
Victoria Lanier ’99. Our second affiliate in San Francisco, ETM-Bay Area, was founded in 2008 and is currently led by
Dylan Tatz ‘06. Trying to replicate or scale any program or business model is a
challenge, and it’s one I believe we’re going to meet, benefiting thousands more children than we could on our own.
Having worked with Princeton
AlumniCorps in multiple capacities -
mentor, community partner, fellow -
why do you continue to work with the
organization, and what originally appealed you?
In addition to gratitude for the opportunity to experience an enlightening and meaningful fellowship
that turned into an enlightening and meaningful career, it was the group’s focus on creating systemic change and
on developing leadership among the fellows. I was inspired by the friendship
and example of AlumniCorps greats like Chet Safian ’55, Sam Suratt ’55 and Judy Suratt, Pete Milano ’55, John Fish
’55, Margaret Crotty ’94, and many others. I enjoyed the opportunities to learn more about the social sector. Those
events made a career in nonprofits seem more viable at a time when my frame of
reference was very limited. The opportunity to connect with the Project 55 fellows is always rewarding,
and the opportunity to make use of their skills and passion as staff members is a privilege. Though AlumniCorps has
become an ever more popular choice for
Princeton seniors, I still think it attracts the most capable and wise members of the undergraduate community.
Recently, you participated in a
fellowship for Emerging Nonprofit
Leaders with the Aspen Institute.
What excited you about the
fellowship? What did you gain from
the experience?
What excited me most was the chance to engage other people at similar points in their careers, but in very diverse fields
of nonprofit work, in answering the deeper questions about what we are
doing and why we are doing it. What is the “good society”? Are people basically good or evil? Is the role of the leader to
command or to empower? Is it wiser to work for change from outside the system or from within it? Where do human
rights come from? Who or what determines what they are? But more than
our collective answers to those questions, it was the process of responding to them that was the greatest
benefit. I had to dust off my close reading skills as we invited Plato, Aristotle, Machiavelli, Arthur Okun,
Harriet Taylor Mill, Martin Luther King, Confucius, and many other great
thinkers to lend their voices to the discussion. The facilitators made it difficult to get by with anything less than
a complete understanding of each point of a writer’s argument, and I’m grateful to them for that.
(continued from page 1)
(continued from page 1)
Emerging Leaders, Ayana Woods ’98, Director
of Education at the National Hemophilia
Foundation, stated “I have a better
understanding of my own path. I know what
sustains and drains me. I know what I need to do to make a difference in the nonprofit field. I leave the last session with heightened self
awareness, a wealth of knowledge, great skills, and great new set friends.” Employers expressed their gratitude for the
impact of the program on the work of their organizations. Rachael Swanson, Director of
Volunteer and Community Partnerships for the U.S. Fund for UNICEF, supervises New York Emerging Leader Taruna Devi Sadhoo.
In commenting on how Sadhoo’s participation yielded immediate results for the rest of her staff, Swanson said that “Our whole team has
read articles, taken reflection to a new level and has begun to take professional
development even more seriously than before. Taruna has also been able to use the skills and resources gained at Emerging
Leaders with her student leaders. I think the U.S. Fund for UNICEF has benefited
tremendously from the program.”
AlumniCorps will offer a third year of Emerging Leaders in DC and New York
beginning in June 2013. Applications are due
on March 15th and are open to:
Graduates of any college or university
With 2-8 years of full-time work, including
at least one year in the nonprofit sector
Who are currently employed in the nonprofit sector and have some degree of
management responsibilities.
Winter 2013 Page 3
Emerging Leaders Celebrate, Look Toward 2013-14
Emerging Leaders is Now Accepting
Applications at www.AlumniCorps.org!
Left: NYC
Emerging
Leaders Class of 2013
Below: Emerging
Leader Chimere
Stephens and his son Cayden with
AlumniCorps
President Kathy
Miller ’77
Left: DC
Emerging Leaders
Class of 2013
Right: Jennifer
Lockwood-Shabat
and
Emerging
Leader Lauren
Stillwell
Page 4 Shared Effort
A Fellow’s Experience: David Jean-Baptiste ’12
David Jean-Baptiste ’12 currently serves as a Project 55 fellow at the Better Boys
Foundation in Chicago. Princeton AlumniCorps asked him to write about his work, his mentorship experience, and
the regular seminars he attends
organized by the Chicago committee.
“Listen, tell me what we can do for
you. Think about it.” That’s what I often hear from my two mentors, Candace Jackson ‘00 and Emile Karafiol ‘55,
each time they take me out to dinner. My normal response is to just stare back with
a demure smile, half confused and half uneasy about the enormity of their request. Do I ask for general career
advice? Advice about law school? Maybe I should go big and outright ask for a job? No, that’s crazy. “I’ll get back
to you on that one,” I reply, effectively guaranteeing another awkward moment
at our next dinner date. This simple exchange captures the value of the Chicago Project 55
mentorship program. More than a means of getting a job or securing a free dinner (though I must confess, dinner is a nice
perk), the mentorship program offers a way of navigating safely and
comfortably the sometimes challenging transition between the Orange Bubble a n d t h e “ r e a l w o r l d . ”
And, oh, how real the world away from the Orange Bubble has gotten. Immaculately manicured lawns have
given way to unattended lots, gothic-style buildings have been replaced by
barely standing row houses, and an overwhelming sense of safety has been replaced by a heightened sense of
vigilance. On the West Side of Chicago—unlike the downtown loop, lakefront, and parks—there are no
majestic skyscrapers gracing the airspace, no wide-eyed tourists walking the streets, and barely any greenery to
break the grayness of the landscape. The lost potential demands your attention.
The “corner kids,” the boarded-up storefronts, and the jerky movements of the disheveled addict weary from drug
use all announce that what could have been or what could be has been muted by the weight of what is. This is North
Lawndale, a part of Chicago that never makes its way into travel brochures.
As a tutor at the Better Boys Foundation (BBF), an afterschool organization that offers creative
apprenticeships and tutoring to students between the ages of five and eighteen, I’ve witnessed firsthand the effects that
growing up in such an environment can have on young people. Far from being unaware of the implications of what they
see around them, the youth of North Lawndale keenly understand that the
odds are stacked against them, that most people have written them off, that societal benefits reach them last and its
ills reach them first. It’s the kind of awareness that makes young people here deeply skeptical, not just of their own
abilities, but also of the people and institutions that inhabit their community.
Through my daily interactions with my students, one thing has become abundantly clear: Despite the
circumstances of their physical environment, my students remain hopeful—hopeful that one day they’ll
leave North Lawndale, attend college, and secure for themselves lives better
than distant onlookers think are possible. This and other insights come together during our weekly seminars, which we
share with Public Interest Program fellows from Northwestern and the University of Chicago. We come from
our respective universities bearing our
school pride, interests, worldviews, and insights. Some fellows are particularly
concerned about LGBT issues, some about the quality of inner city schools, and others, still, about inequality in the
workplace. At the center of our seminars is usually a local speaker—the head of a nonprofit organization or a public
official—who endures the heat of our interrogation. It all makes for a robust and sometimes colorful conversation, a
precious commodity when adjusting to life without lectures and precepts.
Together, we’ve gone toe to toe with Bill Ayers about the legitimacy of the recent Chicago Teachers Union strike, explored
Chicago’s dire fiscal challenges with State Senator Heather Steans ‘85, and delved into the intricacies of the Federal
court system with Assistant US Attorney Sharon Fairley ‘82 as our guide.
What has emerged for us fellows—out of this combination of on-the-ground experiences, seminars, mentors, and
friendships—is not any grand epiphany, or a simple solution to Chicago’s or our nation’s many challenges, but instead a
mature sense of our limitations both as individuals and as a group. No, we haven’t abandoned our ideals, goals, and
aspirations, but, rather, we’ve learned that if we are to affect real change, then
we must become more intimate with our various causes. Don’t spread yourself too thin and too broadly. Start at the
local level, and focus narrowly, intensely, and passionately on those causes. As a result of what we’re
learning in our fellowships, we’re growing up fast, and with our hopes
bruised but intact.
Winter 2013 Page 5
Listening to Our Partner Organizations:
Please consider supporting AlumniCorps and help us meet our goal before June 30th. Here are two ways to give:
Make a secure credit card donation online at www.alumnicorps.org.
Mail your donation to: Princeton AlumniCorps, 12 Stockton Street, Princeton, NJ 08540
For more information, contact Sandy Fernandez, Development Director at 609-921-8808 Ext. 7 or
[email protected]. On behalf of all our program participants and organizational partners, thank you
for your support of our work in the public interest!
Jim Farrin ’58, Executive Director of the Princeton-based
Petey Greene Prisoner Assistance Program, shares his
thoughts on how a partnership with Princeton
AlumniCorps has contributed to his organization.
Community Volunteers recently recruited two graduates—
Haley White ’12 and Beverly Thomison-Sadia ’85—to
develop a national expansion plan for the Petey Greene
prison education program.
The Petey Greene Prisoner Assistance Program takes
Princeton University students and community members to
nearby prisons to help incarcerated students improve their
reading, writing, and math skills. We are currently
operating in two prisons in Bordentown, New Jersey:
Albert C. Wagner and Garden State Youth Correctional
Facility, which are adjacent to each other about thirty five
miles away from campus. The program is five years old
and has expanded to four additional colleges in New
Jersey. Our student leadership group has just set up a club
on campus called SPEAR (Students for Prison Education
and Reform). Our vision is to take our program national,
and we needed to have a business plan developed to act as
a roadmap for our expansion.
Princeton AlumniCorps recruited two Princeton alumni:
Haley White ’12, who volunteered with Petey Greene as an
undergraduate, and Beverly Thomison-Sadia ’85, a former
health care project executive. We three intergenerational
Princeton graduates are working to complete an expansion
plan by April to present to the Petey Greene board. There is
no way that this would be possible without Haley and
Beverly. I am very grateful for their participation at this
crucial stage of our growth!
For information about other Community Volunteers
projects, visit www.AlumniCorps.org.
Raised as of
January 31: $268,850 from
186 donors
We need your help
to reach 500 donors!
At the end of January, Princeton AlumniCorps had raised $268,850 from 186 donors. We are very grateful to those who
have already given, and thank you for your support! We still have work to do to meet our June 30th fiscal year-end goal of $422,500 and 500 donors. We can only reach these goals with
your help. All of our programs build civic leadership and our collective capacity to address public issues. Day by day, we are
engaging a greater number of alumni at all stages of their civic lives. From the moment they walk through Fitzrandolph Gate as Project 55 Fellows through the crucial early stages of
their careers as change agents to later on when they may be looking for new ways to put their experience and talent to
work in the public interest, alumni find community,
mentorship, learning, and meaningful opportunities to contribute to social change through AlumniCorps.
The support of our donors is essential to the vitality of the organization and the high-quality programs we continue to offer. We cannot do this alone but only with your involvement
and financial contributions. There are many different ways to think about your giving to AlumniCorps. You can make a gift to a particular program, geographic location, or a fellow or
Emerging Leader. In-kind donations such as space, refreshments for events, airline miles, and video and photography equipment are also appreciated. By joining the
Keystone Society with a planned gift, you ensure our work will continue for decades to come.