L.A. Works Insider May 2012 
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Visit L.A. WORKS' Site for More Volunteer Opportunities
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Media Spotlight:
Community Day in the news with L.A. Works
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L.A. Works Day Corporate Sponsorship Opportunities
Join L.A. Works Day Sponsors Supporting the LAFD Training Center beautification projects and Service Crawl 2012:
L.A. Works began organizing Days of Service events in 1991 to give companies a civic opportunity to impact their community. Since then hundreds of businesses have helped mobilize tens of thousands of volunteers to make a difference in Los Angeles.
Companies choose to get involved for a variety of reasons:
* building their brand with the public;
* enhancing corporate culture, boosting team-work, and productivity through improved employee morale; and
* showing support for improving lives in local communities.
To learn more about corporate fiscal sponsorship opportunities for L.A. Works Day 2012, please email L.A. Works Executive Director, Debbie Brutchey. |
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Community Day: 20 Years Since the King Verdict Sparked the LA Riots
On April 28 L.A. Works volunteers commemorated the civil response to the community unrest 20 years ago as they planted herbs, spread mulch, pulled weeds, and cleared the site where a grocery store had burned down during the '92 riots. The site had remained empty until last year when volunteers from L.A. Works put in the first big push in transforming the site into a community garden. In partnership with Community Services Unlimited and Community Build, by this time next year the garden will have an arbor and gravel path, a fountain with benches for the community and raised beds where vegetables, fruit and herbs will be grown in order to provide the community with affordable, healthy produce. The spirit of hope and promise for the future of this neighborhood was in the hearts and minds of the volunteers as they looked forward and got to work at this site on this special day.
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L.A. Works Enrich & Serve Session 1:
Curb the Conflict
This new Enrich and Serve series is designed to provide volunteers with an opportunity to learn new skills and make a deeper connection to service, other volunteers, and the greater community. Our a partnership with Dale Carnegie Training LA, experts in delivering professional trainings, allows us to offer high quality environments for learning, collaborating, and growing as citizens. Each quarter pre-project workshops will focus on an important personal and professional skill. Volunteers will then have the opportunity to put their learning to action as they spend the next half of the time, volunteering at one of L.A. Works’ regular community service projects. The first Enrich & Serve Series focuses on an issue we've all faced. But do we face it the way we wish we could? This June, learn the tools of the trade in this conflict resolution workshop followed by our monthly volunteer project Activities With Kids at Zahn Shelter. MORE>>>
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L.A. Works Day 2012 with LAFD
The heroic Los Angeles firefighters are exceptionally trained thanks to the time they dedicate to training at the Frank Hotchkin Memorial Training Center in Elysian Park. As a thanks to their selfless acts of courage and support of the entire Los Angeles community, L.A. Works has some big plans in motion for this year’s L.A. Works Day of Service in July. With the generous support of donors, corporations, skilled laborers, and dedicated volunteers, we will be revitalizing, landscaping, painting and renovating. We can't do it without your help! Space for community volunteers will open in June but in the meantime, if you would like to become a leader for the day, click HERE and for corporate fiscal sponsorship opportunities, click HERE.
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New Project Launch: Sort to Support @ Baby2Baby
L.A. Works’ newest nonprofit partner, Baby2Baby supplies families in need with essential baby gear and clothing for their children up to age 12. By distributing new and gently used items to over 40 non-profit organizations, Baby2Baby reaches over 50,000 children per year. Lara Scheunemann, L.A. Works Volunteer Leader, will be leading projects on Friday afternoon, starting May 18. Volunteers will sort through donations of a variety of clothes, toys and other baby and child gear for the best quality items and shelve them in their proper locations at Baby2Baby’s main office. Other projects may include assembling specific packages to be distributed to underserved families at special events. MORE>>>
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Leadership with L.A. Works
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Volunteer Leadership Project Openings
As our volunteer community is well-aware, each month L.A. Works is able to offer nearly 90 opportunities at nonprofit across LA thanks to our volunteer leadership. We could not offer such a diversity of opportunities without the dedication and commitment of our volunteers. If you have participated in a few of these projects and would like to take a larger leadership role, why not attend our leadership training and then become a volunteer leader at one of the existing projects that need new leaders like:
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Second Annual Service Crawl, Committee
Our Service Crawl 2012 Planning Committee is already underway! With such a strong, passionate, energetic group of folks working to design and spearhead it, Los Angeles is in store for another momentous, unique way to volunteer. Sign up to join the planning today! MORE>>>
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Behind the Scenes at L.A. Works
We have some exciting new volunteer leadership opportunities at L.A. Works. Get a behind the scenes look at how we support nonprofits all across LA by helping in some unique positions like Talent Scout, Matchmaker, and Producer MORE>>>
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Forest City Digs VA Garden
For several years Forest City West has reached out to L.A. Works to coordinate their employees’ community service day. From renovation projects at the Center for Lifelong Learners to LAUSD school revitalization work to gardening with the River Center, Forest City has touched the lives of countless Angelenos. This May, volunteers from Forest City will be helping at a garden center adjacent to the West LA Veterans Administrations building and hospital where the veterans enjoy fresh vegetables from the garden. Volunteers will be clearing land, relocating bushes, and working in the nursery.
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Adconion Media Group @ Angel's Flight
The Angel’s Flight transitional living facility for teens is in transition itself. The teens typically would only stay there for a short period of time before moving on to a more permanent living space. Unfortunately, the home is now having trouble placing the kids and so they are staying there for a longer period of time. In this first time working with L.A. Works, 100 volunteers from Adconion spent one afternoon renovating the outside recreation area (fixing the basketball courts, creating an exercise space, and personalizing the grounds to give it a more "homey feel"), general painting, and mural projects throughout the space. Some photos HERE>>>
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Spotlight: Earth Day of Service
L.A. Works volunteers celebrated Earth Day at the VA Garden in Westwood and at Carnegie Middle School in Carson. At the VA Garden the volunteers, along with resident veterans, got a serious workout with dismantling large picnic tables (to be up-cycled into park bench shade structures on the VA Grounds), demo-ing an old greenhouse structure and clearing ground for more planting. At Carnegie Middle School volunteers cleared an outdoor classroom space to be used by English and Science classes weekly. Both projects gave these volunteers the opportunity to get dirty and commune with the Earth... by being covered with it! For some pictures from these events, click HERE>>>
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Celebrating L.A. Works' Spring Season of Service: Environmental Sustainability
In the spirit of our Spring Season of Service, Bill Seldeen, the Volunteer Project Leader of one of our successful environmentally-themed projects, Ballona Wetlands Restoration, shares the importance of the project and its impact on our community and our volunteers.
"The Ballona Wetlands is a uniquely Los Angeles landscape. The wetlands were once thousands of acres of marshland that naturally kept coastal waters clean and was home to native birds, animals and plant life. Unfortunately, there is not much left of it today. With the help of L.A. Works volunteers we're able to restore the wetlands by removing invasive species, keeping the wetlands clean, and re-planting native flora. As volunteers engage in the project they get to learn about the vital role the wetlands used to play - and could play again. The thing is, while we are restoring the wetlands, what is really going on is that the wetlands are restoring us as volunteers. There is something about discovering nature so close to home and immersing yourself in it for a period of time. After our hard day's work we all take that spirit home with us. It's good to teach environmentalism in the classroom or learn through the internet, but it's another thing to experience it first-hand and personally connect with it right where we live. I think that is one of the best ways to preserve our natural landscapes."
Learn more and join us for the next project, MORE>>>
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Volunteer Spotlight: Margaret Conway
Remember the days when L.A. Works used to mail out paper calendars? Well, that’s one of Margaret Conway’s first memories when she first joined L.A. Works in the early 1990s and began volunteering for many of the projects we still see today including Angel’s Flight, Zahn Shelter and Children of the Night. Things have certainly changed and gotten “more sophisticated” from the website to project leading, according to Margaret. In the beginning, she led a variety of projects every month, but as the program expanded leaders began focusing on leading one project for a longer period of time to develop more consistency and impact. MORE>>>
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Creative Ways to Give Back
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Getting Your Company Involved in L.A. Works
We hope you enjoy how easy it is to volunteer through L.A. Works, now, why not include your colleagues in the mix. Whether you are a part of a company of 25 or 25000, we want to help you help them make a difference. For more information on ways we work with our corporate partners, visit our website, by clicking here, and then reach out to Debbie for more information.
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Make a donation as a gift to honor a birthday, anniversary, or just because! Specify which social issue you want your dollars to go to and we’ll send the honoree a  personalized email acknowledging that cause with your gift.
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