A Dream Come True

Sabrina and I just met to discuss everything that needs to get done now that our event is over.  The first thing we did was start to put together our expense report of all of our expenses throughout the project.  We were a little confused about exactly how detailed this should be, so we still have some work to do on it but at least we got a good start.  We also sent out an email to Stefan and my dad thanking them again for everything they have done for us, as well as asking when they would like to get together for our debrief dinner (as Sabrina mentioned below).  This is extremely nice of them to do.  This will give us a great opportunity to not only talk about everything we did well and the overall success of the event, but it will also give us a great opportunity to talk about some things we might have been able to do better.  They understand, and we understand, that this was the first fundraising event we have ever put on.  As the readings demonstrated, there is always room for improvement, and bringing the external to judge the internal is a great way to generate more opinions on performance.

Sabrina and I also made a checklist of some other things that need to get done:

1.      Send Thank You notes to everyone who helped us:

·        Bob

·        Joanne

·        Kris

·        Dean Gemma

·        Formal thank you to Bill and Stefan

2.      Give out the rest of the raffle prizes to the winners

3.      We also need to talk to Stefan and my dad about exactly what to do with the money!

That’s all for now…more to come soon!

I apologize for not being able to post in a couple of days.  Unfortunately, I put off a lot of things I needed to do in order to make room for our event, which means I have been very busy that last couple of days trying to keep up everything!  On top of that, I am studying for the LSATS which is less than 2 weeks away! (very busy).

However, I finally have some time to sit down and reflect on our event.  Sabrina did a great job recapping everything that went on before and during our event, so I will try not to be too repetitive but offer my perspective on the event.

First of all, I would like to say that I believe our event was a great success!  We ended up with just under 60 people and raised a total of $1600.00.  We were a little disappointed with the turnout of the event because we had originally expected to have at least 100 people.  However, we also originally hoped to raise at least $1,000.00, which is a goal we were able to succeed.

Hopefully all of you got a chance to read our “behind the scenes” look at our event.  Luckily, we were able to get a wireless signal at the bowling alley, and we were able to sneak away for a couple of minutes to give some updates!  The few days leading up to the event, and the day of the event itself were extremely hectic.  There were a lot of last minute things that needed to get done, and we could all feel the urgency!

The beginning of the night was extremely stressful and disappointing.  Our event was supposed to start around 8:15, but unfortunately it did not end up starting until closer to 9.  At 8:15, there were only about 10 or 15 people there, which we did not feel was enough for the speaker.  At one point, we were all standing at the door looking back and forth between each other and the door just HOPING that someone (anyone!) would show up for our event.  It felt like you were having a big birthday party and no one wanted to come.  We really were afraid that we would insult Kris by not having a lot of people there, but she is really so down to Earth that she was not worried about this at all.  We decided we would wait for some more people to show up and we ended up having about 25-30 people there to listen to Kris. 

Kris was such an amazing speaker.  Listening to everything she has been through, and everything her daughter has been through, really puts life into perspective and makes you not only admire people like her, but reflect on things in your life.  Not only that, it makes you want to make more of a difference.  After hearing her speak, I could feel the passion I have for the foundation beginning to rise once again.  Senge talked about the word inspiration, and how it comes from “inspire” which translates to mean, “to breathe life into”.  Kris inspired me, and breathed life into me that night.  I could finally see where the money we would raise would go.  It would be going to amazing people like Kris and Kris’ family, and it would be going to all of the children in the video that left me breathless. 

One girl in the video really touched my heart.  She was talking about her room and how much she liked what the foundation had done for her, and she said, “I just love it so much; I wish I could hug my whole room!!”.  This one sentence summarizes what this foundation is all about, and what this project was all about.  It’s about more than just raising money; it’s about making a difference.  You could see the excitement and the energy in this child’s voice.  She did not look chronically ill, or as if she had been through some horrible things in her lives, but she looked like a beautiful young girl who just had one of her biggest dreams come true.

After the speech and the video, everyone headed downstairs from the function room to the bowling alley and the tournament began.  The bowling alley held its word that our lanes would be open and ready for us when we needed them, and they were.  There were no problems inputting the teams into the computer either.  The bowling event was a lot of fun and we got some great video footage and pictures!  We announced the raffle winners and the tournament winners at the end. 

I can safely say that this will not be my last encounter with the Room to Dream foundation.  I made a personal commitment to make a difference through this event for our project.  On Wednesday night, while I was watching the video and listening to Kris speak, I made a new personal commitment to of continuous involvement in this charity.   I am attending another RTD fundraiser in December, and I am already on a wait list to participate in the next room makeover.  This relates back to one of the themes of the readings for this week.  Senge talked about the idea of having a vision of the future rather than just reacting to problems and having short term visions/solutions.  I could easily just be happy with the fact that I made a difference in the 2 months I worked with the Room to Dream foundation.  However, I know I can do more, and I know that I want to do more. 

One other thing I would like to touch upon is the fact that we could not have had as successful of an event that we had without the help of so many people.  One thing that Senge pointed out is that it is advantageous, not burdensome, to simply ask for help.  In the early stages of the project, many of our teams did not reach out and ask for help.  This may have been for a couple of reasons, one is that they may have been afraid of being rejected, or they may have tried to put it on their own shoulders to figure everything out.  I think that is exactly what happened to our group.  I think we began to feel like this is our project, our problem, and it was our responsibility to solve it.  Due to the systems we have grown up in this seems perfectly reasonable.  Teams have never been encouraged to help one another, and our groups have rarely been encouraged to build networks with people.  As we began to realize the value in asking for help and creating a vision (rather that just react to what was in front of us) things really began to take off.  I can specifically remember Sabrina and I having a conversation about how exciting it was to be “in the room” with passionate people whose creative energy was contagious.  I wish we had realized all of this in the early stages of our projects because I feel like it would have really helped us.

Jeff and I managed to get to the bowling alley approximately two hours before it started.  Although it sounds like a lot of time, I think it was necessary.  This amount of time gave us the opportunity to eat something prior to the event, set up our tables, and take care of any last minute things that we may not have considered until we got there.  I can almost assure you that there will be things you will entirely forget!  For instance, as Shaun was driving to the bowling alley he luckily remembered that the video camera didn’t come with tapes.  Fortunately, he was able to stop at a Walgreens and pick some up! I’m sure this was useful information for our MADD volunteers, who have an event coming up.  Shaun also brought us a case of water, which was much needed after a day of running around!  I also recommend brining scissors, markers, poster paper etc. You never know if you may need it!

Although the founder of Room to Dream did this for us, I think it is helpful to wear matching shirts the day of the event.  We had Room to Dream shirts on, and so did our volunteers, and this certainly helped our guests out.  If anyone had a question, they knew they could come to the people wearing the gray ‘Dream Team’ shirts.

As far as posters are concerned, we tried to make them very clear, concise, and informative.  We had three main posters, which contained, entrance information, sign up information, and raffle information.

From here on out, this post will be very similar to my written response number 13, but I feel as though the material here is prevalent, and should be shared with the other class as well as anyone else who has been following our blog. Because this was our first event, we were extremely anxious.  We weren’t particularly nervous about the amount of money we would raise, but instead, we were more nervous about bringing in a big crowd.  Looking back, we were a little hard on ourselves, but it was because we thought our remarkable speaker deserved a respectable crowd.   We managed to have approximately 35 people listen to Kris’ inspirational story, and 55 people overall, attend the event.

As we all welled up, I realized what an amazing person Kris is.  As Kris explained the various ways that Kayla’s life has improved, her motivating words clarified the tremendous impact that the Room to Dream Foundation has had on the lives of these families.  It was at this point that I became fully aware of the difference our little event will make in improving the life of another child.  The changes Kris had explained in Kayla’s behavior and demeanor were subtle, but made the world of a difference.  While reading, I was captivated by the Lakes Project, and I felt a connection to Senge’s comment, which states, “What is possible when talented people breathe life into products for a regenerative economy.”  Although the Room to Dream Foundation clearly has a different cause, Stefan’s initial passion has made enormous impacts, and his message/actions are contagious.  Essentially Stefan is trying to demonstrate what Senge is, a little can go a long way, every contribution counts, and there is no limit as to who can participate.  In fact, I think both would say the more the better, because Jeff, Shaun and I would agree that we didn’t realize until Wednesday, that we all have the potential to make a difference.

My group realized that as Senge explains, theory in practice gave us the absolute best understanding of what is/isn’t effective when planning a fundraiser.  Working alongside Stefan and Bill was an invaluable experience, and what we learned while going through the motions of organizing our event, we never would have learned in a book.  What’s even better is that Stefan wants to take us out to a post-fundraiser dinner.  Stefan explained that he would use this as an opportunity to tell us what we did well and where we could improve.  Reading Senge, I realized what an ideal situation Stefan has created for us.  Clearly we don’t have all the answers, and I’m sure this debrief will put us at an advantage to learn.

Ultimately, our group wanted to make a difference, get involved with a good cause and create awareness.  Our vision did just that.  We included and reached out to students that didn’t realize this foundation existed.  These students now have an interest and connection to this foundation that they previously lacked.  Stefan told us that he would be posting a picture of all of our attendees on the Room to Dream webpage in hopes of motivating others to contribute to the cause.  Stefan wants people to see that if we were able to do this, so isn’t everyone else.  It speaks to the fact that people can make a difference through their individual choices.

As usual, technology is used to facilitate all of this.  By Stefan putting us on his website, we’ll hopefully motivate others to raise money.  We are going to write something for this column and leave some contact information.  We realized the benefits of sharing information, and want to extend our knowledge and experiences to others.

*Jeff and Shaun will soon be blogging their perspectives of the event.  Until then I would like to thank our volunteers!! They were absolutely wonderful and crucial to the success of our event!

I apologize for not having posted sooner. I have been so busy! The night before the fundraiser I sat down and wrote a checklist of things that needed to be done prior to the event.  This was extremely helpful, and definitely better prepared us for the event.  I called Shaun, and the two of us went through all of the things that needed to be done the next day.  Our checklist included: picking up our technical equipment from media services, buying raffle containers, two cash boxes, two donation containers, markers, posters, pens, clip boards, envelopes etc. While Shaun and I were talking on the phone he quickly drafted a sign-in sheet for our event.  We also wanted to determine how we would price the event.  We knew we were going to have teams of four, but we wanted to offer our attendees a fair amount of games.  Shaun came up with a pretty good system.  We decided to give three games for $10 and five games for $15.  Since we were awarding the team with the highest two combined scores the winning prize, we felt as though our pricing system would give people a nice option.  If a team decided to choose the $10 option, they wouldn’t be at a disadvantage, because they would still be able to have their best two out of three games considered.  Unfortunately, Jeff wasn’t able to join in on the discussion; he had made plans prior to our selecting the date of our event.  We left off that we would talk about our checklist with him in class the next day.

Both Jeff, Shaun and I had the entire next day roped off to purchase the necessary materials, create posters & signage, and organize ourselves.

So everyone has left the bowling alley and the three of us are in the banquet hall alone….glowing!  We realized that we raised at least $1,500!!! We couldn’t be happier with our success.  Although we wished we could have had a larger crowd, we managed to bring in 53 students, and raised a substantial amount of money.  Based on the feedback we received throughout the event, people said they had a great time.  We truly couldn’t ask for more.  It is such a relief that our event went smoothly.

We are now looking forward to our debrief with Stefan and Bill.  They would like to take the three of us out to dinner and tell us what we did well and where we need to improve.  We are extremely excited about this! As we have been discussing the importance of avoiding complacency.  A performance evaluation is crucial, and we are lucky enough to have experienced people provide us with their knowledge and insight. In addition, all of our attendees loved Stefan, our speaker, and the Room to Dream DVD.  Anyways, this probably sounds like rambling.  I am too excited for words…I’ll blog something more coherent tomorrow.

So our event has now begun. It started off a little slow with people showing up. I guess it should have been expected given that we are dealing with college kids. We maybe should have developed a different system with them that gave them benefit to show up. The main reason we wanted people to arrive early was to listen to Stefan speak and Kris Biaggioti, a Room To Dream Mother.

Stefan welcomed everyone and talked a little about the Room to Dream Foundation and the ways in which they worked. He said this “little change in room makes such a big difference” in the lives of those whom they are serving. For these families, the makeover of the living environment is a leverage point for coping with and embracing the misfortune. They go and visit 30 days, 60 days,  and 6 months later and they’ll see kids doing homework more, the house will be clean, and much more. It has such a huge impact.

Kris then spoke about the impact that the Foundation has had on her. We’ll talk later about that speech because I don’t want to waste time blogging about it now but I think everyone was very moved by it and further energized in their support of this cause.

The room was a little less crowded than we would have hoped. More people showed up during the time that she was speaking but now we are off to bowl.

-SRD

Sabrina, Jeff, and I are at the bowling alley. Sabrina and Jeff got here before I did and started making some signs to direct people at the alley. There is a function room on the second floor where we are having our speaker and we just need to make sure people know to get up there. 

Now we are trying to set up some of the AV stuff for the speaker and a short dvd we want to show. Everything is prepared for gametime. Let’s just hope people show up….

-SRD

Hey everyone!

For those of you that DO NOT know….our event is in 3 ½ hours!!!!  I’m sure many of you are wondering why I am sitting here blogging when I should be doing some last minute preparations, but that is actually exactly what we are doing!  Shaun, Sabrina, and I are all at Sabrina’s house making posters and some other miscellaneous things, and we are leaving in about an hour or so.  We absolutely feel a sense of urgency.  I think we can now say (to some extent) what the people in the reading about feeding the homeless felt like! We are anxious yet really excited.

Our plan is to try to give you a “behind the scenes look” at what is going on at our event.  We will have a computer there so if we can find a few minutes we will quickly give everyone (at least those who could not attend) a quick update of how everything is going….wish us luck!!!!!