Meet the Challenge Mural

Our completed Meet the Challenge mural of the Los Angeles Harbor.

On Saturday, February 1, we hosted the Meet the Challenge Mural Project in the San Pedro Boys & Girls Club gym. The mural project was inspired by our Meet the Challenge matching grant opportunity by an anonymous donor who has pledged to match all new or upgraded donations, up to $250,000, which would allow the Club to significantly expand and improve programming for harbor area youth in academics, arts and athletics.

Board President Yvonne Bogdanovich, Board VP Tamara Powers, 
Board member Kate Cocke and Executive Director Mike Lansing 
painting with Club youth.

Our Fine Arts Director Sandra Avila designed a 30’ by 14’ traveling mural of iconic Los Angeles harbor sights including the Port of LA, the Korean Bell of Friendship, Banning House and the Vincent Thomas Bridge stretching across the mural. We opened our San Pedro Club to long-standing friends of the Club and new supporters in the community to join our youth in painting the outlined design. 

LAPD Harbor Division Captain Nancy Lauer with our youth.

Keystone and Torch Club youth from our three Clubs set to work right away when the project started with assistance from local LAFD Station 48 and LAPD Harbor Division volunteers. Community leaders stopped by throughout the day and gravitated to the areas of the mural that held a special significance for them. Port Commissioner Anthony Pirozzi and family helped color in a freighter docking in the Port, while Wilmington Chamber Executive Director Dan Hoffman painted the area of the mural depicting Avalon Boulevard.

Petros Papadakis of Fox Sports Radio helping out with our mural.

Friends of the Club, Petros Papadakis of Fox Sports Radio and Olympic Gold Medalist Eric Fonoimoana brought their athletic enthusiasm to the project. Eric attended with high school volleyball player volunteers from the Dig 4 Kids Foundation. In support of a local arts project, San Pedro Arts Association Vice President Steve Magee and Warner Grand Theater Manager Lee Sweet attended to assist and view the progress of the community’s young artists.

Port Commissioner Anthony Pirozzi painting in a freighter in our mural.

We received much support from the Palos Verdes community with painting assistance from National Charity League Palos Verdes Chapter mother-daughter team volunteers who donated snacks for the event. Representatives from Palos Verdes Young Professionals, which selected our organization as their Nonprofit of 2014 volunteered their time to work alongside Club youth in creating the inspirational depiction.

The traveling mural will soon be making its way through Los Angeles Harbor Boys & Girls Club sites and will make appearances at community events to share with a wider audience. Thanks to all of our volunteer painters for Meeting the Challenge!

Thanks, LAFD Station 48, for the support!

Cash for College at Local High Schools

We hosted two Cash for College events at the end of January to provide parents and teens with the resources they need to apply for financial aid and scholarships. Our College Bound Director Yesenia Aguilar and College Bound Outreach Coordinator Marcey Abrons helped coordinate the events at San Pedro High School on January 29 and Banning High School on January 30 and provided one-on-one assistance to the families that attended.

Our Cash for College event at San Pedro High School.

The collaboration with the two local high schools, which we serve with a school Club site at each location, allowed us to more easily assist high school students in our communities with goals of attending college. The California Student Aid Commission (CSAC) provides the workshop tools and the presence of our College Bound Case Managers resulted in successful events at both schools.

The workshops focused on the FAFSA application and California Dream Act application. After bilingual presentations in English and Spanish about the opportunities available and steps necessary to apply, our College Bound team provided individual guidance on filling out the applications on computers provided by the schools. CSAC provides $1,000 scholarships, to be given at random, based on the amount of attendees who fill out a survey after the workshop. Because of our high attendance of 146 participants and 116 surveys completed at the San Pedro High School event, we secured five $1,000 scholarships and saw similar results at our Banning High School event.

Securing the resources necessary to attend college is a major component of our College Bound program. We host workshops for high school students at our San Pedro, Wilmington and Port of LA Clubs on different financial aid options and provide individual assistance on FAFSA and scholarship applications. We helped our 2013 high school graduates earn nearly $700,000 in scholarships and over $3,000,000 in financial aid. Our goal is to increase this number for our 2014 graduates as we serve more youth and help them overcome barriers that prevent them from accomplishing their goals.

Celebrating Black History Month

Our LA Harbor Clubs host a variety of cultural education events to broaden our Club members' knowledge of the history and diversity of their communities. According the Library of Congress, "National African American History Month (also known as Black History Month) in February celebrates the contributions that African Americans have made to American history in their struggles for freedom and equality and deepens our understanding of our Nation's history." We celebrated Black History Month all February with events for teens and younger youth.

Fine Arts students visit an African American art exhibit.

Our San Pedro Club High School Center hosted a series of movie screenings about prominent stories in the African American community. The movies included 42: The Jackie Robinson Story and The Butler. High School Center Director Cara Askew also organized a "Taste of Soul" potluck where our teens shared dishes they prepared, including peach cobbler, macaroni and cheese and collared greens. Arts Academy Instructor Darren Iacono and fine arts students visited the California African American Museum to learn about different African American styles of painting and sculpture.

Fine Arts Director Sandra Avila and Elementary School Center Coordinator Joshua Johnson organized a presentation for our Wilmington Club youth about African American history and music. Students learned how the first African Americans lived as slaves before fighting for their freedom and about the prominent contributions they made to all aspects of society. Our youth also learned about the history of corn bread and each received a piece.

Our educators at all three Clubs incorporated Black History Month into their lesson plans to help our youth better understand that African American history is important to all American history.

Our Wilmington Club students learned about African American history, music and food.

Partner Spotlight - Valero

Valero is a longtime partner of our organization that has provided our Clubs with essential resources, generous funds and great volunteers. Their support has been fundamental in helping our organization provide successful enrichment programming to the number of youth whom we serve.

Valero employees, including our Board Vice President Steve Faichney, have undertaken volunteer tasks such as painting inside of the Wilmington Boys & Girls Club, installing shelves in rooms and planting trees. The support we receive from generous business partners like Valero has enabled us to sustain and expand the services we offer to harbor area youth.

Board VP Steve Faichney presenting our Club with a contribution from Valero.