Professor Sabir's Posse

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Lauryn Helling

Mrs. Wanda Sabir

English 201B

13 May 2009

Alameda Meals on Wheels

As one ages and the good times roll by, it becomes harder to physically do

things on your own. Whether it be because of a disability or because old age

caught up to you. No one wants to feel dependent on another, but sometimes your

physical body leaves you no other choice. There comes a time when you find it difficult to

get out of bed, wash yourself, or even put together a decent meal. Luckily, there are those

few good people that want to help the disabled in any way, shape, or form. Alameda Meals

on Wheels is a foundation that helps make the days of the disabled go a little less stressful

and a lot more relaxing. Social entrepreneur is defined as "A person who uses creative

business practice to start a social services organization." (Dictionary.com) The director of

AMOW, and social entrepreneur herself, Rosemary Reilly along with a number of different

chairmen commit to the success of this great program. With the economy in such bad shape

as it is, it's leaving retirees no other choice but to go back to work. One could have worked

for over 50 years but when the prices of gas, food, and clothing rise, who else is going to

be able to pay for them? The resources are becoming more scarce as we speak. It's going to

be a long while until this country gets back on top of things. The Alameda Meals on

Wheels is happy to help during this tragic time. They deliver mid-day meals to any person

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that feels that they don't have the ability to create their own meal. Some might think that you

would have to be a certain age to have this kind of help considering more than half of the

customers they deliver to are over the age of 50, but the truth is that there is no age limit and

you don't have to be on disability to receive this help. Although AMOW limits their

deliveries to residents in Alameda, there are a number of different Meals on Wheels in other

cities across Alameda County. Besides the delivery of food to the residents, they came up

with another program called the Alameda Friendly Visitors Program in September of 2004.

This is for if volunteers want to visit the residents they could either visit them at the

hospital, or their home and keep them company for a few extra hours out of the day. Kathy

Miranda, director of Alameda Friendly Visitors Program, and Rosemary Reilly have

changed lives in more ways than one, and gave the people who want to help an easy access

to do so.

Founded in 1973, Alameda Meals on Wheels is no stranger to this city. AMOW

delivers seven days a week, holidays included to roughly about 140 residents of Alameda.

This organization is locally funded, and has volunteers deliver the meals. These volunteers

range from the age of 7 through 65. Most of the volunteers are teenagers in high

school who get service hours for the delivery of a meal once a week. These special meals

are made by the staff at Bay View Nursing and Rehabilitation Center and are kept in a tin

container to keep the food hot, and fresh for the residents. The cost to have a meal everyday

is determined upon if the customer is comfortable with it. Some customers don't pay

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anything while some pay the maximum expense which is $6.00. Founder and committed

board member for 25 years, Hugh Tebault passed away in May of 2007. This shocking,

and sad news did not stop them from becoming more of a success just as Tebault wanted.

There are many chairpersons that help this program run smoothly. One of which is Ed

Kofman. He joined the team in 1990 and hasn't stopped yet. Some of the roles that he's

served were leading the board, refining the mission, giving out roles and responsibilities of

board members, holding the position of office of treasurer for 7 years, and the President on

the Board for about 9 years now.

The Alameda Friendly Visitors Program was founded in September of 2004 and

Kathy Miranda is now the director. This program is to help cure the loneliness of a senior

who is stuck in a hospital bed all day and sees no one except for nurses and doctors or

stuck at home with no ability to go outside and no one to be around. The hours spent with

the recipients is limited to their interests, and physical mobility. This is very different from

delivering meals, this requires a mass amount of questions for both the volunteer and the

recipient. First, the recipients are interviewed and asked questions based on personality,

certain needs, hobbies and such. The volunteers are also interviewed with similar

questions, and they would be trained, and given a full background check. When the results

are in, Kathy would pick the matches that are most compatible and friendships that were

formed from the beginning would now have an even stronger bond at the end. Recipients,

from the very start, have said nothing but positive comments that have truly helped them

with their long days. "My visitors are absolutely wonderful! We talk about families, our
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problems and the world. This makes me feel like I am a part of the outside world." Says

recipient of the AFVP.

With a program so widely known, it's only fair that it has an outrageous amount of

sponsors helping it out. AMOW has about 32 different businesses that sponsor them.

These sponsors range from Alameda Magazine, Bank of Alameda, Peet's Coffee,

and Wal-Mart. This organization is a house-hold name by now. Volunteer work can be

more rewarding than someone could imagine. The feeling of putting a smile on someone's

face for doing something as little as delivering their lunch says a thousand words. The time

and energy that some of these directors put into this program are reasons why it's so

successful. It takes a lot to be the need of someone on disability, or to be the one putting

that smile on an elderly woman's face. But the committed volunteers, and the unbreakable

chairmen know what their doing. Coming from a first-hand experience, seeing their smiling

faces always puts a smile on the volunteer's faces. It doesn't matter if you get lost on the

way to the house, or you forget their small snow-globe as a special treat when delivering

near Christmas time, all that matters to them is knowing that they had someone care enough

about them to wake up every morning and feed them when they couldn't do it themselves.

The recipients will be forever grateful for this cause. Alameda Meals on Wheels' great

success will live until the end of time. It doesn't take much time to do something that means

the world to someone else.




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Bibliography

http://www.alamedamealsonwheels.org/about_amow.html

http://www.alamedamealsonwheels.org/about_afv.html

http://www.alamedamealsonwheels.org/assets/files/Newsletters/AMOW%20Newsletter%20Fall%202007.pdf

http://www.alamedamealsonwheels.org/assets/files/Newsletters/AMOW_Newsletter_Spring_2007.pdf

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/social%20entrepreneur

Rosemary Reilly - Director of Alameda Meals on Wheels
 

So 1
Christine So

Professor Sabir

English 201 B

5 May 2009

Niko Everett: Girls For a Change


"The simple act of listening and believing in [the girls] meant the world to them. Having

an adult in their life that they could talk to without judgment changed the way they thought about

themselves and their world." says Coaches from Girls For a Change. Now it's becoming harder

and harder for young women to find positive role models. It's difficult when you do not have

someone there to look up to for support or advice, and in result of that, some choose the wrong

path and make bad decisions. Girls for a Change is here to help and guide these young ladies and

women to change for the better and also help them help others. GFC gives these young ladies and

women the opportunity to see outside of how they were living and how the environment can

change all together if they can help one another out. Although Niko Everett did not experience

pregnancy, drugs, and gang activities, she had an interest in helping those young girls and women

into the right path because inspiring these ladies to making extraordinary decisions and seeing

the outcome touched her heart. Social entrepreneur is someone who recognizes a social problem

and uses entrepreneurial principles to organize, create, and mange a venture to make social

change.

Girls For A Change is an organization that helps teens and women change and also lead

social change. This organization started in 2002 in San Jose, CA and has been really successful

ever since. GFC was founded by a social entrepreneur, Niko Everett, who is also the co-founder

of Young Women Social Entrepreneur. Everett grew up in New York and was the first person in

her family to go

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to college, her mother was a waitress and her father was a carpenter. After graduating college

Everett moved to California to help watch a family friend's house, she worked as a waitress in a

restaurant. Everett was very unhappy and had no friends. She envied the professionals that would
come in the restaurant to eat, so Everett went out and searched for a job. Everett found a job and

started working at Cross Cultural Community Center, leading a self esteem workshop, then Girl

Scouts where she worked with young teen girls who were in middle school in the low income

neighborhoods. Everett herself grew up in the low income neighborhood as a child. Everett

started out from scratch not having any knowledge in this type of work. Everett majored in a

graphic design and art history, but really enjoyed helping females but never seen it as a job.

Everett realized more women doubted themselves than men. Working with many middle school

girls, Everett noticed a lot of them had low egos and wanted to change that.

At first, Everett had a job as a public speaking teacher, was also a dorm mother and was

reading about adolescent girls and was intrigued by it and thought to herself that it'd be a great

job. Everett sent out her resume to multiple organizations but none of them responded and she

was really crushed. Observing these girls who have no one to go to for support and just dealing

with difficulties in life just caught her attention. Working with these young girls really motivated

her. Girls need that positive role model to look up to when things get tough and GFC helped

many.

Girls who have participated in this organization gained many friends and support. They don't

only help and support the girls but also encourage these girls to want to change the community

for the better. Everett wanted to help let these girls know that if you set your mind on something,

you can make it happen. There are girls out there that give up on hope and for the women in GFC

who wants to lend a helping hand really shows these girls that things can come around.

Everett got the community's support for the project by donation, corporate sponsorship,

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and in-kind donations. She had investors and corporate partners from Sephora Inc, Bank of

America, Intel and American Express. She worked really hard to raise money to fund Girls for a

Change national expansion. GFC has spread to other communities outside of the Bay Area and

California; Baltimore, Philadelphia, Phoenix, Richmond, VA., Silicon Valley and even

international for example India. It has impacted many lives all over. GFC teamed up with

Sephora to help open the eyes of the women and girls that they are powerful, brilliant, and

beautiful. The money purchased to a Sephora bag, $3 goes to donating to GFC.


Everett gained experience in helping people set their minds to something and help them

accomplish things. She started out with very little friends when she first moved here in California

and after finding her orgnaization, she has gained many friends. Most of her close friends are

from her organization. She has also won many awards and honors such as Draper Richards

Foundation fellowship for social entrepreneurs in 2007, one o the "40 under 40" up and comers

in The Silicon Valley business Journal, and KQED Local Her (Women's History Month). Every

year, they celebrate with the girls, women, and community supporters because without them,

GFC would not be what it is now.

They did not realize there were local woman who made such

an impact in our community for the younger generation. They feel that Niko Everett reminds all

of them that they may not know what they want in life, but that's what life is all about, demise

and rise, everyone will eventually find their calling.




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Bibliography

http://www.girlsforachange.org/national/files/baltimore-times_article.html

http://www.girlsforachange.org/national/2007/10/national-homele.html

http://www.sanjose.bizjournals.com/sanjose/stories/2007/02/12/tidbits1.html

http://www.girlsforachange.org/national/2007/07/this-summer-tee.html
 

Sabah Said
5/8/09
English 201B
Mon/Wed 10-12

Boona Cheema Social Entrepreneur

A Social entrepreneur are people who have an organization that assume the risk of a business or enterprise. It’s someone who recognizes a social problem and uses entrepreneurial principles to organize, create, and manage to make social changes. Social entrepreneurs makes a difference for people. They try to help improve community and environment at the best of their abilities. The social entrepreneur Boona Cheema is an interesting person because she’s one of the top people that are known to help people. She’s done so much in her life, for so long. Boona Cheema works with Alameda county, California with the people who need them extra help; for example adults who face homelessness and many children who are also in desperate family circumstances: HIV/AIDS, domestic violen ce, or bad health problems. Boona Cheema works for the organization called BOSS, she is the director of Building Opportunities for Self-Sufficiency. BOSS provides a range of health programs to help people achieve the most possible health and wellness to support stable independent living. There offering respite from the street and a connection to life-changing support. The programs that BOSS has is shelter programs, transitional housing programs and employment programs. How they do that is they get recommendation from Alameda County. Or homeless just come to there office saying they need services and for mentally ill people they have to have prove, that they see a therapist on a regular bases. BOSS has several groups also like drug/alcohol recovery groups, peer support group and socialization , and life skills workshop. California has a lot of problems to be changed around. Boona Cheema has lived in California and most likely everyone knows how much our country needs the help, from poverty to sicknesses, and jobless people. It’s nice getting to know what Boone Cheema does; especially since she helps our community. Boona Cheema decided to help people in the community and helps make a difference and changes for people. That’s nice someone like Boona lives in the Bay area because people are really thankful for the support she has been giving to people.

Boona Cheema is a unique person. For twenty years Boona has dedicated her life to her community. Boona the BOSS executive director of Building Opportunities for Self-Sufficiency, has largest provider for homeless and people of low income in Alameda County. They have fought homeless, hunger, and poverty by creating housing, job support services, and opportunities. She built shared groups between service providers.

Boona was born in Peshawar, now called Pakistan (then India), on August 6, 1945, the day Hiroshima was bombed. She was born into a family of Sikhs, that is people part of an Indian religious group. She was a victim of the partisan riots that happened in India during the struggle to end British colonial rule. Her father Dr. Amrik Singh Cheema, was a civil servant and agricultural expert. Her mother, Raminder Kaur Gill, was a village organizer and farmer. Boona Cheema was one of three children. One brother Jatinder Cheema works for USAID/Africa; the other brother of hers, Jagdeep Cheema, is a farm consultant and organizer of young farmers in India as refugees. When she was two years old, Cheema saw how much violence that took place during separation
 

Sabah Said
english 201B



cont... to my social entrepreneur essay



Boona Cheema had personal experience with her son being mentally ill then later made her want to volunteer with war-wounded children, Boona has been committed for more than 35 years to human rights, social justice, and helping to make better opportunities and resources for people that need help. Boona also the BOSS organization which she is the director of has thousands of homeless people, ill people and people that just been struggling with problems. They have made a difference. And still until this day they are still supporting our community. I’m glad to know people in our community are being helped. Just knowing people are happy because of what they have and how they are being supported, makes Boona Cheema happy, because she’s feels for them and she’s being thanked for it. I love helping people, I always feel good about myself when I do. Boona Cheema is a great, strong woman who I admire, Boona is an inspiration.









Sources Work Cited

Boona Cheema. "Letter to the Community." The Berkeley Daily Planet
Tuesday October 19, 2004: Page 1.

www.berkeleydailyplanet.com/article/19901. 3 May 2009 Sept 8,2008


Berekeley Homeless commission. Torn Reed. Meeting Minutes.
May 5, 2009
www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/uploadedFiles/Clerk/Level_3_- _Commissions/2006.



BOSS Team. "Building Opportunities Self suffiency BOSS.”
. BOSS Team.
BOSS community organization Team. www.createpeaceathome.org/



BOSS Organization. www.selfsufficiency.org/what/health/wellness/
 

Sabah Said
English 201B


that was my rough draft to my soical entrepreneur essay
 

Treana Penn
English 201B
May 20 2009

A Social Entrepreneur Dr. Joseph Marshall
The youth of the Bay Area has a higher rate of being dead or in jail than being 'Alive and Free'. Dr. Joseph Marshall Jr. a social entrepreneur of San Francisco, CA. He felt the need to give back to his community by starting a nonprofit organization for the youth. An organization for youth where they can have a safe environment to hang out while learning to be successful at the same time. Social entrepreneurs are people that point out a problem in their community and start up their own business to change the social problem. Social entrepreneurs are dedicated to fixing the problem(s) of their community with a vision of a better future. Dr. Marshall jr. Took on the role of being social entrepreneur to improve his own community.
Dr. Joseph Marshall jr. Has taken the responsibility to give back to his community by starting a nonprofit organization for the youth. It is said that we are a product of our environment, Dr. marshall grew up in a single mother home in the rough area of Los Angeles. One day he picked up a book about Malcolm X and read what it had to offer his brain. The words of Malcolm X inspired and changed his thinking process causing him to look at life more optimistically. He refers that book to every man he meets, because he feels it is for every man to learn from. It even inspired him to write his own book, Street Soldier One Man's Struggle to Save a Generation, one Life at a Time.

Many people have experienced and heard how Omegas Boy Club has affected many people in the San Francisco, Bay Area. There has been said many people who wished there was an Omega Boys Club in their own city or State. Dr. Marshall and the staff of Omega expands as much as possible by teaching everything they teach in Leadership Classes to Elementary and Middle School classes. “Coach” Wilburn Jigetts spread so much wisdom before he passed in 2003 “the more you know, the more you owe” is one of his coachism that would represent what Omega is. Coach Jiggetts was the elder of The Omega family, like the grandfather, every year Omega celebrates his life with a memorial celebration. The Omega team has traveled the world to share the works of being “Alive and Free”. Omega has done its job by making an impact in its community to keep the youth “Alive and Free”. Yet, in reality there job is not done, because their plan is to keep the movement going on forever. Omega has not decreased the rate of violence, but it has increased the knowledge of the consequences of violence. Many people have participated in Omega keeping youth and adults out of street decreasing the statistic rate in San Francisco area, bay area. My life has personally changed from Omega. I have taken the Leadership classes, that has given me a different aspect on life on the way I handle every day situations. Out of all the programs that Omega had to offer the Black College Tour that they paid half for. I was able to visit the college of my dreams that I always told Dr. Marshall about. We were able to meet new people, have fun, and learn black history. Dr. Marshall told me that If “I claim something as mine it will be mine”, so I claimed Clark Atlanta University to be my school that I transfer to. The leaders of Omega teach us respect and I have nothing, but respect for everybody in the Omega family.
A Social Entrepreneur is a person who realizes the issues in their community. They find solutions to the problems by creating businesses that can help the issues. The businesses are usually non-profit, because they are more concerned for the change and not the money. No pun intended. Dr. Marshall has fit these categories of being a social entrepreneur by creating Omega Boys Club. Dr. Marshall is a role to his community and his idea will live on forever.