Hi everyone, 

I truly cannot believe that with this short week we’re already halfway through the summer. It has flown by! I spent most of this week away from my laptop, physically sorting through the storage room at ETSS. I took inventory and catalogued items like printers, basketballs, kids’ water bottles, reading kits, and more, which will allow us to use them in our programs and distribute resources to our clients. I even found a clunky ‘90s computer that had been missing a screen for a couple decades! I hope that by labeling and organizing everything, it will allow ETSS to more efficiently use that space in the future. 

I’ve had success regarding donations for the Youth Summit this week. Seeds of Caring kindly offered to donate some 525 “welcome kits” for new immigrant and refugee children. Tulip Cafe, a local Turkish restaurant who catered my grad party, is contributing rice for the event. Costco agreed to send us gift cards to buy bottled water for the kids. 

I’ve learned so much about fundraising and event logistics in the first half of my internship. It’s no longer scary asking people to contribute to the event, and I’ve memorized my pitch.  I’m also grateful for my previous office experience, which has helped me in this job with simple things such as writing professional cold emails to potential donors and inviting coworkers to meet with me on Teams. 

On Thursday we held our Collaborative Board Meeting for the Youth Summit, which brought together over 60 people from different community organizations who are involved with the event. My supervisor Sarah had received a suggestion from one of the children to do a program-wide art project, where each kid from each site would contribute something—a petal or feather—and we would display the final project, a flower or bird. I always find it fascinating watching a group brainstorm and bounce ideas off each other. 

See you next week, 

Sanay