Last Week's Meeting
General items
Welcomed guests Ian McConnell President of RC of Frankston North and Jodie Yandell who joined the meeting to see what we were all about!
- Great Train Race - roster circulated - please contact Ian Wakefield if you can assist on 5th May at 7am
- FunFest this Sunday 7 April. Please ensure you are aware of your roster time, contact Russ Marnock or Ian Ash to confirm.
- Thank you letter received from Monash Health for the work and donation towards their Children's Cancer Centre - great work by John Henderson and his Kids Fun Run with Thomas Committee last year. We will again support the wonderful research team for the 2019 KFRWT.
- Reminder - Board Meeting next week.
Ian McConnell provided some insight into the RC of Frankston North - they also have a raffle for a holiday worth $12k, but as they have to purchase this offer a 75% funding model to participant organisations.
Pyjama Foundation
Shannon O'Brien, the State Manager for the Pyjama Foundation provided us with a great overview of the work they do. She has been with the organisation for 5 1/2 years.
The organisation was founded by Bronwyn Sheehan in 2004 and was established in VIC in 2014.
The organisation supports children in 'out of home care' (foster/kinship/permanent care) especially those requiring reading assistance and Pyjama Angels are assigned to a child to assist. Trained volunteers range in age form 18 - 80. 5% of volunteers are male but the vast majority are women aged 21-40 yrs of age.
In 2004 there weer 21k children in out of home care today that number has soared to 50k. 92% of children in out of home care are below their reading age. If you are dealing with trauma or abuse your brain is not focused on learning.
The mentoring program provides 1-1 time each week to read and have fun around educational goals.
Fundraising is tough - the Battle of the Brains happens in March and Pyjama Day is in July.
We appreciated the time Shannon took to come all the way to Emerald to tell us about the organisation.