A Message from the President
Dear Friends,
The baton has been passed. At our annual meeting on June 21st we thanked some long-time members of our Board of Directors and our past leadership as we welcomed five newcomers to our Board and a new leadership roster. Mayor Bill Bogaard reminded us of where we were just 10 short years ago, when we were a well-kept secret in the community, and how much has been accomplished since then. “Today Northwest Pasadena, Tomorrow the World” was the Mayor’s challenge to us as we move forward
Reflecting on our Past: A Luxury of Limitations
For the past 40 years, Mothers’ Club has operated out of a collection of rooms and spaces at the Friends Meeting House on Orange Grove Boulevard. While this has indeed been difficult, it has also had benefits. It gave us the luxury of limitations.
In our small space, with limited hours, and facilities, the staff developed a program that grew straight out of the need of isolated mothers with young children. As a result, we have developed a highly relevant program with some of the highest success rates on every evaluation measure we’ve studied.
Because we were too small a facility to be licensed - while our program was outstanding, our space did not conform to license requirements - that meant that we had to have the mothers in attendance, and they couldn't leave their children to go somewhere else. That, in turn enforced our parent program, and we saw what a difference it made for them. If we were given a choice of whether moms had to be there or not, this fact might not have been so apparent.
Because of our limited facility, our program could only serve so many families. As word of mouth spread over the years, so did our waiting list. Though our families have many difficulties in every day survival, they know that coming to Mothers’ Club is a privilege. Because of this, and our outstanding program development, we have one of the highest retention rates among comparable programs.
Our space was only available to us in the mornings. So, what did we do? We created an intense, highly personal two-generation program that is winning accolades from national foundations and evaluators.
Lastly, because of the support of the Friends who donated and later leased their facility to us at cost, we have had the luxury of being able to exist on a minimal operations budget.
The Challenge: How Do We Grow?
But, now, we will have a glorious space - space that is ours 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. What are we going to do with that space? How are we going to grow? How will we continue to meet the community’s needs - what new needs are arising in our community? How can we grow and keep true to our mission? How are we going to fund the increased staff, increased resources and growth? How do we grow and maintain our standard of excellence?
In a recent inquiry from one of our funders, how do we move from being an exemplary program to being a leader in the field of two-generation learning? We need to explore our leadership responsibility. More than ever, this world needs what Mothers’ Club has learned.
As we struggle to bring our teenagers back from the brink of dropping out of school, joining gangs and heading straight toward irrevocable bad choices - we wonder, where are their parents, where are their mothers? If they knew what Mothers’ Club mothers know - would the outcome be the same?
It is an exciting time. I am looking forward to this new chapter for Mothers’ Club.
Best Regards,
Judy Smith Asbury
For full report on Annual Meeting, download our July 2007 Newsletter.
