Subject: BBF Board Update & January Board Meeting Poll
From: "Joshua Alcorn" <[email-masked]>
To: "Emily Chen" <[email-masked]>, "Xanthi Karloutsos" <[email-masked]>, "Louis J. Freeh" <[email-masked]>, "Fred Sears" <[email-masked]>, "Allen, Tony" <[email-masked]>, "Howard Z. Borin" <[email-masked]>, "Hallie Biden" <[email-masked]>, "Hunter Biden" <[email-masked]>, "Ashley Biden" <[email-masked]>
Cc: "Patti Bescript" <[email-masked]>, "Patty Dailey Lewis" <[email-masked]>, "Joan Mayer" <[email-masked]>, "Burris, Bonnie" <[email-masked]>, "Marsha Borin" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Nov 2016 12:39:04 -0500

Hello board members!

Apologies for being somewhat radio silent for the last 6 weeks or so. We’ve spoken to most of you individually, but have not been great about keeping you posted on developments here. Which is to say, we’ve been really busy and are just now coming up for air. This email is lengthy, but please make sure to vote in the online poll for the best time/date for our January board meeting.

Fundraising update: 

1. The Blue Dream Gala raised $200,000 for the Foundation. It was amazing, really a great event.
2. The second annual golf outing in Wilmington raised over $340,000 and netted over $213,000.
3. We just wrapped up a programming and fundraising drive at the ShopRite grocery store in Warminster, PA. We raised over $30,000 over the 12 weeks cashiers were asking for donations as customers came through line.
4. Grants: We expect to hear from the Laffey McHugh Foundation in mid-December about our grant. We requested $50,000, and I am hopeful we’ll get at least $25,000. We also received an unsolicited grant from the Dircks Family Foundation for $5,000 and expect $10,000 from the Joseph Alexander Foundation (we didn’t submit a formal grant application, but they donated 10k last year, and asked for a letter requesting another 10k).
5. Since April, we’ve raised over $625,000.

Programming update:

Stewards of Children: We trained 14 new facilitators in September and have had three of them engaged in running their own Stewards trainings. We also have trained about 1/2 of the Indian River School District teachers, administrators and staff. We will have completely trained this district by March. They will be the second district state wide completely trained in Stewards of Children - and the first done completely by the BBF. To date, we’ve trained over 1,400 adults in Delaware. Additionally, Patty is headed to NYC in December to meet with folks who participated in the Blue Dream Gala in order to talk about training and giving back to the community.

NetSmartz: We’ve spoken to over over 3,000 kids since April - Patty had a presentation at Padua Academy last week where she spoke to 675 girls at one time. We’ve also launched a presentation for adults, wherein we talk to them about what their kids are doing online and ways they can start healthy discussions about internet safety at every age level. 

Safe To Compete: We’re still working through some issues with the Boys & Girls Clubs of DE, but they’ve begun rolling out NetSmartz to their clubs and have begun including BBF branded Child ID Kits with their welcome packets for new members. We also gave them two of our child ID kit laptop machines (http://shop.ezchildid.com/Complete-Mobile-Turnkey-System-SYSTEMTURNKEY.htm <http://shop.ezchildid.com/Complete-Mobile-Turnkey-System-SYSTEMTURNKEY.htm>) as part of the grant.

NAAG Fellowship: Our first BB Fellow at NAAG, Shannon Signore, has been hard at work on a survey of child protection laws across the country. She’s also been spending a good amount of time at NCMEC, working to build bridges between NAAG and NCMEC. She wraps up her work for us at the end of the month, and I look forward to a full debrief from her, which I’ll share with you all.

Growth update:

We moved out of our office in the city of Wilmington last week, and are settling in to our new (free!) digs at Widener University’s Delaware Law School. With just about everything free here, we’ll be saving the Foundation close to $1,600 per month. The space is great, and we have easy access to all of the classrooms and lecture halls for us to run programming here. Patty and I are working on a plan to build out our volunteer base at the law school as well.

We’ve finally worked out the kinks in our thank you note process, and will have a much smoother system moving forward.

In the next two months, we will be transitioning to a new donor management system - moving away from the system we inherited that was built for political campaigns. The new system will be much more user friendly, and allow for greater reporting, donor “touch” tracking, and - most importantly to to me - offer a unified email and contact management system. We’re still reviewing solutions, and I’ll let you know how it goes.

Events Update: 

We’re beginning to plan for 2017 events. Mark the following on your calendars if you would, it would be great to see you at these events, if your time permits.

January 24, 25 or 26: BBF Board Meeting. We’ll do this in Wilmington, with folks able to dial in if unable to attend. Please fill out this form to let me know your availability: http://doodle.com/poll/245tp5sr442fxggr <http://doodle.com/poll/245tp5sr442fxggr>. Also, please let us know if you have any ideas you’d like to explore at the next board meeting, or folks you think we should reach out to. Your input is invaluable. 

Saturday, March 18, 10 am - 12 pm. BBF Trail Run at Granogue, (2830 Montchanin Road, Wilmington, DE)

Saturday, February 25 OR March 25, 7 - 9 pm. BBF Night at the Delaware 87ers (NBA-D league team) (Bob Carpenter Center, 631 South College Ave, Newark, DE 19716). Will have clarity on the actual date next week I hope.

Monday, September 25, 2017: 3rd Annual BBF Golf Outing, Wilmington Country Club (and a few other courses), Wilmington, DE

We’re also working with the local minor league baseball team on a BBF partnership some time this summer. More on that to come!

Thank you for all of your support. Let me know what dates and times work for the January Board meeting, and have a fabulous Thanksgiving!

Patty & Josh

Joshua Alcorn
302/295.8340 (office)
302/598.1885 (cell)
[email-masked] <mailto:[email-masked]>
Joshua Alcorn
302/295.8340 (office)
302/598.1885 (cell)
[email-masked]