State of the Club Address

Since this is the time of year where presidents seem to give speeches about the condition of this or that country, I thought I'd try my hand at doing the same for our Cal Alumni Club in Philadelphia.

I have been a proud member of this group since I arrive in town in 1999 and in that time we have been able to modernize our communications, expand our membership and establish a calendar of recurring annual events to which all members can look forward.

So here's the year in review:

• In March, we host the Cal Men's Octet as part of their East Coast tour. It was two fun filled days of hijinx and song as we visited several Philadelphia landmarks and even got a plug on TV (Thanks Aditi!)
• April brought us our annual New Student Reception where nearly 30 people braved extreme weather conditions to gather and talk about student life at Cal. We also awarded our Club's Alumni Scholarship to Megan Beale from Avon Grove High School.
• In May, we participated in the annual Main Line College Fair at Villanova University where Cal is always a big draw. Long lines at our table and lots of interested prospective students and parents.
• Over the summer, we listened to a carillon concert at Princeton University by own of our own, Laurel MacKenzie.
• In the Fall, we watch a few football games together. Some great (Tennessee) and some not so great (The Big Game) and some downright dangerous (Oregon State, not the game but the bar!),
• We ended the year by hosting the Cal Women's Basketball team in their visits to Princeton and Rutgers.

A lot to look forward to for 2008!

• Our own web domain http://calphilly.org !
• On February 16, Cal co-sponsoring a banquet event with the Organization of Chinese Americans featuring two Cal Alums (Aditi Roy and Joan Pfaelzer) - see the website to sign up!
• The annual student reception on Sunday 4/13 2-4PM
• The Main Line College Fair on Tuesday 4/29 6:30-9PM @ Villanova
• IRA Rowing Championships 6/5 - 6/7 @ Cooper River Park, Camden, NJ
• Cal vs. Maryland football on Saturday, 9/13 @ College Park, MD
• The Big Game 11/22, viewing location TBD

Keep an eye on our website for these and other great events in 2008.

2008 will also be a year in which we get our house in order membership-wise. We plan to initiate a database cleanup project that will merge information from multiple sources and allow us to more efficiently stay in sync with the CAA in Berkeley. We would also like to do a better job at maintaining the ties with local students who go away to Cal (and come home, eventually).

The Cal Alumni Club of Philadelphia Alumni Scholarship Endowment Report

As of June 30, 2007, I am proud to report that our club's endowment stands at $29,545.46. In the year preceding, we added over $5,000 to our account. 90% of this was due to investment gains. We also transferred $500 from the club's checking account to the endowment as a result of money collected at various events and direct contributions from members (Thank you!).

I would like to set an ambitious goal over the next five years to increase our endowment to $50,000. This will allow us to offer either an additional scholarship or to increase the amount of the existing one. In order to do this, we will be asking members, where fiscally possible, to contribute $15 per household per year. Although we have had our own membership fee in place for many years, it has fallen off most folks' radar! If each of the 140 or so members of the Yahoo group contributes $15/year, that gets us nearly half way to our goal! See the website for the membership form.

As always, we could not do this without your support which reflects your dedication to Cal and the work of this club. If you would like to get more involved, please do not hesitate to contact me or any other board members.

Thanks and Go Bears!