Autumn mornings: sunshine and crisp air, birds and calmness, year’s end and day’s beginnings.

Charles County Fallen Leaves

Those lovely hours….

Each month we ask for your hours to be submitted.  While we have mentioned the need for hours to report when doing grants, it actually is much, much more.  CCLC is a volunteer organization with two part-time employees.  The hours our volunteers spend demonstrates our commitment and support of CCLC’s mission.  Those hours represent accountability; that accountability is reported in grants, official forms and even in presentations.  Any time spent helping CCLC – tutoring, attending a CCLC meeting, attending an event, volunteering for a specific project – should be submitted.  Now remembering to do so…here is a suggestion.  Set an appointment reminder on your cell phone or computer.  Each month you will get that reminder and when you hit snooze, you will get the reminder again!!

Much Needed Fundraisers/Donations

Perhaps you didn’t know – CCLC was awarded a grant from the Charles County Charitable Trust.  However, it was $3,000 less than award amounts in the past.  Grants are wonderful for any organization, but we know that we cannot survive on grants alone. If grants are close to half our annual budget, the other half of raising revenues means…fundraising and donations.  We must fundraise to build our revenues and to keep CCLC going for years to come, starting with 2022.  And we all know it is getting harder and harder.  So with the sustainability of CCLC in mind…announcements!

Our virtual Fall “Bakeless” Bake Sale is back!  You know, that bake sale where you don’t have time to bake or go to the store and spend money on ingredients or on already baked goods?). Or when you look at all those donated goods on the table and say, “I shouldn’t buy that,” and ask to donate instead?  Here is that chance – you can donate the cost of the ingredients, the cost of buying something, or what you might actually spend at the bake sale table.  $10, $20 or more, it all adds up.  So… starting next Monday, October 25, for two weeks support our “Bakeless” Bake Sale.  We will definitely remind you next Monday!!

End-of-year-campaign drive – We will be doing an end-of-the-year campaign drive.  It was highly successful last year and truly helped us enter 2021 soundly.

Fall Dinner Drive Through – We are ‘investigating’ a dinner drive through.  Stay tuned for details.

Annual Adult Spelling Bee – After much consideration, discussion, etc., it has been decided to delay our 2022 Spelling Bee until September.

2nd Virtual Balloon Pop — And finally at the end of February as Mardi Gras is about to begin, we will host our 2nd Virtual Balloon Pop.

Paying it Forward – CFC and MCC
The Combined Federal Campaign (FC) is the official workplace giving campaign for federal employees and retirees

The Maryland Charity Campaign (MCC) is an annual giving campaign that allows Maryland State employees and retirees.

Both campaigns allow employees and retirees the opportunity to give and support participating charities who serve to support citizens of Maryland, our nation, and/or the world. 

A pledge of just $2 per paycheck ($52 total a year!) provides a set of instruction books. $50 per paycheck can support our outreach program in reaching out in the community to those who need our services and supplying them materials. A little goes a long way.

If you are a Federal Government employee or retiree, please join in paying it forward at  https://givecfc.org/home.  To select CCLC Combined Federal Campaign use code 77322.

If you are a Maryland employee or retiree, please join in paying it forward at https://mcc.maryland.gov. To select CCLC Maryland Charities Campaign (MCC) use code 52-1525917.

Reaching Out
As you may well imagine, we are keeping busy.  We have been fortunate to get out into the community recently to spread the word about CCLC.  We were at Judy Center’s Harvest Fest on October 9th, and at the La Plata festival on October 10th.  Both events were successful all the way around.  The next outreach event will be Community Resource Day on Wednesday, October 27th, at the Regency Furniture Stadium from 10:00 am – 1:00 pm.  It is a great event that offers exactly what it was designed to – resources for those in our community who would benefit the most.

Future Workshop
We are presently looking at scheduling our next workshop in January – 12th, 13th and 15th.  Once again we will continue in the same format of 2 evenings virtually and one half-day in-person session.

Tutor News
Congratulations to our adult learner MJ!  He recently passed the U.S. Citizenship exam, thanks to our volunteer tutor Nancy S.!  Her dedication in helping him reach that goal is highly commendable.  What a wonderful accomplishment!  How exciting to hear this kind of news from our volunteers! It reinforces our commitment to teaching literacy to adults in our community, and reminds us that what we do can make a profound impact on the lives of those who are brave enough to ask for help when needed.  We are so grateful to all of our volunteer tutors, and are proud of our adult learners as well!! 

If you have any news of your adult learners, we would love to hear and share that news with others.  Any accomplishment they make towards reaching their goals or even achieving that goal is newsworthy! 

Happy Fall Y’All!!!

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