FRIENDS OF THE FIRST TEE OF EAST LAKE MEMBER NEWSLETTER | AUGUST 2016
2016 Cousins Cup Participants
DATES TO NOTE
August 17. Board Meeting. Board members only. Noon – 1:30 p.m. Drew Charter School Senior Academy, Eva Davis Board Room. (3 pts.)
August 20th. A Taste of East Lake. 4:00 – 6:00 p.m. Home of Carrie and Chad Parker. Enjoy refreshing cocktails, as well as tasty treats from East Lake’s Executive Chef Nick Barrington. Spouses welcome! No cost to attend, but please bring a bottle of wine for the East Lake Invitational Wine Wall. (Proceeds from the wine wall will benefit the Harrison Scholarship Fund. Last year this raised $7,000 for scholarships!) Kindly RSVP to: slavine@eastlakefoundation.org. (2 pts.)
August 25. Play Date. Shotgun – 5 p.m. Charlie Yates Golf Course. To sign up, please email brucekirst@yahoo.com (3 pts.)
For a full 2016 calendar of events, as of 8/1/16, please click here.
VOLUNTEER RANKINGS AS OF 8/1/16 In an effort to broaden those eligible for the Volunteer Cup, capture all of the ways in which members support the program, and to re-enforce member expectations as well as committee focus areas, we have implemented a volunteer ranking system. We hope these rankings will be a good personal reminder about your engagement, but also encourage a little friendly competition. The member with the highest number of points at the end of the year will be named the Volunteer of the Year AND win a foursome at East Lake! Below are the top 10 volunteer leaders as of 8/1/16. For a full ranking, please click here.
FRIEND MEMBER Mike Dehart Bruce Kirst Jonathan St. Clair Keene Reese Hamilton Reynolds Robert Murphy Adam Croft Jim Hatcher Graham Roberts Willis Dobbs
Total 45 45 35 30 29 27 25 23 23 22
*Points are given for each activity, including annual fund donation, and included on the calendar of events. For questions regarding your points, please contact Brittany at bglenn@eastlakefoundation.org.
WAYS TO GET INVOLVED JOIN US AT TOPGOLF MIDTOWN ON NOVEMBER 10! Last year’s Golfers Who Give Back event (thank you, Patty and Brian!) was such a success that we are replicating the fun! Join us for the inaugural Golf with a Purpose event on November 10 at the amazing Topgolf Midtown. Enjoy incredible food, open bar, hobnobbing with local celebrities, and (of course!) golf —all to benefit the East Lake Foundation. And, between now until August 31, we are happy to offer all of you wonderful Friends a Bronze sponsorship at a “Friends and family” rate* of $1,500. This provides a private bay for 6 players, as well as your company’s name on the event website. Not to mention, your purchase will count towards your fundraising goal, you will receive points towards the Volunteer Cup (2pts) and a portion of your sponsorship will be tax-deductible! So start talking to your friends and get a group together! It’s a night not to be missed! For more information or to purchase a bay, please contact Sarah Lavine at slavine@eastlakefoundation.org. *Bronze sponsorship is offered for $1,750.
COME OUT AND PLAY A ROUND! It’s hard to believe, but school is back in session and The First Tee of East Lake is in full swing! Through our daytime physical education and after school classes, The First Tee of East Lake is serving 200 junior golfers every day. An additional 150 will be served when our Saturday sessions resume on August 20.
Just a reminder, we are ALWAYS in need of volunteers to take our kids out on the course for a round so they can practice their golf skills and be tournament ready. If you are interested in coming out, during the week or weekend, please contact Coach Nyre at nwilliams@eastlakefoundation.org or 404-822-2416. And, for every time you come out, you get 4 pts towards your volunteer cup
DON’T FORGET! PLAY DATE ON THURSDAY, AUGUST 25 If you haven’t already, please RSVP to Bruce Kirst (brucekirst@yahoo.com) if you plan to participate in our next play date. 5 p.m. shotgun at the Charlie Yates Golf Course. *For those who have nominated a committee prospect, please invite them to join you at this fun event. Just inform Bruce of their attendance and to pair them with you. It’s a wonderful opportunity for them to get to know fellow Friends members and our junior golfers.
NEWS OF INTEREST On Saturday, July 23, the mentoring committee hosted an etiquette course for First Tee participants at the East Lake Golf Club. Students received instruction on topics such as conversation, proper place settings, dining, and electronic and written correspondence. Many thanks to the members of the mentoring committee who helped organized this valuable event specifically Kendall Bailey and Tjuan Dogan who were on hand the day of to help!
Kudos to our Friends!
Special thanks to Friends member Adam Croft who arranged for The First Tee of East Lake to be the charitable beneficiary of the 52nd Southern Company Employee Classic. This is the second year The First Tee has been chosen and last year this event raised $5,000 for the program!
Congratulations to Bruce Kirst and the volunteer committee who organized another successful Cousins Cup! Organized similar to the Ryder Cup, two teams, captained by Bashir Chuma and Aubrey Graves, competed over the course of two days on July 9 & 10. Congratulations to Team Aubrey who took home the trophy. And special thanks to Leslie Zacks for serving as a volunteer scorekeeper despite suffering from a painful snake bite!
First Tee Highlights
Congratulations to Solomon Dobbs who won his first Atlanta Junior Golf Association tournament in late July!
Jakari Harris won her last Georgia Junior PGA event. This was especially meaningful since it was played at the East Lake Golf Club.
The First Tee Cup will commence this weekend. This is annual, month long competition determines who will hit the ceremonial opening tee shot at the TOUR Championship by Coca-Cola. We look forward to updating you on the deserving winner!
SEPTEMBER 22-25 | HISTORIC EAST LAKE GOLF CLUB It’s hard to believe, but we are just 50 days away from our favorite time of year! The golf course has fully recovered from the renovations and summer maintenance and is shaping up nicely to test the game’s best once again this year. Click here to follow the course build out and watch East Lake Golf Club transform into the finale of the PGA TOUR FedExCup Playoffs! http://www.pgatour.com/tournaments/tour-championship-by-coca-cola.html
NEWS OF INTEREST EAST LAKE FOUNDATION ELECTS FOUR NEW BOARD MEMBERS The East Lake Foundation is delighted to welcome four new members to its board of directors:
Derek Bottoms, Vice President Employment Practices & Associate Relations, The Home Depot
Phil Jacobs, Partner, The Pendleton Consulting Group
Erika James, John H. Harland Dean of Goizueta Business School
Rodney K. Sanders, Senior Vice President, PNC Bank
These four leaders in the community bring important legal, accounting, finance, fundraising and human resources skills that will be beneficial to the Foundation’s work to eliminate the cycle of poverty for residents in The Villages of East Lake and families at Charles R. Drew Charter School. You can read more about these new Board Members in our recent press release. For a full list of our Board of Directors, please click here.
SUMMER NEWSLETTER AVAILABLE ONLINE The East Lake Foundation’s newsletter, Community Vision, is hot of the press! In this edition you will find information on:
Drew Charter School’s first senior class An update on 2nd and Hosea’s Revival The winners of our START:ME entrepreneurial business loan And much more!
Access the digital version here: http://bit.ly/ELFSummer16
NATIONAL MODEL
Tulsa’s Growing Together Joins Purpose Built Communities Network. Growing Together’s work is focused on the Kendall-Whittier neighborhood and is the most robust place-based effort of its kind in Tulsa to date. This is Purpose Built Communities’ 14th national member. Click here to read more.
Evidence shows that geography plays a powerful role in determining life outcomes in the United States. Click here to read the Urban Institute’s article on why place matters.
THE FRIENDS OF THE FIRST TEE OF EAST LAKE A group of community leaders with an appreciation for golf and a desire to make a positive impact on the lives of East Lake youth, The Friends of The First Tee of East Lake was symbolically created March 17, 2004, on legendary golfer Bobby Jones’ birthday. The mission of The Friends of The First Tee of East Lake is to support, empower, and invest in the participants of The First Tee of East Lake through golf and non-golf activities to prepare them for success on the course and in life.
Thank you for all that you do for East Lake! Stay connected: Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and LinkedIn