Las Madres '80 East
JUNE 2004 NEWSLETTER

Happy Father's/Graduation Day

JUNE BIRTHDAYS
1st        Ed Ryan
2nd       Sally Brooks-Schulke
14th      Jeffrey Caso (Happy 24th!)
25th      Kevin Ballard (Happy 21st!)
29th      Andreas Tsafos
30th      David Ryan (Happy 22nd!)

Sally, as well as many other members, will be on vacation, so those of us in town will enjoy a Mom's Night Out! Send Ginny your e-mail suggestions (dinner, movies, both, other ideas), and she'll send out final plans in an e-mail.

Graduation and Beyond

Leah D'Agosta - received her Elementary Teaching Credential from Humboldt State University on May 15th, (as well as various teacher certifications). Now the job search. (She is currently looking for a teaching position and prefers upper grades). Shirley and Lou will not be paying tuition for the first time in 12 years!.....Shirley

Doug Eastman - is receiving his Masters in Mechanical Engineering from MIT on June 4, 2004.  He accepted a position with The Math Works and will be living in Natick, Massachusetts (it's near Boston).....Ruth

Bret Kranak - graduated recently from the University of Arizona in Tucson with a BA in studio art in the fine arts department with a history minor. Yeh!!! Bruce, Marti, Chad and Matt Rumsey attended. Ceremony was great. A very impressive university.....Marti

Taryn Rasmussen - will be graduating on June 19th from the University of California, Davis, with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Sociology with an emphasis in Law and Society.

Adam Reid - graduating from Stanford University, Sunday, June 13th at 9:30am, Master of Education in Social Science, Summa Cum Laude. He has started a 501(c)3 non-pprofit organization called "KOREducators" to form and manage charter schools in Oregon. He hopes to start the first one in the next year or two. His web site is www.KOREducators.org (this has his vision and mission statement and much more about his organization). So far he has formed his board of directors, met with an organization that will be a potential source of funding, and has two other people onboard that will be starting this with him. He has a lot of work ahead of him and will for sure be getting opposition from the school district (they usually are not in favor of charter schools, as they view them as competition.) Adam also will be teaching a class at Portland State (where he got his BS degree).....Lynn

Jennifer Butler - graduated from St. Mary's College of Moraga on Saturday, May 22nd. She graduated Magna Cum Laude and received an inter-departmental award from the Communication Department. Her Bachelor of Arts is in Communication, and is currently working for Joe Kapp, reviewing and editing manuscripts and web content design. After a semester in Brazil, she becamevery versed in Portuguese and enjoying the people and history of the area. Every weekend, the three girls that studied abroad from St. Mary's, would go rafting, shopping, and seeing the cultural points of interest. They were even there for Carnaval. They will have stories to tell their grandkids. For the month of August this year, she will be going to Europe with her mom starting out in London and Ireland, and ending our trip in Paris. Dad wasn't invited. Her parents are very proud of her, and was glad that so many Las Madres friends could be here to share in the celebration. Thanks to all our friends for the memories.....Sue

Megan Grady - graduated from Mitty High School on May 29th. She received the Yearbook Medallion (editor-in-chief) and the Academic Excellence Award for maintaining a 4.0+ for four years. She will be attending St. Marys in Moraga where she received a Honors at Entrance Scholarship, a Presidential Scholarship and a St. Marys Scholarship. She is also the recipient of a SBC Foundation Scholarship. That's all the graduation news the Gradys have.....Carol

Kevin Simmons - graduated from Bellarmine High School on May 29th. He will be attending Sonoma State to study "college". (No declared major at the moment or where he really wants to go. It's just not fair to ask a 17 year old life altering questions.).....Sharon

Trevor Wilson - did it!!!!!! He graduated to full time work status with benefits working at Bonfante Gardens, a subsidiary of Paramount/Viacom as Marketing Operations Manager in charge of Events, Promotions, Guest Services etc. His plans for the future are to increase visitation and expand on the "Family" theme park idea. It is a great place for a youngster's birthday party. His immediate goal is to increase sale of Friday Garden Days.....Joan

(As a side note, Trevor gets promotional perks. He will have 200+ tickets to the Standford v. San Jose State football game on Sat. September 11th at Standford. If there is enough interest, we can make it a LM event. Let Joan know.)

Michael D'Agosta - got a job at Mark Monitor, soon to be right in the City so he will have an easy commute. He is at the headquarters in Boise learning about the company. They monitor intellectual properties, domain names and who knows what else for big companies, including many in the Fortune 100, so hope it will be a moderately stable job......Shirley

Saturday Coffee Clatches Continue
Meet your Las Madres friends for some coffee and conversation at the Starbuck's at White and Aborn on Saturday mornings at 9am. Every third Saturday is a field trip. For the month of June we will go on the SECOND Satuday, June 12, up the hill to a special morning hosted by Dee. We will also have time to visit with Lynn who is in town for Adam's graduation.

e-MAIL TIDBIT

The Choice is Mine

I choose to live by choice, not by chance

I choose to make changes, not excuses

I choose to be motivated, not manipulated

I choose to be useful, not used

I choose self-esteem, not self-pity

I choose to excel, not compete

I choose to listen to my inner voice, not to the random opinions of crowds

CLUB OFFICERS

Co-Presidents - Robin Nevoli & Cathy Hennig
Treasurer - Vicki Rasmussen
Newsletter & Webmaster - Ginny Gomez
Coffee Coordinator - Tina Cuneo Coffee Advisor - Randi Heinrichsen
Executive Committee - Randi Heinrichsen, Joan Wilson and Sally Brooks-Schulke