An anonymous donor has presented us with a $50,000 Challenge Grant to help us grow our Non-Profit Scholarship Fund. She wants to ensure that our non-profit women leaders have the same opportunities to participate in our programs as our for-profit women. In non-profit organizations there are very rarely funds allocated or available for leadership and professional development. What little money is in the budget typically is put into programmatic needs or general operating funds. Leadership training is a luxury for our non-profits that need it most and the absence of leadership development is a growing threat. Just like a for profit company a non-profit is more likely to survive and thrive with a strong leader at its helm. The leadership deficit looms as one of the greatest challenges facing non-profits. We hope to continue to make scholarships available for women non-profit leaders and emerging high-potential leaders for both our one-year professionally facilitated CEO Forum program, where women receive real time feedback, individualized guidance and support from other members as well as mentoring opportunities from our extensive TCI network of women executives and other recognized experts and in Strategies for Success, our four day highly interactive program for emerging and high potential women managers. We all know the importance of professional (and personal) development and growth and we want to continue to enhance the effectiveness and broaden the perspectives of emerging leaders.

Through our Scholarship Fund, TCI has been able to support dozens of South Florida non-profits by providing access to the support and education of our Non-Profit CEO forums and our emerging leadership program, Strategies for Success. We have helped over twenty Executive Directors through the Scholarship Fund in 2014. They are now better prepared to provide essential community-based services in South Florida bringing stability and growth to their organization, which in turn strengthens their capacity to meet society’s escalating demands. Our goal is to double or even triple this number in 2015 and beyond.

Here a is a listing of the women and the non-profits they serve that are currently in our CEO Non-Profit Forum that renews in April 2015. Without our scholarship funding they would not be able to participate:

Thema Campbell- Girl Power Rocks
Virginia Emmons- Educate Tomorrow
Sonia Jacobson- Dressed for Success
Lisa Kauffman-Celebrity Cruises
Candice Maze- Foster Care Review
Catherine Penrod- Switchboard Miami
Anna Pietraszko- Miami Music Project
Maureen Ruggiero- Habitat for Humanity
Dacia Steiner- ReServe Miami now Center for Social Change
Maria Tejaro- Girl Scouts of Tropical Florida
Shelia Womble- Arts for Learning

Here are the non-profit organizations that had the opportunity to send emerging leaders to Strategies for Success thanks to our scholarship fund that you have helped support in 2014:

Epilepsy Foundation of Florida
Family Counseling Services (a division of Swithchboard Miami)
Habitat for Humanity Greater Miami
Miami Children’s Museum
Miami Dade County Public Schools
Miami Music Project
Terralex
United Way of Broward County
Urban League of Broward County

A special thanks to those that have donated to our $50,000 Challenge Grant:

Linda Alexander
Germaine Baugh
Laurie Friesner Bomstein-Economic Development Consultants Inc.
William Burdette
Mindy Cassel
Giselle Cheminand
The DS Foundation, Neerja Sethi
Diane Davis
Kirsten Dolan
Sandi Finn
Laura Kaplan
Jennifer Knight
Linda Lubitz Boone
Ginger Martin
Marian & Marc Milgram
Marilyn DeMartini
Kaufman Rossin
Jan Navatkoski
Doris Neyra
Leigh & Cory Olson
Edith Osman
Linda Paresky
Toni Randolph
Sue Rosenthal
Ryder System Charitable Foundation
Penny Shaffer
Barbara Shrut
Lois Silverman
Marte & Paul Singerman
Phyllis Swersky
Liz Alicea-Velez