American Nomad fundraiser for Learning Without Limits raises $1,000.00!

Thanks to all who came to our show January 26th! With the help of the T sisters, Jesse Herrera and the Place for Sustainable Living, we were able to get  public/charter school Learning Without Limits 1,000 bucks toward helping their kids read! What a fun time. I’ve never seen so many people doing contact improve dancing for such a good cause.

Here is a letter from one of the school’s teachers if you want more info…

Dear Friends and Family,

I’m writing because my school, my students, and I need your help. As you know, I teach kindergarten in a high-need area of East Oakland at a public school called Learning Without Limits Academy. While my students and their families are amazing, we are attempting to stay afloat in a profoundly broken educational system. It’s a sad fact that on top of working 10-12 hour days teaching, planning, communicating with parents, evaluating data, professionally developing our practice, and supporting our students, we educators need to be our own and our students’ financial advocates as well. But we live in a country where education is undervalued, particularly for students of color who live in low income areas. I do the work I do because I believe deeply in the power of public education to transform communities, and am committed to getting my students the services they deserve.

A little about the community where I teach: most of my students have not been to preschool, almost all are learning English as a second language, and violence and trauma is a very real part of many of my students’ lives. While our first priority as educators is ensuring our students have strong literacy and math reasoning skills that will ensure they feel confident and successful in school, this alone is not enough to enrich their lives and instill a love of learning.

We are trying to go Beyond the Basics at Learning Without Limits and provide our children arts, enrichment, sports, rich classroom libraries, field work experiences, social and emotional support, and more. Our school has accomplished so much, but California continues to decimate public school funding, and we need to raise additional funds this year to deliver a high quality, equitable education for our children. We all know that a quality education can’t just be reading, writing, and math. The current state funding barely provides enough resources for the core programming, and our children definitely deserve more.

We are currently seeking funds for our $200K “Beyond the Basics Campaign.” 100% of the funds you donate will go to my school’s budget where staff come together to make decisions about how to allocate our resources. We will use the money to hire music and martial arts teachers, establish our school garden, fund more field trips and service learning projects, and provide one-on-one intervention support for all students who need it.

Not only will my school directly receive 100% of funds that you donate, but we’ve also been offered a generous gift from a donor: The school that amasses the most donors between now and January 31st will get an additional $20,000 for their school, on top of getting to keep everything we raise.

My goal is to have 20 people donate (any amount) by the end of January. You can give online safely and securely here, at my fundraising page: http://fundly.com/sonya-mehta-beyond-the-basics. Just to be clear, it’s the number of donors that matters, not the amount raised, so I’m not exaggerating when I say that no amount is too small – even $10 will be deeply appreciated. And, of course, please feel free to pass along to friends and family who might also like to help.

Thanks in advance for any help you can offer! The work I do isn’t easy, but knowing you all support me propels me to keep fighting the good fight in the education system.

Love and light to you all,

Sonya