2011 Holiday Fundraiser Drive Donors

Thanks to everyone who donated to the Eastside Community Connection 2011 Holiday Fundraising Drive. Your support and contribution will continue to make a significant impact on the lives we touch in the East Austin community through adult education programs and food pantry services.

Our aim this year was to raise $10,000 in order to maintain and expand our services for 2012. With your help, we exceeded our own expectations and managed to raise $12,001.98!

Once again, on behalf of everyone at ECC, thank you for your generosity during this past holiday season.

Updates From the Interns

Our student interns work hard to keep Eastside Community Connection running. Read about what some of them have been working on this past month. Also, if you’re interested in becoming an intern for the Spring 2012 semester, check out the available positions here!

Food Pantry

With the holidays quickly approaching, the pantry is in full swing and operating at max service capacity. The recent new additions to office space fortunately give the pantry some much-needed square footage, but we still can’t grow fast enough! Hopefully, with the added inventory space, we can increase daily serving capacity. We just can’t seem to keep food on the shelves or the front door open long enough to get to everyone one in need. We’re very lucky to be receiving the collection of canned goods care of the UT Community Nutrition Class’s Food Drive, an anticipated donation of 2000 pounds of much-needed food.

Madi Webster, ECC Food Pantry Director

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ESL Program 

The ESL Program is getting a fresh start this semester with new director Eric Nikolaides, a second year Spanish and Linguistics major at UT.  The classes will continue to be held at Memorial United Methodist Church in East Austin, but a new curriculum has been developed that aims to take greater advantage of the students’ already-acquired knowledge of Spanish.  The new curriculum will try to combine a more theoretical approach to the English language (similar to how an English speaker would learn Spanish in school) with a much more practical approach that can teach the students English phrases that they can use the day they learn them in class. Currently, the ESL program is seeking one or two more student volunteers to assist in recruiting for the classes, planning lessons, and teaching.

Eric Nickolaides, ECC ESL Director

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Volunteer Update

We have received an oustanding level of support from the UT community this past month including several organizations who have provided hours of service at the food pantry. Special thanks to Alpha Phi Omega, the Texas Lassos, Texas Cowboys, Texas Lone Stars, Iron Spikes, UT Advertising Graduate Council, Lending Hearts and the Texas Nutrition program for providing us with hard working volunteers. We will continue to look for more organizations to involve in our mission and work with us toward our goals. 

 Armin Salek, ECC Volunteer Coordinator

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Grants and Move-In Update

We have just recently completed the first step in the grant application process for the Long Foundation. We should be hearing if we have been invited to complete the second step of the process in December. Also, an application we completed over the summer has been approved and Charity Bash will be throwing a fundraising party on ECC’s behalf sometime next summer! In other news, the move into the new office space has gone well! Not only do the interns have a large space to work in now, but we have also created more room in the pantry for food items and made the interview room more wheelchair accessible. 

Geraldine Avila, ECC Staff Intern

A Word from Our Program Director

• The quick thinking intern who welcomed and assured a worried breathless mother of 6 who arrived after Pantry hours.  The Pantry volunteers who carefully packed meat and other groceries for her bus ride home.
• The quiet student athlete who applies her skill and enjoyment of numbers to prepare financial reports, and her kindness to assist new clients.
• A UT senior who devoted her summer and fall to understanding and communicating the ECC mission via a new skill — grant writing.
• The nutrition students who faithfully order, pick up, and drive more than a ton of food weekly from the Capital Area Food Bank, carry it box by box to the ECC Pantry, and organize it for distribution.
• The earnest intern who takes a new approach to teaching English to adults and receives affirmation from his students when they bring their friends to join the class too.
• The thoughtful student who independently worked with clients to understand their needs and initiated a successful diaper drive at UT in response.
• The intern who uses his skill in social media to find a host of willing UT students to assist in operations.
• Problem solving by two tireless creative interns which resulted in a revitalized and visually appealing ECC webpage in one weekend.
• The energetic and resourceful intern who executed the Halloween Party plan that made a night to remember.

Armin, Diana, Eric, Geraldine, Kristie, Madi, Paola, Sandra, and Sylvana

It has been my sincere pleasure to witness the creativity, skill, energy, and determination you have brought to your ECC role. Thank you.