GIVING The Centre on Philanthropy’s
focused on a better community
Winter 2012
Society celebrates 50 years of service The Continental Society of Bermuda has been supporting children in need for a half century
By B. Candace Ray ast month The Continental Society of Bermuda celebrated its 50 year anniversary as part of the Continental Societies Inc. The Bermuda chapter is the only overseas chapter of the 45 that make up the Society, whose mandate and motto is “Our Children, Our Commitment and Our Concern.” Leola Edness, Moira Cann and Audrey Abbot first came together in November 1960. On March 12, 1961, four others, including sole remaining charter member, Marilyn Smith, joined the three women in pursuing a sororitylike association. Mrs. Smith said: “When we first started, we wanted something to do… We hadn’t thought of being a charitable organisation. We were just getting together to have a little social club.” Mrs. Edness’ friendship with Eva Broome, of the New York Continentals, gave direction to the group when Mrs. Broome explained her Society’s precepts and format. The New York Chapter sponsored the Bermuda ladies, facilitating their ‘club’s’ membership into the US-based public service organisation. The Bermuda Chapter, was officially installed May 19, 1962 and now forms part of the Society’s Eastern Region. In the beginning, members depended upon dues and that first family-andfriend supported luncheon at Elbow Beach. An initial donation of gifts from hotel staff was presented at the Society’s St David’s Island Christmas Party, for children challenged by their circumstances. The Continental Society of Bermuda is one of the Island’s earliest charitable organisations, according to Mrs. Smith. School teachers, social workers,
L
nurses and guidance counselors comprise its 33 members, of whom five young professional women were newly installed in the last two months. Many are retired, but requests for assistance might come from any of their former or present associations, including churches. Mrs. Smith said: “Even though I’m a charter member, there are still members that joined soon after 1962 that are still working… Now we have a younger group that’s in there, and we seem to blend pretty well. “It’s very rewarding to me.” According to retired social worker and 40-year member, Olga Scott, the sisterhood exists to share a life, give of oneself and volunteer to assist children in the community. Fundraisers continue to include luncheons, also Tag Days, wine tastings, bake sales and more. Various sections of the community help with funding, and partnering is significant. Unlike Continental Society chapters in the US, the local chapter provides school uniforms and grocery vouchers, and assists with overseas medical care costs. Mrs. Scott noted that the hand-outs can be attributed to the Island’s inherent closeness and bonding. “It’s very Bermudian,” Mrs. Scott said. “[Overseas], they’re dealing with hundreds of thousands of children. We gear things to what we think is best for our community.” Like the overseas sisterhood, the Bermuda Chapter works in the same five avenues promoting Education/ Literacy Development with the purchase of laptops, offer of an annual scholarship and donation of books. It pursues childhood Health/Obesity Prevention through soccer and bowling events, and asthma awareness through colouring books and a partnership with Open Airways. It focuses on Employment through Career Exploration and Support by hosting, for example, a ‘Bring a girl to work day.’ This parallels the mandate of the overseas chapters and was done in conjunction with one of the local schools. Mrs. Scott said: “Because we’re females, we want to mentor our young females.”
“Now we have a younger group that’s in there, and we seem to blend pretty well.”
continued on Giving page 2
Strength in numbers: The members of The Continental Society of Bermuda recently gathered to celebrate the organisation’s 50th anniversary. The Bermuda group is the only international chapter of the US-based Continental Societies, Inc.
Continental Societies, Incorporated Continental Societies, Inc comprises 45 chapters in 19 states of the continental United States, including the District of Columbia and Bermuda. Dedicated, service-oriented women people the nonprofit, tax exempt, international public service organisation, which exists to further the welfare of children and youth challenged by circumstances. Individual chapters from Baltimore, Philadelphia, Newport News and Washington, DC formed the nucleus of the group in 1956 when the first official Conclave of Continental Societies met in Maryland. A Central Advisory Committee became its governing body in 1962. Bermuda affiliated, that year, as its first and only international chapter. The cement that bonds the individual
GIVING is a quarterly publication of The Centre on Philanthropy and is sponsored by the Colonial Group of Companies in Bermuda
chapters is the Five-Point focus on Health, Education, Employment, Recreation and Arts & Humanities. In the US, the women volunteer their time through outreach programmes at youth centres, schools and pediatric wards, to special needs and emotionally challenged youth, and at homes for the delinquent. The visibility and viability of the group were such that the organisation was nationally incorporated in 1972 at St Paul, Minnesota. Member and corporate donations, annual benefits and grants finance the programmes and projects, which according to the website, www. continentalsocietiesinc.org, have served more than one million children and youth over the past five years.
Tips to develop Social Media that matters Using the three Es of Social Media: Educate, Entertain and Empower By Stephanie Lee ocial media has grown exponentially in the last five years. Businesses are seeing the marketing potential to reach their clients. The difference with social media vs. traditional marketing is pull vs. push. Social media is all about interactive communication with the client. For a nonprofit, getting clients to interact with your organisation is pertinent to gaining more support within the community. A problem that many nonprofits face is developing content that will engage the audience. Some questions nonprofits ask are: • What do we say? • How do we say it? • How do we get people to talk back to us? Here are a few tips on developing engaging content.
S
Educate
When developing content for your social media, remember to educate the consumer about the purpose of your organisation, your mandate, who you help, what you do to help. Educate your community about your organisation industry. For example, if you run an organisation dedicated to eradicating childhood obesity, you can write and post an article about the effects of childhood obesity on the body, or share an article from a industry partner (like a doctors blog).
terrified, evoking emotion and empathy from the viewer. A great resource for helping you create content that speaks to the human mind is Neuromarketing.com. A neuroscientist became fascinated with how people decide on which items to buy, and started investigating. The rest is marketing history.
Even tips and news updates relating to your organisation. An organisation that helps underprivileged youth find money for education, can share an update from local organisations offering new scholarships. You should educate your community on how to get involved; educate your community on how to find you, what products and services you offer, and definitely, how they can join your cause, by volunteering or donating.
Empower
Entertain
While educating your community is pertinent to gaining support for your cause, a lot of writing and reading is boring. Have you ever watched L’Oreal commercials and wondered why they use beautiful models to sell their product? Because it’s entertaining, it’s interesting, it makes the viewer want to believe that by using this product, they too will look like Penelope Cruz! Here a few ways to make your content more entertaining; using pictures and video is best. Visuals capture attention, moving visuals, are even more captivating. Create picture slide shows of your events, and encourage people to come to the next one. Show video testimonials of your clients describing how great your organisation is and how you impacted their life. Have your executive director film a 30 second thank you to your latest donor/sponsor. Using emotion to capture your audience is acceptable as well. Look at the three minute commercial for the ASPCA using Alyssa Milano, pleading, begging you to donate $2 to help save abused animals. Global nonprofits might have larger budgets than smaller, local nonprofits, but
Media Maker: Stephanie Lee, Marketing and Communications Coordinator for Sandys 360, says social media can help nonprofits engage their target audience.
You should ask your audience questions. Find out how they feel about your organisation, what they want from your organisation. the concept remains the same. A great example, the Centre for Abuse created a banner campaign that displays the victim and perpetrator engaging in various forms of abuse. They are visual to captivate the community, but the images themselves are striking, a woman with bruises in various stages of healing, a child sitting in a corner
Now that you have your audience’s attention, using pictures to catch their eye, and telling them about your organisation… what next? Tell them what to do! If you want them to donate to your cause, to volunteer, to use your services, to visit your website, to share your message, tell your audience what you want them to do. If people don’t know, how can they help? In general, people are very generous and want to support the organisations they believe in. Let your audience know they can help with more than just money. Donate time through volunteering, donate supplies for events, some might even have their employer help you with a needed service. Finally, you should ask your audience questions. Find out how they feel about you, what they want from your organisation. Facebook has a great survey tool that can help spur conversation. For example, at Sandys 360 we are conducting a survey to find out the perception of the organisation. So far, our biggest problem is that we are in the West End, too far for some. Now that you’ve created engaging content, that educates, entertains, and empowers, share it with the world. Post it on your social media sites, like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Pinterest. Make sure you keep up with the conversation being held. The content was the conversation starter, now you have to keep the conversation going. Having a (positive) conversation with your audience means they are engaged. Job well done!
Golden Anniversary for the Continental Society continued from Giving page 1
The local Society, however, invites both boys and girls to the Pantomime and ‘Reading Under the Stars’ events. They also particiapte in the Society’s Mother of the Year Essay Writing Contest. “It is always good to see the difference that the organisation makes,” Mrs. Scott said. On November 10th, 2012, The Continental Society of Bermuda celebrated its 50th Anniversary in style with 95 ‘Continental sisters from overseas’. The Executive had elected to hold its annual meeting here in honour of the Bermuda Chapter’s Golden Anniversary. The gala dinner-dance took place at the Fairmont Hamilton Princess. Teenager, Malik Alick played piano through dinner, and Pamela Barit Nolan, executive director of The Centre On Philanthropy featured as speaker. “(Malik) plays beautifully,” said charter member Mrs. Smith, who, that evening, received the President’s Distinguished Service Award from National President, Florence Blount. Mrs. Smith said: “It was sort of a surprise. They told me to come up… I was sitting there awhile before I could move… I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.” The Continental Society of Bermuda meets once a month in members’ homes, with the hostess chosen alphabetically by last name. Dues are $15 per month. Membership, which is both demanding and rewarding, appeals to those wanting to make a difference. Mrs. Scott observed: “It remains an active, vibrant organisation (that’s) sharing (its) lives with children, and there’s no greater cause.” For information on how you can contribute as a member or donor, email continentalbda@gmail.com.
Honouring the legacy: Mrs. Marilyn Smith (left) is one of the charter members of The Continental Society of Bermuda. At their 50th anniversay celebration Mrs. Smith was received the President’s Distinguished Service Award from Florence Blount (right), the Continental Society’s National President.
GIVING is a quarterly publication of The Centre on Philanthropy and is sponsored by the Colonial Group of Companies in Bermuda
“Action Day” helps restore natural beauty HSBC Bermuda and two Government Departments are steadily restoring Cooper’s Island to its natural state By B. Candace Ray eamwork continues to pay dividends with the Cooper’s Island Restoration Project, a partnership between HSBC Bermuda and the Departments of Parks and Conservation Services. On December 7, another team of HSBC volunteers spent the day clearing invasive plants and replacing them with native and endemic plants. This is a continuation of works that began in 2009, Bermuda’s 400th Anniversary year, as a mission is to return the site formerly occupied by the United States’ National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) to its natural state. According to Department of Parks and Conservation Services Director, Andrew Pettit, HSBC have provided funding and staff volunteers to restore the land, including helping to demolish seven buildings and three ammunition bunkers and installing 15 Longtail igloos, even as the birds were prospecting the site for new homes! “The volunteers have put in hundreds of hours, mainly to cull invasives and to plant plants, thousands of plants.” Those plants needed to go into the former building site which was largely devoid of topsoil, so a mini-excavator predug holes during the summer months for the 1,500 trees planted last year. Mr Pettit said: “(We) brought in new topsoil, filled the holes that we dug mechanically and marked each hole with a colour-coded flag.” That code enabled the volunteers to match the ‘hole’ with Department of Conservation Services pre-determined vegetation — Olivewood, Palmetto, Buttonwood, Bay Grape, Prickly Pear, Spanish Bayonet, Sea Ox-eyed and other all-native and endemic coastal plants. The winter season began with clearing the main invasive species, which according to HSBC volunteer, James Hea, was “Mexican Pepper”. The volunteers used axes and saws to chop down and pull up 2,000 invasives. They then employed shovels and wheelbarrows to dig out each tree pit and plant native and endemic plants. Getting out of the office, breathing in fresh air and getting hard work done appeals to Mr. Hea, who admitted to being “healthily tired” at day’s end, but also satisfied with the connections he’s made. He said: “We get to interact with members of the staff from other departments, to network and to bond. There also a sense of pride for helping restore such a beautiful part of the Island. For many people it was their first time to this part of Bermuda.” According to Mr. Hea, the project involves four-hour shifts of 20-to-30
T
Teamwork: Mandy Shailer (left), from the Department of Conservation Services and HSBC volunteer, Michelle Doars (right), cleaning the beach during the December 7 “Community Action Day” at Cooper’s Island. Ms Shailer said the contributions of the volunteers was, “priceless, many hands make light work.”
“The volunteers have put in hundreds of hours, mainly to cull invasives and to plant plants, thousands of plants.” volunteers who devote a workday morning or afternoon, as per their interests. Mr. Pettit noted: “It’s very fluid… you have volunteers that want to go in and chop stuff down. Then there are others who prefer to do the planting.” Cuttings and clippings have to be dragged to chipper-shredders and trash has to be picked up and so on to, as Mr Hea said: “(Put Bermuda) back to its original and pristine state. “We’ve made Bermuda more beautiful… you can’t really overstate the value of beauty in terms of quality of life.” Mr. Petitt added: “As long as we’re going in the right direction, great. It’s a huge benefit to Government.” HSBC honoured its commitment to the environment for a third year, rejoining its partners early this month to continue the Cooper’s Island transformation. The Government team, meanwhile, is working on re-purposing at least one of the structures on the site by converting an old NASA radar base into a ‘Watchtower’. The plan, according to Mr. Pettit, is to install a spiral staircase, new railing and all-weather telescope. “HSBC (is) assisting us with the installation. (The ‘Watchtower’ is) fantastic for whale watching. It’s the
Working the land: HSBC volunteers Blake Hellam (left) and James Hea (right) helped coordinate and oversee the efforts of HSBC staff at Cooper’s Island. closest point to the southern reef line where the whales come past on their migration.” It is also a great vantage point for viewing Longtails in flight, Nonsuch Island and Cahows arriving by night. Mr Pettit said: “Within 10 years… you’ll really start to see those dividends (of the bank’s investment) coming together, it’s no longer a brownfield site.” HSBC volunteer Blake Hellam, summed up the success of the collaboration, saying: “Together we have made a positive impact… Restoring the space to its natural aesthetic beauty, as a critical wildlife habitat, takes time and we’ve made significant progress.”
Flagged for success: Coloured flags helped volunteers know which native species to plant, like this young Bay Grape tree.
GIVING is a quarterly publication of The Centre on Philanthropy and is sponsored by the Colonial Group of Companies in Bermuda
Centre’s Conference to show: “Together We Can” very two years The Centre on Philanthropy gathers some of the charitable world’s most renowned speakers and thinkers for a Third Sector Conference in Bermuda. The Conference is designed to bring Bermuda’s Third Sector together for two days of education and inspiration that will shape how the industry moves forward and increase the impact of Bermuda’s charities. The 2013 Conference is titled “Together We Can” and takes place on February 22 and 23, at the Fairmont Hamilton Princess. “There are some distinct advantages to having our own conference here in Bermuda,” says Danielle Riviere, Programme Manager for The Centre on Philanthropy. “First is the cost. Sponsor support means that attending our Conference is infinitely less expensive than travelling overseas. “But it is also a chance to gather as a group to share and learn from each others experiences.” Subjects covered in the Conference workshops run the gamut for the sector
E
including; social media and marketing, fundraising, strategic planning, collaboration and more. Of course attendance at “Together We Can” is not limited to charities and features workshops for corporate and individual philanthropists to help them learn and understand how to maximise the impact of their donations. The Conference also includes a number of activities that extend its reach beyond the scheduled workshops. These include: • Special school assemblies for the Island’s High School and Middle School students. • Three Pre-Conference Workshops on February 20 and 21. • An open reception for Conference attendees on Friday February 22 from 5:30 - 7:30pm. • Presentation of the Youth Philanthropist of the Year Award (see sidebar). “At the last Conference we held an impromptu social on Friday night and the everyone enjoyed the chance to sit down and just talk,” explains Ms Riviere.
“So this year we’re going to do it again. Networking and collaborating are a big part of this event.” Early Bird Registration is presently open to members of The Centre and runs until January 18, 2013. The price of membership is $100 or $200 per year, depending on the size of the organisation. This cost is basically the difference between the member and non-member fee for attending the Conference. “The Conference is priced so that it is better to join and attend than not join and attend,” continues Ms Riviere. “That way if you go to the Conference and you join, your organisation gets the added benefit of a year of membership with The Centre for the same cost.” Organisations interested in attending the Conference should contact The Centre at info@centreonphilanthropy. org or 236-7706. Alternately they can visit www.centreonphilanthropy.org for more information.
Recognising Young People that Give The Youth Philanthropist of the Year Award recognises the efforts of those young people who seek to improve the community through a specific initiative or programme that addresses an identified social need. Nominations for the Award can be submitted by parents, teachers, schools or other community organisations. Four finalists will be chosen to be recognised at the Conference and the awardee will receive a $2500 Scholarship towards higher education at an accredited college/university. If you are aware of a young person/s who you feel meets the criteria please contact The Centre on Philanthropy at info@centreonphilanthropy. org or 236-7706 or visit www. centreonphilanthropy.org to download a nomination form. Deadline: January 18, 2013
Important Dates and Information for “Together We Can” Early Bird Registration Open for Centre Members through January 18, 2013. Price (Members Only, Join Today!): 1 Day - $200, 2 Days - $250 General Registration January 19, 2013 - February 8, 2013.* Price (Members): 1 Day - $ 300, 2 Days - $350 Price (Non-Members): 1 Day - $400, 2 Days - $450 *Late Registration must be done at The Centre’s offices from February 11 – 15, 2013. After February 15, participants must register at the Conference. There will be a $25 charge for Late Registration. Youth Philanthropist of the Year Nomination forms available at The Centre on Philanthropy offices and website. Deadline for nominations is January 18, 2013. Pre-Conference Workshops February 20 & 21. Please contact The Centre for more information. “Together We Can” Conference February 22 & 23, 2013.
GIVING is a quarterly publication of The Centre on Philanthropy and is sponsored by the Colonial Group of Companies in Bermuda If you have a story about Bermuda’s charitable community that you would like to share please contact us at peter@centreonphilanthropy.org or call 236-7706. To learn more about The Centre please visit www.centreonphilanthropy.org.