Local Education Center Wins Grant From Maxwell House!

A Few weeks ago I posted information on a contest that was offering a $50,000 renovation grant to the competing organization with the most votes. I am happy to report that Philadelphia's own Community Education Center (CEC) was the winner of the Maxwell House Drops of Good Competition. Good job guys! Here is a copy of the thank you letter from Terry Shockley of CEC:

There are sooooo many people to THANK!   The web of supporters, the level of engagement was amazing!  Everyday I hear another story of how someone went above and beyond to help the CEC win the $50,000 makeover, from individuals to organizations, from family and friends to complete strangers, over 200,000 votes!  I might be making a mistake by singling out some to thank, it is truly impossible to thank everyone, but here it goes: to the gorilla marketer who created the attention grabbing  pieces left at CEC (to this day no one has confessed to creating them), to the young man who was so taken by the simple kindness of my finding him on Facebook to return a envelope he lost containing $40 and a blank check that he created an online campaign called Help Me Give $50,000 to the Person Who Returned My $40, to Randy Dalton for creating his Blue Maxwell House Vote for the CEC Sculpture, and to Scott Maits who set up the CEC's on site voting stations and worked tirelessly to get people to vote over the course of the nine week campaign, to Poetica for the Swap Social voting event, and last but not least to my husband Ed who was one of CEC's biggest ambassadors and whose winning attitude never wavered.  And to all the media folks: Tiffany Bacon, Michael Harrison, the lovely folks of the University City Review, WPEB the West Philly community radio station with the mostest, Todd Holtsberry of Rap Radio, and the Flying Kite; to the dancers and theatre artists who had their whole offices voting as well as their moms - a big shout-out to Hedi, Mark, Bill, and Marcel.  And then there were so many wonderful organizations that helped: Dance Philadelphia.org, the Folklore Project, Dance USA Philadelphia, the Leeway Foundation, and the Peoples' Emergency Center, to name a few!  We even got our government officials in on the act, thank you to Councilwoman Blackwell and Mayor Nutter!   And this is just the tip on the iceberg, our local partner Rebuilding Together Philadelphia had another huge network of people and organizations working overtime to get the votes in, so a big thank you to RTP and all their Ambassadors and supporters! 

As you can see I need your help to pass the good news of CEC's win and to thank all your friends, family and beyond!   

And lastly everyone's invited to an impromptu Drops of Good Celebration PARTY on this Friday, July 8, at the CEC, 5:30 - 9!  It's a bit of a potluck, so bring a drink, chips or dessert.  We'll have the grill fired up with hot dogs and vegetable skewers.

Love to all,  

Terri

PS Mark your calendars for Sunday through Tuesday, August 14-16, that's when the makeover happen!  The details of the project are still being worked out, but we will need volunteers to help and you won't want to miss the Big Reveal Event on the afternoon of Tuesday, August 16!  I'll pass the details on to you as they becomes available!  Thanks Again!   

We WON the Maxwell "Drops of Good!" contest!  

THANK YOU!