September 2019
Dear  ,

Thank you  so much for your help this year!!

We want to thank our board members, event hostesses and coordinators, and other volunteers for their generous donations of time, talents, and hospitality during the past fiscal year that ended on August 31st.  Sara Biyabani, Marylou Cronin, Laurie Daniels, Jean Davidson, Alix Davie, Sidnie Davis, Alex Frizzell, Fatima Hanif, Laura Hyatt, Melanie Herscher, Felice Kong, Samantha Li, Diana McDonough, Charmaine Mesina, Shana Nelson MIddler, Laura Selznick, Sally Smith, Nisha Thatte-Potter, and Eugenia Yee all helped make this a fun year for our members. They have enabled the Club to thrive and supported deeper connections among Smith alumnae throughout the Peninsula. We know that many nonprofit organizations compete for your volunteer hours and hospitality and we are very grateful that you chose to support our Club!

The Club also wants to gratefully acknowledge receiving $783 in philanthropic support from Benevity/American Online Giving Association. Some of our volunteers' hours were matched by financial donations from various corporate employers who participate in charitable giving for their employees through Benevity. The Club is very appreciative of these donations.

Finally, we would like to thank all 59 Club members for paying their annual dues this year, which provide the financial resources needed to support our activities.  This past fiscal year, the Club received $1,145 in additional cash and/or in-kind charitable donations from the following members: Gioia Allegretti, Maria Allo, Jinny Cox Atkinson, Sara Biyabani, Barbara Campbell, Martha Clayton, Christine Conklin, Marylou Cronin, Jean Davidson, Alix Davie, Sidnie Davis, Sally Foster Erickson, Fatima Hanif, Marilyn Higuera, Stannie Holt, Jennifer Bock Hughes, Jia-Yi Loo, Margie Madding, Shana Nelson Middler, Jean Parmelee, Margaret Rushing, Anita Seipp, Laura Selznick, Melodye Serino, Joy Silver, Alice Smith, Laura Sternberg, Nisha Thatte-Potter, Martha Tolles, Anne Forst Townsager, and Amanda Wallis. We greatly appreciate your benevolent support! The Club can offer more events because of these additional funds.

Annual Meeting and Potluck

The Annual Meeting and Potluck was held on September 8th at the home of Laura Hyatt '89. Thanks Laura, for your hospitality! Twenty-five alumnae attended and enjoyed meeting up with fellow Smithies. The following alumnae were elected or appointed to serve in the roles indicated for the current fiscal year:

President: Alex Frizzell '12
Vice President/Program Chair: Alix Davie '08
Treasurer: Jean Davidson '73
Alumnae Admissions Coordinator: Marylou Cronin '88
Book Awards Coordinator: Eugenia Yee '16
Book Club Coordinator: Sally Smith '64
Communications Coordinator: Samantha Li '09
Membership Chair: Fatima Hanif '89
Secretary: Sara Biyabani '84
Young Alumnae Coordinator: Eugenia Yee '16
Webmaster: TBD

We are looking for a volunteer to assume the position of Webmaster! Please email the board at  [email protected]  if you are interested.

Admissions News

Welcome to the Class of 2023!
This year, 78 young women from the Peninsula were among the 5,594 students who applied to Smith! This fall, 9 students joined 19 other current Smith students from the Peninsula. The incoming students hail from Carlmont High School, Colegio Dante Alighieri,  Harker School, Henry M. Gunn High School, Homestead High School, Leigh High School, Los Gatos High School,  Nueva School and  Woodside Priory School.  

Thanks a Million!
A sincere thank you to the following alumnae who volunteered to represent Smith at a College Fair and/or interview one of 27 prospective students:  Christine Chang,  Elisa Morales,  Emma Strong,  Eugenia Yee,  Felice Kong,  Grace Barrett-Snyder,  Ivanna Lin, Jessica Feinberg, Joanne Poon,  Kelly Johnson, Laura Hyatt,  Lori Kahn, Marylou Cronin, Melanie Herscher, Mindy Chu, Rahela Abbas, Sara Biyabani, Sara Schwegler, Sarah Tomlinson, Shira Burns, Sidnie Davis, Varsha Prabhakar.  
 
Book Awards Program
Smith College Book Awards recognize outstanding young women in our community for their academic and personal achievements. This year, six students were given the book  Code Girls: The Untold Story of the American Women Code Breakers of World War II by Liza Mundy, which recounts the story of 10,000 American women from diverse backgrounds, such as women's colleges in New England and small southern towns, who served as code breakers for the U.S. Army and Navy during World War II.

This year's award recipients and their schools were:
Akasha Fobbs of Eastside College Preparatory School
Elena Maria Mujica of Los Altos High School
Priyanka Pereira of Lynbrook High School
Avani Anne of Menlo-Atherton           
Kaitlyn Thompson of Saratoga High School                
Ziggy Sheynin of Woodside High School  

Book awards fulfill two purposes: Recognition of Smith College's name by the student/parent community during the award ceremonies, and inspiration for a promising junior to learn more about Smith and possibly apply. While many factors influence enrollment, the Admissions Office views book awards historically as a successful recruitment tool for the College. For Bay Area students, Smith is far away and colleges and universities closer to home flood the students with information. Therefore, the book award is an invaluable public relations tool. 

We are happy to expand this program. If there is a local high school where you would like to raise awareness of Smith through sponsorship of a book award, please email us at  [email protected].

Annual Treasurer's Report

The Club's past fiscal year ran from September 1, 2018 to August 31, 2019.

Gross receipts:
Dues
 $2,280
 (53%) [includes $400 in prepaid dues]
Alumnae Donations
 $1,145 
 (27%)
Benevity Donations
 $783
 (18%)
Event Guest Fees
 $110
 (3%)
Total $4,318

Total expenses:

Administrative expenses $204 (6%)
Admissions/recruiting/book 
awards		 $396 (12%)
Communications with Peninsula Alumnae $484 (14%)
Donation to scholarship fund $1,000 (29%)
Exam care packages for current Smithies from Peninsula $515 (15%)
Social/community service events $791 (23%)
Rounding $2 (0%)
Total $3,392



Net Cash on hand as of 8/31/19: $4,615

The Club is in decent shape financially, although the number of dues-paying members has dropped significantly in recent years (from a high of 99 members in 2015 to 59 members this year), which negatively impacts our gross receipts.

Following financial best practices, the Club retains a cash reserve to start each new fiscal year. This year, the reserve is bigger than usual, attributable to additional donations received from alumnae and the Benevity Fund, prepaid dues for future fiscal years by several alumnae choosing the 5-year discounted membership option, and Club activities that didn't use all of their budgeted funds.   

Please note that dues constitute just 53 percent of gross receipts. Thanks to additional donations made by 31 Club members and the Benevity Fund, we have been able to sponsor many more activities. We are very grateful for their generosity!   
 
In early September, Jean Davidson '73 , Treasurer, filed the following financial reports for the 2018-2019 fiscal year:  
  • The Annual Financial Report with the College
  • Federal Form 990-N e-postcard with the IRS 
  • CA Form 199-N e-postcard with the Franchise Tax Board
  • Form RRF-1 Annual Nonprofit Registration with the CA Attorney General
The Club is current with all of its required non-profit filings.


Nisha Thatte-Potter '88 hosted Movie Night on August 21. In keeping with the movie, we ate a potluck of Southern dishes and then watched "Fried Green Tomatoes." Most of us had read the book; some preferred it to the movie and others liked the movie better. Thanks to Nisha for the hospitality!


October 16: The Overstory by Richard Powers. This unusually structured novel, centered on trees, won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. Available at Kepler's now.

November 20: The Only Woman in the Room by Beate Sirota Gordon. In 1946, at age twenty-two, Beate Sirota Gordon helped to draft the new postwar Japanese Constitution, ensuring that it would establish the rights of Japanese women. Note: there is another book by this same title; be sure to get Gordon's book. It will be available at Kepler's soon.

If you're interested in joining the book club, please contact  Sally Smith '64 for more information.


Stay tuned for more Smithie events and news next month. If anyone is interested in volunteering with the club, please feel free to reach out to [email protected]! Thanks!

Samantha Li '09
Newsletter Editor