2/23/2018 0 Comments The End of an Era...Well, not really an era, but close enough. As of 3:23 on February 23, the Dress Drive was over. The experience was so rewarding! Mia and I worked so hard at this project and the outcome was everything we wanted and so much more. I think my favorite part was interacting with the girls buying dresses. I spent over 2 hours with one girl helping her find her dress. At first, she was really shy and had me run dresses back and forth for her, but as we spent more time together, she started showing me her dresses. When she found the dress that she was going to get, she was so happy, and that made me so happy for her! The best part was when Mrs. Pratt and Mrs. Taylor counted the money we had made so far...WE RAISED OVER $6,000 AT THE EVENT, which is DOUBLE the amount they had made last year!!! A small portion of the proceeds will go to Mia and I to use towards our next project, which we are still in the process of thinking of right now. Our current idea is to somehow work with teens in homeless shelters, since our overall goal is to foster relationships with kids in those situations.
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2/9/2018 0 Comments Dress Drive Eve!Tomorrow is the day! Today after school, we are meeting at Doe Creek to organize the dresses throughout the hallway. We have gathered some strong, male volunteers to help us lift the racks. Then, tomorrow, Mia and I will be arriving at 7:30 AM, which is going to painful and will require A LOT of coffee. We have planned for the volunteers to arrive around 8 AM. The hour before the event, the volunteers will be trained on how to talk to the costumers and understand the format of the event. The Dress Drive will open at 9 AM and it will go until 2 PM.
These last four months have been leading to this event and I have such mixed emotions. I am so excited, I don't even know if I will be able to sleep tonight. I can't wait to see the product of all of our hard work, but I am also nervous that I have too high of expectations for the event. What if there isn't a big turn out? What if people don't like the inventory? So many 'what ifs'. Mia and I have spent every day sending emails, organizing, making phone calls, and doing so much more. We have also had so many helping hands putting in their effort to make the Dress Drive a success. I know no matter what the outcome is, I learned so much from this experience. I have also met some of the nicest people who will leave an impact on who I am. Right now, I am brainstorming ideas for my next project. Once Monday comes, all of this will officially be over, which leaves me kind of sad, but this will drive me to find a good project to work on the rest of the semester! 1/19/2018 0 Comments Less Than One Month...The Drive Drive is approaching fast! We have been super busy as we're trying organize for the event and tie a few knots. After talking with Mrs. Pratt and Mrs. Taylor, we now know what we need to do. We have been collecting donations from local schools and boutiques. So far, we have heard from two wedding boutiques about possible donations, which is super exciting! After lots of anticipations, we are finally setting up the dress donation box today! We have posted flyers all over the school hoping lots of girls see it and think to donate their used dresses. Also, we have been looking for volunteers to be personal shoppers for the event. We emailed Mrs. Clayton (head of National Honors Society) about scouting out 20-25 kids to help out with the event. She told us that about 10 kids are interested, so we are stilling hunting out more. I feel like we are on the right track! Just a few more weeks and then we will be waking up early on February 10th to go to the middle school.
12/15/2017 0 Comments Only 2 More Months...It's such a good feeling when something runs smoothly! Right now we are still working with Mrs. Taylor and Mrs. Pratt on the 2018 Dress Drive. For the last two weeks, we have gone to Doe Creek to organize the dress room. Within those few two hour trips, we emptied TWELVE cardboard boxes FULL of prom dresses. Those boxes contained probably over 200 prom dresses! Peaches (the company that donated the dresses) was so generous to give these to us, they will make the girls at the event very happy! On top of the dresses from Peaches, there are still many beautiful dresses left over from last year. Every time I walk into the dress room, I get overwhelmed with so much excitement knowing that we can give formal dresses to people in need!
We are working on setting up donation boxes at high schools in the area. So far, we have donation boxes at Mt. Vernon and Greenfield Central. Next week, we will definitely have to get a donation box set up here at New Pal for girls to donate dresses. Through donations, we hope to get a couple hundred more dresses that are in good shape. We have created an Instagram page for the Dress Drive, which we think will help get the word out about the event. We are so excited for it, time is flying by! 11/17/2017 0 Comments Onto the Dress DriveWithin the last two weeks, we have been extremely busy between meeting with multiple people and organizing ideas. I will begin to tell you about last week when we met with the principal of what we thought was Arsenal Tech High School. When Mia, Emma, Mackenzi, and I arrived to the big campus, we went into the main building which we assumed was where Mrs. Sultzer would be. Long story short, Mrs. Sultzer is not the principal of Arsenal Tech, but she is the principal at a graduation academy on the campus. We discussed possible opportunities, but we were both on separate pages with our ideas. Right now, we are thinking of ways to incorporate kids from inner-city schools to what we are doing right now, which is the 12th annual Dress Drive.
Last week, we also met with Mrs. Pratt and Mrs. Taylor who now run the event. Mia, Emma, Mackenzi, and I going to take on this project as well. It's a great event for EVERYONE to get a formal dress or tuxedo for a reduced price to have a special night without worrying about a dent in there wallet. We are responsible for creating the flyer, getting the donations, and spreading the word of the event. This last Wednesday, we went around the north side searching for dress donations and just talking to businesses about our event. It was very successful! When we walked out of the second store we went to (Nancy's Bridal Boutique), we had our hands full of dresses! We are super excited to show Mrs. Pratt and Mrs. Taylor of our accomplishment, and today we are going to Doe Creek Middle school to drop off the dresses and talk to them about some more ideas we had. 11/3/2017 0 Comments Crossing Cultural BoundariesAt the beginning of the week, we made a flyer to provide when we meet with the principal at Arsenal Tech. The flyer includes all of the information needed to sell the idea. Once the flyer was created, there was a lot of waiting around to hear back from principal. We were really wanting to meet on Wednesday to discuss our plan of action and see if we could get approval to get the project started. After not hearing back from them for a week, Mackenzi and I got a little anxious and decided to make a phone call to them. The whole process was long and confusing while we were constantly being transferred to and from schools. We finally got connected with the principal and we talked about scheduling an upcoming meeting. The meeting was scheduled for next Wednesday at 9:45 and Mackenzi and I are have a mix of emotions. We are so excited that our idea is finally becoming reality, but we are also nervous that it may or may not be approved. On the plus side, we finally came up with a name for the project, "Crossing Cultural Boundaries".
10/27/2017 0 Comments ResearchingOn our first week back from fall break, Mackenzi and I checked our email and found that the homeless shelter never got back with us. After our failed attempt at connecting with an organization, we were left with open minds After talking with Mr. Large, we decided to search for another group/organization to partner with to find girls for our project. He remembered a lady from the Prom Dress Drive in the spring from the inner-city area who worked with young girls from IPS schools. He then got this lady's information and connected us with her. The last few days, we have been emailing back and forth and planning a day where we can meet and discuss ideas for the project. These women work within the IPS schools, so we can be assured that they can connect us with a good group of girls and give us guidance through this project, as well. By the sounds of the email, they sound just as excited as we are, which is what we want! Kenzi and I are planning to start working on a template to share with them when we meet up. I can't wait to share our ideas, as well as take some input from women who experience this type of situation daily.
10/27/2017 0 Comments Passion Project BrainstormingAs of now, I have completed my first project (Future Dragons Fair) and I have been doing a lot of thinking about my next one. I am very passionate about helping those who are less fortunate, and in my upcoming project, I am doing exactly that. On this new project, I am working with Mackenzi Black and together we are going to give young girls in the inner-city area the entire prom experience. (Hair, nails, dress, dinner) We are planning to receive grants to help fund this project. At the moment we are going through a homeless shelter to get a small group of girls who are interested. This project is more than just giving them a glitzy, fun night, but the experience to form meaningful friendships. Not only will this project benefit the girls from the homeless shelter, but will also give Mackenzi and I an eye-opening opportunity. For now, we are just waiting to hear back from the homeless shelter we have chosen to work with. We are very excited to get this project moving!
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Ivey SimmonsI am a senior at New Palestine High School and I am so excited for all of my projects I will take on this year in Advanced Business Management! |