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In The News …

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DC Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy (WUSA9: Brightwood): “Councilmember Mary M. Cheh and colleagues the DC Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy on the steps of the John A. Wilson Building for a press conference to highlight the continuing challenges the District of Columbia faces with teen pregnancy and its effect on the economic well being of our residents and the city at large. [...] Due to the work of groups like the DC Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy, the District of Columbia has recently seen a reduction in the rates of pregnancies for teenage women aged 15-19 years old; however, rates in the District far exceed the national average.” In DC, the rate is 67 out of every 1,000.

Michael on Being Down for Da Struggle (People’s District): Michael, a poet, vividly desribes how Catalogue non-profit Free Minds Book Club & Writing workshop made a critical difference in his life. He recounts, “I eventually started getting into trouble with the law. Which also lead to me going to prison more times than anyone would ever want to. really helped me become more diverse and more open minded. I started to do a lot of reading; also, I became very intrigued by poetry [...] Every Friday, I would get up early to prepare to go to the book club because it was a way to free my mind. Free Minds Book Club gave me a positive outlet to express myself and has opened several doors for opportunity and success.”

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Reading Early

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From “More than 100 cities, counties agree to push early literacy” in yesterday’s Post:

Washington DC, Baltimore, and six communities in Virginia are among the more than 150 cities and counties across the country that are pledging to concentrate on early literacy efforts to ensure that children can read by the end of third grade.

The Campaign for Grade Level Reading is a collaborative effort by dozens of funders to make sure that all children, especially those from low-income families who often enter kindergarten already behind, learn to read. Signing onto the campaign are big cities such as Chicago, Los Angeles, Houston and Atlanta, and the entire state of Arizona. [...]

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Mutuality

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My conception of the audience is of a public each member of which is carrying about with him what he thinks is an anxiety, or a hope, or a preoccupation which is his alone and isolates him from mankind; and in this respect at least the function of a play is to reveal him to himself so that he may touch others by virtue of the revelation of his mutuality with them. If only for this reason I regard the theater as a serious business, one that makes or should make man more human, which is to say, less alone.

– American playwright Arthur Miller, born today in 1915

Around Town: October 15-16

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Happy mid-October! We have plenty of cool places to spend your weekend, including …

Multicultural Career Intern Program (Columbia Heights Education Campus, 3101 16th Street NW)

Between 10:00 AM and 3:00 PM on Saturday, head over to MCIP’s 3rd Annual Booksale in support of the middle school and high school libraries at the CHEC — thousands of books in all genres at very reasonable prices.

Earth Sangha (at Occoquan Bay National Wildlife Refuge, 13950 Dawson Beach Road, Woodbridge, VA)

Help out with invasive plant removal, clearing invasive vines and grasses from Earth Sangha’s grassland site, from 10:00 AM to 2:00 PM on Saturday. Directions right here.

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Moving Outward

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From “The Suburbanization of Housing Choice Voucher Recipients,” published by The Brookings Institution on October 11, 2011:

Just as the suburbanization of poverty has gathered momentum, Americans who use housing choice vouchers (HCV) to help pay for their housing have increasingly moved into suburban areas as well.

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In The News …

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Go Big on Education: Five Big Ideas for the Senate to Put in Federal Education Law (Center for American Progress): “Next week the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee is scheduled to vote on a bill to reauthorize the Elementary and Secondary Education Act” and CAP here outlines “five big policy ideas the Senate should put in its bill to ensure the next ESEA is big and bold enough to improve the education system, and thus our nation’s economy.” The fifth and final recommendation? Encourage and reward bold thinking by educators, authorizing “competitive programs such as Race to the Top, the Investing in Innovation Fund, or the Teacher Incentive Fund, to spur states and districts to innovation.” Do you agree?

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Feature of the Month: Gift Registry

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Hope that you all had a good long weekend! So, do you have a fall wedding or anniversary coming up this month? Why not combine philanthropy and celebration with another cool Catalogue web feature: gift registries.

First, just create a Catalogue account. We talked about this last month, and it’s both free and simple. Once you’ve done that, browse our non-profits as much as you like. If a particular organization captures your interest, click the bolded “add to favorites” link at the bottom of their description (see below):

Once an organization is one of your “favorites,” you can add it to your Gift Registry:

Just keep adding non-profits in the same way and, once you have saved all your favorites, you can publish your registry: including a title, personal message, and easy-t0-share URL. And friends and family can make gifts to your chosen non-profits in celebration of your event. Moreover, if you would like visitors to your registry to consider specific wish list items from a certain non-profit, you can leave a comment on that non-profit’s page — which only your visitors will see. And you can update your registry at any time. Think of it as a celebratory way to customize the Catalogue site for your event:

Around Town: October 7-9

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Enjoy the weekend, Greater Washington! And consider spending it with …

Dance Place (3225 8th Street NE)

Precise, positive, and powerful. Join the Dance Place Step Team for “Step It Up DC,” an afternoon of workshops followed by an informal performance starting at 5:30 PM on Friday.

Habitat for Humanity of Montgomery County (9110 Gaither Road, Gaithersburg, MD)

Do you need to gain control of your energy expenses? If you attended the first session of “Watt Watchers,” stop by for your second FREE energy saving class on Saturday from 10:00 AM to noon.

Capitol Hill Arts Workshop (545 7th Street SE)

Starting on Saturday at 5:00 PM, the Capitol Hill Art League (CHAL) proudly presents an all-media juried exhibit entitled “The Art of Craft.” The juror of the show is Steve Fleming, artist and instructor at The Art League.

And in this coming week … Earth Sangha will be planting sumac, wingstem, and various goldenrods at Meadwood Recreation Area on Wednesday from 10:00 AM to 2:00 PM; the Mautner Project‘s Raffle for a Reason begins on Wednesday too!

In The News …

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DC-Area Apartment Rents Rise, Vacancy Second Lowest in the Country (Urban Turf via DCentric): “… rents in the DC area for Class A and B apartments have risen 3.6 percent over the past twelve months while vacancy rates sit at 2.8 percent, the lowest for any metro area in the country except for New York City.” For Class A apartments (primarily large buildings constructed after 1991), the vacancy rate is just 1.6% and rental rates “averaged $2,582/month, up from $2,448/month in September 2010.” So not only is affordable rental housing difficult to locate in the city, any rental housing is not easy to come by — and the search alone can require both funds and time.

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