Junior League of San Antonio Community Council 2015-16 Year in Review

Written by Rebekah Elliot, Community Writer, Graphics by Sara Buske, Graphic Designer

This year, the Junior League of San Antonio, Inc. was also able to give over $22,000 to these local non-profits! (Learn more about the grants process on jlsa.org)

American Cancer Society $1,000

The Arc of San Antonio $2,578

Boysville, Inc. $1,300

Roy Maas Youth Alternatives $2,518

University Health System Foundation $2,500

Catholic Charities, Archdiocese of San Antonio, Inc. - Help a Senior $1,500

Kinetic Kids, Inc. $2,500

Good Samaritan Community Service $2,500

YOSA (Youth Orchestras of San Antonio) $2,500

Catholic Charities, Archdiocese of San Antonio, Inc. - Guadalupe Home $2,500

Volunteer Services Council of the San Antonio State Hospital $800

$8,000 was also awarded to local high school arts and music education programs at the 2016 Margaret Tobin FAME Awards!

2015-2016 has been such a wonderfully successful year of giving, volunteering and caring. Cheers to all of the amazing women in Community for accomplishing all of the below and more!

2015 Resolve for a Better SA 5K

By Jaime Brunner, JLSA Resolve for a Better SA 5K Outreach Coordinator

The 3rd Annual Junior League of San Antonio Resolve for a Better SA 5K Polar Bear Dash is on January 31, 2015 at 9:00am, at its new location at the San Antonio Museum of Art! Join us to help the Junior League of San Antonio “Freeze” in the New Year! The Junior League’s signature project is Let’s Go San Antonio, which promotes healthy living for San Antonio youth.  Please bring your kids to join us for the Kids’ Cub Crawl (Half K) so we can get San Antonio’s youth off to the right start in the New Year. All proceeds from the race goes to help Junior League of San Antonio’s numerous community partners.

Why do we do a 5K? Our signature effort, known as Let's Go San Antonio, is aimed at promoting a healthy lifestyle among San Antonio youth by teaching children how to make healthy food choices and become physically active.  The 5K further promotes our League-wide goal of promoting wellness by getting our members and friends physically active and setting an example of health and wellness.

Where exactly is the race? I don’t want to get lost on the way there! The race will start at the San Antonio Museum of Art (200 West Jones Avenue, San Antonio, Texas 78215). Bonus: there’s free parking on-site (look for happy JLSA volunteers pointing out the lots!). Registered racers will also be granted FREE admission to the museum for the day (a $10 added value).

The route along the San Antonio Riverwalk

Registration Details: Registration available at www.jlsa.org and on-site on the day of the race. All registered runners will receive a race t-shirt, bibs with chip timing, access to the San Antonio Museum of Art for the entire day!

Registration options:

- General Registration: $40 through January 30.

- Day of Registration: $45 on site

- Cub Crawl: $20

- Team Registration: Team of 5 = $150

- Hibernator: $35, support the Resolve for a Better SA 5K effort from the comfort of your warm bed. Hibernators will receive a race t-shirt

Packet Pick Up will be at Soler’s in Alamo Heights on Friday, January 30. Details will be on the website.

If you'd like to support the Junior League of San Antonio by donating to our 5K fundraising efforts please visit us online and help us reach our goal of $20,000!

And a big thank you to this year’s sponsors!

You Say You Need a Resolution

By Sarah Bragg, Junior League of San Antonio Admissions Chair

Okay, so about this time a few years ago,  Christmas was over and I’d eaten my entire body weight in sugar cookies. What to do before the sugar wore off? Make an ambitious list of New Year’s resolutions of course!  

1. I wanted to get fit
2. In order to get fit I needed to eat healthier (remember all those cookies I just confessed to eating?)
3. Learning something new is always good
4. So is getting organized
5. I thought about how I could give back to the community
6. In order to know my community better I needed to explore San Antonio more

Wow, that’s 6 resolutions that I’d come up with; it sounded a little bit daunting. I questioned how I was going to do all these things over the next year. There’s a myriad of organizations to volunteer for in San Antonio and so many new and up and coming areas to explore. 

I asked a couple of my friends if they had any suggestions. 

One very smart friend suggested that I check out the Junior League of San Antonio. After reading about the organization online at jlsa.org I decided to fill out an application- I had nothing to lose! 

I read all about JLSA’s Resolve for a Better SA 5K and the Let’s Go San Antonio Program; it looked like I could get two of my resolutions checked off my list right away especially because the 5k is at the end of January… I found my running shoes fast! There's still time to register for the race in 2015! 

2014 JLSA Resolve for a Better SA 5K

Let’s Go San Antonio seemed like a really great way to give back to the city and to pick up some healthy eating habits too. I’m slowly I can’t eat mac n’ cheese forever. (The key is moderation.) And I loved the fact that Let’s Go San Antonio is a city wide initiative to help children develop healthier eating habits. 

I also was ready to get organized and when I learned more about the Junior League's partnership with Goodwill for donating I thought it was awesome that the donations basically counted double: support Goodwill's mission of changing lives through the power of work and earn gift cards for JLSA to give to our community partners! 

One resolution kept sticking out in my mind-volunteering. I wanted to be a part of an organization that had rich history in my city, part of an organization that could help me development myself as a better leader, an organization that would guide me. The Junior League of San Antonio seemed like a great fit! I knew a couple women in the organization already and both spoke very highly about how the Junior League helped them to grow as women and as leaders, and honestly I had been looking for an organization just like this since I graduated college. I truly felt like JLSA could really help me accomplish my New Year’s Resolutions.

The single biggest way I could accomplish all of my resolutions was to join JLSA. So I did and you can too! If you’re interested in joining the Junior League of San Antonio you can fill out an application online at jlsa.org. There will also be an information session on Tuesday, January 13th at 5:30 pm at the Bright Shawl prior to the January General Membership Meeting.

2014 Food Bank SNAP Challenge

By Lesley Vernor, 2014-2015 Let's Go San Antonio Chair

Are you up for the San Antonio Food Bank SNAP Challenge?

There are 3,812,561 people qualified for SNAP in Texas and 262,887 SNAP recipients in Bexar County.

The challenge is trying to provide our families with healthy options for $4.50 a day per person in the household.  The Let’s Go San Antonio team is working with families/children who are receiving services from the Food Bank or SNAP or both (52% receive both).  

The real crux of the challenge is how to teach and implement healthy nutrition choices when a person has a limited income.  

By deciding to participate in the SNAP Challenge, Junior League of San Antonio members, friends and families will have a better understanding of the issue that Let's Go San Antonio is trying to tackle. How can a person, or a family, really eat healthier when on a budget. 

 
Knowing how to do this is vital information that is helpful for our Let’s Go Team to come up with ways to approach the issue and it will be helpful to understand the problems that Challenge participants face while on this limited food budget.

Experience firsthand what  many children in our community are facing on a daily basis. This is the population Let's Go San Antonio is working with in teaching different ways to budget to choose healthier options. 

While participating in the challenge take pictures of meals prepared, shopping items found at area grocer’s that are cheaper and healthier options and share! It will be great for participants to learn from one another where cheaper and healthier options exist in San Antonio!

Did you give it your best effort and it ended up being an epic fail? Share why it didn't work for you.  It validates how difficult it can be to realize what $1.50 per meal really means and why Let's Go San Antonio is so important.

Some have asked "Why $4.50 a day per person?"
The Food Bank told us that $1.50 is a national average for an individual benefit.  The local per meal average is actually lower but we are using our national network’s number at $1.50.  

Share with us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram and use #JLSAgoesorange, #sagoesorange, #jlsa #safoodbank #snapchallenge. 

Don't use social media? Email us your thoughts on the challenge and photos of any attempts to participate.

Make a pledge to commit the savings back to healthy activities for your family or give back to the Junior League of San Antonio Loyalty Fund or San Antonio Food Bank.

Are you up for the challenge? Awesome, we look forward to hearing from you! 

Still wondering how you could make this work? Check out some online resources and then get back to us:

• SNAP menu and grocery plan (scroll toward bottom of link)

• KENS 5 News Anchor Jeff Goldblatt’s blog about his SNAP Challenge experience 

Board of Directors Food Bank Project

July 2, 2014, by Hannah Steward

On Saturday, June 28th, members of JLSA worked with the Food Bank Mobile Pantry, and The Fountain Christian Church, to sort and distribute food baskets to over 200 needy families.  The JLSA Board of Directors, "Let's Go San Antonio" Leadership Team, and JLSA Staff sent home baskets filled with fresh meat and vegetables, in addition to non-perishable goods, with the grateful families.  JLSA Members enjoyed the opportunity to give back to the community and work alongside the church congregation.  It was a terrific start to the 2014-2015 League year and put our Mission to action.