Dear Fellow B-CC Baron,

I am asking you to join me in making a contribution to the B-CC High School Educational Foundation to support our alma mater. Founded last decade, the Foundation provides needed funding to fill gaps in instruction and extend opportunities to all students enrolled at B-CC. It was a long overdue idea to tap the generosity, creativity, and loyalty of B-CC alums and community leaders just as our private school counterparts have been doing for decades.

This year the Foundation has pledged to raise extra funds to support our signature program, CollegeTracks. Every student who graduates from Montgomery County Public Schools deserves the opportunity to go to college or technical school, regardless of his or her family income, race, or whether his or her relatives attended college. CollegeTracks’ mission is to improve college access for Montgomery County’s students who are most at risk of not attending college—first-generation college bound, low-income, minority, and immigrant youth.

Unlike their higher income peers, the students CollegeTracks serves have no adult in their lives knowledgeable enough about the American higher education system to help them get to college. CollegeTracks staff work right in the high schools to ensure that these students and families get inspiration, information and support to understand their postsecondary education options, successfully navigate the admissions process, and secure the financial aid they need to attend.

The Foundation also helps fund many other programs at B-CC, including student mentoring, professional development support for our teachers, grants to the math, science, English, social studies, music and arts departments, and an innovative new project that will facilitate coordination of the curriculum and teaching standards between Westland Middle School and B-CC.

To support these critical programs, the Foundation must raise $175,000 this year. We cannot do it without your help. While contributions of any size are appreciated, we urge you to join our Barons Scholars Circle by making a contribution in the enclosed envelope or online of $500 or more. All Barons Scholars Circle donors will receive special recognition in Foundation publications and at our annual fundraising event.

We are coming to you at a critical time. The bleak economic outlook means that already strapped state and county budgets will continue to dwindle, and the effect of these developments will be felt the hardest among our most vulnerable population. It has always been a unique characteristic of the B-CC community to look beyond our own children to help address the needs of the broader student population, and that has been the guiding mission of the Foundation.

Please take a look at our 2008 Annual Report, http://www.bccedfoundation.org/annualreports/annualreport2008.pdf. You can also visit our website for more information on all our programs, http://www.bccedfoundation.org

You can make a tax-deductible direct contribution at: http://www.bccedfoundation.org/donationform.html. You can also mail your contribution to: B-CC High School Educational Foundation, P.O. Box 31209, Bethesda, MD 20824-1209.

I greatly appreciate your consideration of this effort. If you have any questions about the Foundation, please feel free to contact me. Thank you very much,

Matt Gandal
President
B-CC Educational Foundation
B-CC Class of 1985
mgandal@achieve.org