BRUNSWICK
After five years of development, Brunswick Community Education Foundation officially made its debut today.
However, the simultaneous launch of both its website — www.brunswickCEF.org — and inaugural fundraising campaign, originally scheduled for today, will have to wait another week due to travel plans complicated by a harsh weekend weather forecast, and maybe a little triskaidekaphobia.
The foundation’s Web developer is out of the country, said Melissa Fochesato, chairwoman of BCEF’s Board of Directors, and had been scheduled to return this weekend but now likely will be delayed by impending wintry weather.
So, Fochesato said, the pomp, circumstance and solicitation can wait a few more days.
Former Brunswick School Board members Becky Shepherd, Malcolm Andrews and Allen Springer originally approached Brunsweick schools Superintendent Paul Perzanoski in 2008 with the idea of creating a public, tax-exempt charitable foundation that would step in when municipal and booster funding fell short.
It’s taken since then to develop the model, create its governance structure and lay the groundwork for the fundraising.
BCEF’s goal, Fochesato said, “is to raise funds for school staff-led initiatives, activities to strengthen the academic achievement and intellectual experience for all of our students.”
Directors set an initial fundraising goal of $50,000, but have yet to start actual collections.
An account has been established at Bath Savings and they have a list of pledges from private and commercial contributors. But no money yet has changed hands, because BCEF’s directors wanted to wait for the School Board’s official endorsement, which they received Wednesday.
“We have verbal commitments from dozens of local supporters whom we have approached over the last few months to gauge interest,” Fochesato told The Times Record Thursday. “Not only have people been supportive of the idea, we have been humbled by the eagerness to donate.”
Brunswick’s foundation is modeled after other successful regional community foundations, such as wellfunded peer groups at Greely, Falmouth and Kennebunk high schools.
The seven-member board of directors was finalized during the past year. Its roster includes James Ford; local educators Jon Riggleman and Rick Wilson; Bowdoin College professor Stephen Perkinson; and residents Dana Bateman and Frank Strasburger. Shepherd, who co-owns Wild Oats Bakery and Café, and Mary Herman, a former social studies teacher and Maine first lady, comprise the foundation’s advisory committee.
Applications should be available by April 1, with a first round of disbursements scheduled for autumn.
In addition to its seven board members, BCEF has four committees — Development, Grant Application, Finance and Public Outreach — and is looking for volunteers to staff them.
Board meetings are open to the public; the next is scheduled for 3:30 p.m., Jan. 7, 2014, at Frontier Café, 14 Maine St.
jtleonard@timesrecord.com
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