First off, I must share an embarrassing tid bit. This photo below is of the entrance to the Amarillo Area Foundation, where I am interning this summer for the No Limits No Excuses program. The picture of the entrance is not embarrassing – the entrance is gorgeous as you can see. What’s embarrassing is that I tried to snap this picture undetected as I was walking in to the VP’s office for my interview! I wanted to play off the whole cool, calm, and collected recent college graduate vibe; but as an art history buff, I was GEEKING out over the large grey, charcoal, and black mural you see below.
Since I have began working at the Foundation, I’ve been a little more open about my obsession with the art in our offices and made sure to find out more about this stunning mural piece. Turns out it was commissioned by the late Mrs. Sybil B. Harrington to abstractly represent minerals, the stratification of oil deposits, and drills. Such minerals and oil deposits bring vast wealth to the Panhandle region and many of the 26 counties the Amarillo Area Foundation serves. Interestingly, the entire piece is made of nails! It’s dimension and light is just breathtaking. Mr. Delmas Howe built the piece and it fits together like a jigsaw puzzle of six sections; the puzzle weighing a total of 2,500 pounds. It’s little aesthetic treasures like this one that make me so excited to come to work everyday.
However, I’m also excited to come to work because I love the outreach work we are doing at the Foundation. The No Limits No Excuses program is a multi-partner, community wide initiative designed to assist low-income students attain professional training after graduation, either through college, technical, certificate, or military training – and then through that training, attain a living wage job that sustains a better life for themselves and our community. Our goal is 10, 000 more degrees by 2025. Presently, I am researching best practices on similar programs through out the nation, to design procedures to get more student feedback and participation on the work we are doing. The poster below is a promo we are sending out to businesses in the community to help promote the message of getting students to think about “their plan.”
Also, check out the link below to get coverage of our Chamber of Commerce luncheon where we highlighted the work of Miranda, a No Limits No Excuses student, and incoming AISD superintendent, Dana West!
http://agntv.amarillo.com/jay-ricci-report/businesses-help-students-beyond-high-school
