Friday, December 6, 2019, 6:00-8:30pm | 965 Barrett’s Mill Road, Concord
Join Rev. Jenny and other First Parish folks for Christmas caroling at the Northeast Correctional Center in Concord with the men incarcerated there on Friday December 6, 6:00-8:30 pm. Sponsored by FPL Outreach partner Concord Prison Outreach. Registration (limited to adults 18 and over) required by November 29. Contact Larry Buell at fplgiving@gmail.com or after service on November 17 or 24 if (1) you would like a ride from the church or are willing to drive others and/or (2) to join the group registration. Individual registration also possible via email to outreach@concordprisonoutreach.org with this information: your full legal name (must match what’s on your ID), unexpired MA driver’s license number, birthdate (MM/DD/YYYY), phone number including area code, and email address for confirmation.
Category: Outreach Committee
Outreach Committee news
Outreach Committee: Pre-Christmas Sing at Concord Prison
Coming sooner than you think!
For a soulful, compassionate holiday experience, join Rev. Jenny Rankin and members of First Parish for the annual early-December at the Northeast Correctional Center in Concord to sing Christmas carols with the men incarcerated there. Our Outreach partner, Concord Prison Outreach, sponsors the event, which has deeply moved those of us who’ve participated in years past—25 folk from FPL in 2018. Tentative date = Friday December 6, with advance registration (adults only) required before Thanksgiving. Details forthcoming soon. Contact FPL organizer Larry Buell (lbuell@fas.harvard.edu or fplgiving@gmail.com) with any questions or concerns.
Outreach Committee: Seeking Applicants for Jean Wood Preston Grants
The Outreach Committee of the First Parish, Lincoln seeks qualified nonprofit organizations to apply for the Jean Wood Preston Fund Grant competition in 2019-2020. This year there are two options; (1) the traditional Jean Wood Preston Grant ($5000 – $25,000), which is for a one-time capital improvement project essential in enabling the organization to further its goals and/or (2) the Transformative Innovation Grant (also $5000-$25,000), potentially over a period of as many as 3 years), which is for critical program development that promises to take the organization in an important new direction or provide a major new extension of services.
A critical factor in our decision process will be the level of impact the project would have on the ability of the organization to fulfill its mission. In submitting a proposal, we encourage you to be highly creative in determining the kind of project that would truly impact the effectiveness of the services that you provide your clients.
Please find attached the guidelines for each Grant and the application by clicking the button below. Organizations may apply for both grants but they must be on separate application forms. Please read the application paperwork carefully because our terms and requirements have changed. The application deadline is DECEMBER 31, 2019. Please submit the application to FPLgiving@gmail.com.
The Outreach Committee will begin choosing finalists for the traditional Preston Grant and site visits will be scheduled during March and April so that the Outreach Committee can learn more about the project.
We look forward to hearing from you.
Melissa Brooks, Administrator, Jean Wood Preston Grant
Outreach Committee: September 2019 News
Drumlin-Farm to Open Table volunteer program news.
Every Thursday morning from late June through October, a team of FPL volunteers led by Bill Stason is delivering fresh produce from Drumlin Farm to Open Table, Maynard, Food Pantry, which serves clients in a half-dozen surrounding towns including Lincoln. Last summer, Bill ran this program singlehandedly. This summer he is working with a team including Gary Taylor, Becca Fasciano, Kathleen Dunlap, Monty Grob, and Deborah Youngman. Heartfelt thanks to all those early-rising volunteers! If you would like to join them in future seasons, please contact fplgiving@gmail.com
New Youth Service Grants
Outreach welcomes applications from children or grandchildren of FPL members up to 25 years of age for donations of up to $300 to registered charities in honor of service work or participation in bikeathons and walkathons. We hope to be able to fund 2-3 such projects yearly. Project descriptions of 500 words or less should be submitted to the Outreach Committee at fplgiving@gmail.com. Deadline for submission is May 1, but applications will be considered at any time of year at the monthly meeting after they are submitted.
Preston Grant competition
Candidate suggestions welcome. Thanks to an endowment created by the generous gift of Jean Wood Preston in the 1970s, Outreach is able to award up to 5 grants of $5000 – $25,000 each year to small regional nonprofit organizations for capital improvement or transformative innovation. (Winners in 2018-9 included GreenRoots Chelsea, Sudbury/Framingham-based MetroWest Free Medical Clinic, Acton-based Household Goods, Waltham-based Chaplains on the Way, and the Roxbury-based Refugee and Immigration Assistance Center.) We welcome additional nominations of worthy, well-run, small organizations to add to the list of invitations we’ll be extending on October 1. Please send nominations to Outreach Committee member Melissa Brooks at fplgiving@gmail.com
Call for volunteers
Outreach is looking for captains or co-captains to help organize some of our other traditional volunteer initiatives, such as the pre-Christmas sing at Concord Prison in early December and the Farrington NatureLinc work day in April. If you think you might be interested, please contact fplgiving@gmail.com or Outreach Chair Larry Buell. Please also let us know if you would like join an existing group volunteer initiative or FPL Faith-in-Action group, or if you might like to start a new one.
- Larry Buell, Chair, Outreach Committee
Outreach Committee: May 2019 News
Jean Wood Preston Grants Award Recognition Ceremony, June 2. Please join members of the Outreach Committee in welcoming Kim Prendergast, Executive Director of MetroWest Free Medical Program. MetroWest is winner of the largest of this year’s several awards made possible thanks to the generosity of long-term FPL member Jean Wood Preston in the 1970s. Our grant of $25,000 will enable significant enhancements of the crucial medical services that this largely volunteer-staffed organization offers each year to many hundreds of uninsured and underinsured families in our region. Kim will speak briefly at the start of our service about MetroWest’s work and be on hand for discussion after the service during the coffee hour.
Would you be interested in serving as a UUUM Delegate? The Unitarian Universalist Urban Mission (www.uuum.org) offers an array of programs of after-school and summer enrichment programs for neighborhood youth, a year-round serious of special events (performances and lectures), and diversity-awareness programs for members of suburban UU churches. Your donations support its summer camp program, and last November a contingent of more than 15 FPL members visited UUUM’s Roxbury headquarters to witness the rollout of its new van, funded by a Jean Wood Preston Grant, for transporting after-school students safely home. Outreach hopes to strengthen FPL’s ties with the UUUM in the future by appointing two more FPL members to join Gary Taylor as UUUM delegates. If you are interested, please contact Larry Buell at fplgiving@gmail.com For more information about the delegate experience, contact Gary Taylor.