NCA (Los Niños de Chapala y Ajijic A.C.) Minutes
November 3, 2015
La Floresta
The meeting was called to order at 10:45 am.
Present: Bill, Doug, Shannon, Amy, Lori, Tim, Susan, Nancy.
Absent: Nicole.
A quorum was declared.
The Minutes of September 25, were accepted as reviewed. A few outstanding action items will be circulated to Directors.
- Quarterly Newsletter still an outstanding item: brief summaries from each Director to go to Nicole, asap. Nicole will collate, submit to Amy for editing, and the edited version will go to Doug for publishing. Deadline to go to Nicole, Nov 20, publish date, December 1.
- Scholarship Summit: A new initiative at LCS following 60th Anniversary. Calling a meeting of all education-related groups to present who they are, what they do, try to coordinate activities. Susan will cover this. Can we have Kenia & a couple of students that need sponsorship attend? 10-2. Will have pens. Nancy will check with Kenia about being able to bring a couple of kids. Will try to have student in need of sponsorship as well as a graduate. Each group with an active interest in education will have ten minutes for presentation.
- Tim will do the LCA event Saturday, bring student profile book, plus pen, mugs & brochures. Mugs for new sponsors only. Tim will carry the NCA torch Saturdays at LCS in the future.
- Updated NCA brochure to be produced by Shannon and Amy.
- A translator at Notary #5 has expressed an interest to assist with translation: her children are in the NCA system waiting for sponsors. Nancy will get her contact information.
- Doug will upload the new Student of the Month columns to the website, the older ones have been done.
- Amy will contact Kenia for more students for the OJO monthly column.
- Monthly Web review by Directors: any suggested updates to be submitted to Doug by Nov 20. Kenia and Lilia have done some review, and student profiles have been updated.
- Doug will design the new NCA Bazaar facade, and produce sandwich boards for the Bazaar and LCS.
- A proposed future event at the Auditorio may still be a possibility: Susan’s friend, Cony, says that for a non-profit event, the cost could be minimal.
- Swentik Fund: Irma of IJAS is going to help us with getting the funds released. Lilia and Kenia met with Irma directly, had a good meeting. Explained that we can’t generate a report for IJAS in July due to our distributing Becas. We will send a letter in June, stating that the report will be delivered in October. Profiles need to be updated for existing students. We’re already doing this for all new students. Irma wanted us to have a professional child psychologist to evaluate students. It was explained that we can’t afford this. Irma said we don’t need to follow the IJAS fund-raising procedure for smaller events. Also explained to her that the Bazaar is autonomous. Understood that NCA doesn’t pay rent nor employees. Irma wants confirmation that building is donated by the city. Kenia will be getting this documentation.
- We are going to have Adolfo mentor Lilia & Kenia. He works at Love in Action and used to work with Irma at IJAS. He’s a professional child psychologist.
- Irma will be coming to visit NCA at our office. Date has not been set, likely Nov-Jan time frame. We will make this discussion a part of our next AGM. Current status of our relationship with IJAS will be an agenda item.
- IJAS was made aware that in the past, some kids were not getting all of their funds. IJAS understands our accountant is more than qualified for the NCA dossier.
- IJAS knows that we have a two-person operation when we give out Becas. Both NCA personnel sign, and money is counted out in front of the recipient. The mothers sign as well and are issued a receipt.
- We should get our operations manual that was prepared by Adolfo to the person for translation into English.
- Did a dry run of the Indian Dinner, went very well. Everything was very good.
Nicole doing salad.
Pat and Shannon doing dessert.
Doug Naan Bread
Nancy Chicken, Rice
Amy Rice, Raita
We have 4 girls from the Bazaar to help.
Schedule for the event:
- 3-4 Cocktail
- 4-5 Meal
- Continued bar service, music
NCA Bazaar Girls will be here 12:30.
Kenia wlll help with Naan bread.
Bar, Lilia, Adela on tickets. Doug will run the bar.
We have all of the plates, glasses, utensils and table cloths.
Shannon request: next door to the Iron Horse there is an Indian store. See if she is willing to let us borrow some decorations in return for being able to set up a display of her items at the event.
Shannon will get material for draping. We will need to set up lighting. Material at Oscar’s.
Reminder to sponsors to ticket sales. Doug to send. Tickets will be at the Bazaar.
Nancy: Michael will get the tables and chairs from the NCA office.
Next Meeting: December 10, 10:30am, La Floresta.
The meeting was adjourned at 11:50 am.