Last Thursday, on the last day of Women’s History month, a group of powerful Bay Area women were making a little history of their own. More than 50 extraordinary women leaders from a wide variety of backgrounds came together to inform the creation of a women’s leadership group dedicated to United Way’s goal of cutting [...]
SparkPoint Partnership with Neighboring Bank Makes ‘Cents’
March 10, 2011 By
Umpqua Bank proudly displays a sign in their lobby that promotes their affiliation with SparkPoint American Canyon, their neighbor just a few store fronts away. The partnership between SparkPoint and Umpqua Bank has come out of necessity and circumstance. Located in southern Napa County, the small city of American Canyon (population 16,000) has been hit [...]
SparkPoint Job Coach is “Simply the Best”
March 9, 2011 By
Jose Zuniga, a father of two who lives in Napa County’s American Canyon, was unemployed when he turned to SparkPoint. It had been a while since he was last out of work, so he knew he needed to not only update his resume, but also improve his job-hunting skills. Jose credits SparkPoint Employment Coach Stacy [...]
SparkPoint Skyline Teams with Grove Scholars: Building a Foundation for Success
March 2, 2011 By
A few years ago, Evelyn Ibanez never imagined her family could become homeless. She and her husband held steady, full-time jobs at the same Bay Area company for more than a decade. But when the recession hit, they were both laid off, victims of corporate downsizing. After exhausting their savings, the family of five became [...]
Three Money Lessons for Your Kids – Part III
February 7, 2011 By
The following guest post is the third of a three-part series by Dr. Douglas Rice, who volunteers as a financial planner with United Way’s SparkPoint program. SparkPoint Centers are one-stop financial education centers that help families move out of poverty and achieve lasting financial stability. Learn more at www.sparkpointcenters.org. Lesson #3: Money Has a Life [...]
Three Money Lessons for Your Kids – Part II
February 3, 2011 By
The following guest post is the second of a three-part series by Dr. Douglas Rice, who volunteers as a financial planner with United Way’s SparkPoint program. SparkPoint Centers are one-stop financial education centers that help families move out of poverty and achieve lasting financial stability. Learn more at www.sparkpointcenters.org Lesson #2: Money is Time Frame [...]
Wanted: Financial Experts
February 3, 2011 By
United Way is recruiting professional financial planners as volunteers for our SparkPoint Centers throughout the Bay Area. We need your expertise to achieve our goal of cutting Bay Area poverty in half by 2020. One in five Bay Area families has income too low to meet basic needs. Most will never have the opportunity to [...]
Three Money Lessons for Your Kids – Part I
February 2, 2011 By
The following guest post is the first of a three-part series by Dr. Douglas Rice, who volunteers as a financial planner with United Way’s SparkPoint program. SparkPoint Centers are one-stop financial education centers that help families move out of poverty and achieve lasting financial stability. Learn more at www.sparkpointcenters.org. If financial literacy were taught in [...]
“A Job I Can Believe In”
February 1, 2011 By
Christa Brown is an AmeriCorps VISTA, who is spending a year working at United Way, supporting our SparkPoint program. Here, she describes her experience in her own words: As a recent college graduate, I was seeking an opportunity to make a difference and to work for an organization that I believed in. After interning at countless organizations, I still was still [...]
United Way Presents SparkPoint To A National Audience
January 27, 2011 By
Last week, United Way had the opportunity to present SparkPoint to a national audience, including United Way personnel from Delaware, Orange County and Portland, as well as representatives from Citi Foundation, City College of San Francisco, and Everett Community College and Highline Community College, both located near Seattle, Washington. More than thirty people toured the [...]
