August 3, 2017

By Pam Harlin, Meemic Foundation Director

Sigh. Look at them. I wish I could be as laid back with “no care in the world” as my two dogs, Hudson and Macy. They are 2½-year-old Bichon Frises, enjoying life on the couch. Don’t they know that it is August? That we are in the midst of back to school time?!? 

This year is flying by! It is hard to believe that we are approaching a new school year already. The Meemic Foundation team and your local Meemic representatives have been busy working with many school districts on back-to-school partnerships and activities – whether it is to celebrate recent grant recipients (we have more than 2,000 grant recipients to present awards to this month – wow!), to help local administration kick start the new school year (with a variety of in-school partnership initiatives like back-to-school breakfasts and Foundation awareness presentations), or to promote our current grant opportunity (our traditional grants that fund a variety of classroom needs, from field trips to classroom technology and beyond). 

Like you, we are busy busy busy. Yet my dogs ... well, this whirlwind of activities doesn’t seem to faze them at all. And I didn’t even mention other important initiatives like our Together Movement (you can find more info at MeemicFoundation.org/Together), which is designed to promote kindness and diversity, and to fight bullying with great resources you can tap into for your classroom. Along with this, I’m most excited about our partnership with Defeat the Label and their upcoming Second Annual Community Conversation on Bullying Conference (check MeemicFoundation.org/Events for information about this and other Foundation events). And ... we’re already working on our fourth-quarter grant opportunity that we know will excite our club members (hint — we’ve partnered again with the exceptional education brand Lakeshore Learning). 

And still, my dogs just roll over, stretch, wag their tails ever so slightly, then go back to sleep.  Hmmmm ... maybe they are content because they know that we’ve got everything under control and know that Meemic is always fully focused on serving the needs of our educational community. Hudson and Macy can relax because they know that “Meemic’s got this!”

I hope you know that, too. Because we were born from educators (our company was started by a group of educators), our commitment to serving educators is in our DNA. Got ideas on other partnerships we should consider or other ways we can assist? Please let me know. In the meantime, I think I will go give my very content dogs a rub on their bellies ...