Outdoor Movie Survey Winner: Boys And Girls Club of Greater New Bedford
Contact Open Air Cinema at 866-802-8202 to order your portable movie screen system today, or shop directly in the OAC online store. We look forward to placing your order today. Congratulations to the Boys and Girls Club of Greater New Bedford, who are the proud new owners of an Open Air Cinema 12' Home Inflatable Movie Screen.
They rallied the most forwards and won our outdoor movie survey forwarding contest. For blog readers who aren't familiar with the contest, click here for more info. We sent Mike Valler (an administrator at the Boys and Girls Club of Greater New Bedford) a few questions about the organization and how they plan on using their new outdoor movie screen:
Open Air Cinema: First off, congratulations on winning the Open Air Cinema 12' Home inflatable movie screen!There were quite a few individuals in the running, but the Boys and Girls Club of Greater New Bedford were clearly the winners. How did you pull it off? You had quite a few forwards, and so you must have really rallied your support base to get that much activity.
Mike Valler: You know, this is something we've been trying to get for a while. We've been trying to start our own community revitalization project using outdoor cinema in our housing development areas in our city.
So once we saw this great opportunity, we rallied our troops together to put the word out via our Facbook family and friends, as well as using our youth by informing them to go home and take the survey. Staff even posted this on their own personal pages as well we're lucky we had a great turn out.
OAC: Can you tell us a little bit about the Boys and Girls Club organization? Although many of our readers are familiar with what you do, could you give us a brief summary of your mission, goals, etc., and how you accomplish these?
MV: Well there is a little history lesson here as we're the THIRD oldest Boys & Girls Club in the Country.
This year we will be celebrating our 140th of service to youth here within the Greater New Bedford area. Through our programs, we enable our youth to reach their full potential as healthy, productive adults.
Our programs are the heart of our promise for the future. They engage young people in activities with adults, peers and family members that enable them to learn powerful life skills and introduce them to new experiences.
Based on the interests and needs of the disadvantaged boys and girls we serve, our Clubs offer diverse program activities in the following three areas: Academic Success Healthy Lifestyles Character & Leadership And much more.
OAC: What community do you serve specifically for your chapter of the Boys and Girls Club?
MV: Our Club serves the Greater New Bedford area, our currently memberbase in our club is over 900 youth.
Under our organization we also have our Wareham unit which has and additional 300+ youth. We serve as many as 6 communities in the area.
OAC: How will you be utilizing your Open Air Cinema inflatable movie screen? Open Air Screens are great for entertainment, but can be used for so many other purposes. Do you have any educational or community building initiatives in mind?
MV: We're looking to using our NEW Open Air Cinema inflatable screen in a variety of ways. Indoors, by means of using our gymnasiums. As well as outdoors, on our site to provide Club Movies to your youth.
We're also looking to brin it out into the community at local housing developments to bring families out for a night of fun. We're also looking into using it in our Bullying Programs as well as other programs we offer that contain educational videos. This is just the first stage of how we're looking to use this great Open Air Cinema Screen.
We also in the mist of trying to develop a resources and tools to purchase a bigger screen and display package so we can't take this to the next level.В Also very important to us is developing and releasing (with the help of Open Air Cinema) this information so that other organizations and Clubs can benefit from having their own Open Air Cinema Program running in their own community. (ie: tools such as templates for donation request, fundraising plans and canned PR releases etc)
We're hoping by creating a plan as well as resources for how to make this a reality for others is very important. (be sure to check out Open Air Cinema's Forums for more info)
OAC: How will the 12' inflatable movie screen further the mission of the Boys and Girls Club of Greater New Bedford?
MV: Specifically for us, having this screen adds to our Outreach as a club.
It provides us the opportunity to get OUT of our Club and bring the Boys & Girls Club TO the community. It's a great way for us to support our community as well as our youth.
OAC: Is there anything else you'd like to say about the Boys and Girls Club of Greater New Bedford, or anything you'd like to promote?
MV: It's important to know that Boys & Girls Clubs all around the country are struggling, just as we all are these days.
That being said, there has been a misconception that we as Boys & Girls Clubs are a nationally funded organization. This can't be further from the truth. I can attest that clubs around the country are closing due to these difficult times. Each clubs is autonomous and struggles to find funds to keep doors open to serve OUR youth, OUR communities.
The majority of a Clubs financial help comes from its community. So please take the time to support your local Boys & Girls Clubs. With over 4,300 clubs across the country, it's very important that we as individuals, businesses and communities support the work we do everyday.
Remember, not all support starts with a $ sign. Time is sometimes more valuable than money! It just takes ONE! For more information on the Boys & Girls Club of Greater New Bedford please visit: www.bgcnewbedford.org