CPS Alumni Awarded NetAid honor

CPS alumni, Katharine Kendrick and Annalise Blum, Awarded NetAid honor for Raising Awareness of Genocide in Sudan. The College Preparatory School announced that recent alumnae, Katharine Kendrick and Annalise Blum, have accepted the distinguished NetAid Global Action Award. NetAid is an organization dedicated to the eradication of global poverty through youth action. For their dedication to raising awareness about the genocide in Sudan, each alumna will receive $5,000 and will be invited NYC for an awards dinner on November 9, 2005.

Katharine Kendrick & Annalise Blum voice their concern for Darfur to the CPS Community

“We are delighted to see Katharine and Annalise recognized. Their passion and dedication were evident here at CPS through their campaign to purchase chickens for Sudanese refugees buy selling small chick pins and green ribbons, the color of Darfur awareness. Their desire to make a difference truly transformed the campus and brought the community together in both awareness and action. It is an integral part of citizenship to both learn and serve.” states Dr. Murray Cohen, Head of School.

The students raised thousands of dollars and oversaw the expansion of their project to a number of Bay Area schools.  “My belief in the power of the individual has been revitalized,” says Katharine. “The most rewarding part was seeing how supportive the CPS community was of our project,” agrees Annalise.  Thanks to Youth Philanthropy Worldwide and Relief International, Annalise, Katharine and the Darfur Green Ribbon Project were able to funnel funds into refugee camps where money was most needed.

Annalise and Katharine designed the Darfur Green Ribbon Project to make sure that others could easily replicate it. They wrote an action guide to help other schools begin to take steps and offered advice to keep other student leaders from feeling overwhelmed. In addition, the women spoke at leadership conferences and were featured in the Christian Science Monitor and on television.

Today, both women remain involved global citizens. Annalise Blum is taking a post-graduate year before heading to Stanford and is currently in Thailand where she teaches English in villages that were affected by the tsunami. Katharine Kendrick is enrolled as a freshman at Yale where she works at the Globalist, an international journalism magazine on campus. Both remain involved in the Bay Area Green Ribbon Project.

NetAid (www.netaid.org) educates, inspires and empowers young people to take action against global poverty. Using technological innovation, peer-to-peer education, and leadership training, NetAid provides the knowledge, perspectives, and skills to create a new generation of informed global leaders. NetAid is an independent, non-profit organization based in New York and founded in 1999 by the United Nations Development Program and Cisco Systems.