Oregon's 10th IHAD founders to speak

By JEWISH REVIEW

article created on: 2009-02-15T00:00:00

Oregon “I Have a Dream” Foundation class 10 founders Sonja Straub, Ph.D., and Julie Diamond, Ph.D., will discuss the I Have a Dream program at the Kol Shalom Sunday Forum 9:45 a.m., March 1 at the Mittleman Jewish Community Center.

In 1981, New York businessman Eugene Lang made a speech at the elementary school he attended 50 years earlier. When he was told that 75 percent of the students at P.S. 121 in East Harlem probably would not graduate from high school, he made an extraordinary offer: he assured the 61 sixth-grade students that funds would be available for college tuition or vocational school if they complete high school.

The national “I Have a Dream” Foundation was officially launched in 1986. The program was lauched in Oregon in 1990.

When the foundation adopts a class of children, it promises to provide supportive services and enrichment programs for Dreamers to help them graduate from high school, and financial assistance for either a college or vocational education to every Dreamer who graduates from high school.     Sonja Straub and Julie Diamond did graduate studies in psychology together in Zurich, Switzerland (Straub’s home town) and found that they shared a passion for education and for creating opportunities for those less fortunate.

Diamond heard Lang speak at Temple Beth Israel and inspired by his talk, the two talked to friends, hosted fund-raising parties and developed a list of friends, supporters, donors and potential tutors, mentors and other volunteers.

In 2008, after  raising just over $1 million, they started Dreamer Class 10, with 64 third graders at Rigler Elementary School in the Cully Neighborhood of Northeast Portland. Rigler is the most diverse school in the Portland Public School system, with many immigrant children from Somalia, Russia and Vietnam, as well as African-American, Hispanic and Native American children.

Kol Shalom forums are free and open to the public. For more information, call 503-459-4210.