In news particularly meaningful for Martin Luther King Jr. Day, we are extremely proud and honored to announce that Friends of CRLS is this year’s recipient of the coveted Education Award of the Cambridge NAACP! We were told that our work in trying to address the needs of all sectors of the CRLS population was a key factor in our selection.

New: Read an article on the award ceremony in the Cambridge Chronicle on 3/11/2013.

FOCRLS will be presented the award at the 28th Annual NAACP Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Memorial Breakfast on Saturday, February 23rd, at 9 am, at the Cambridge Marriott Hotel in Kendall Square. The keynote speaker is Professor Charles J. Ogletree Jr. The flyer for the event is available here.

To hear that we have earned this kind of acknowledgement from the NAACP is both humbling and deeply significant. This, we believe, is a moment in which to reflect on the steps we have taken and will continue to take, developing opportunities for all communities at the high school, with particular mindfulness toward ending academic, financial, and social divides and injustices.

Thank you to all of those – parents, teachers, administrators, Cambridge businesses and community members, and alumni – who have supported our work through volunteering, donating, or both! This award is your award!

We hope you will join us for this very meaningful celebration. Tickets can be purchased for $60 from the Cambridge Branch of the NAACP. For more information about the breakfast, please call (617) 895-7760 or email cambridgenaacp@gmail.com.

What says “home” better than Cambridge and Thanksgiving? The CRLS Alumni Association invites alums of CRLS, CHLS, Rindge Tech and their guests to attend the First Annual CRLS Alumni Homecoming Week, for a series of events beginning Friday, November 16th, through Friday, November 23rd, 2012. For tickets, visit crlshomecoming.eventbrite.com. We hope to see you there!

CRLS Alumni Week Events:

Fall Musical
Enjoy a special presentation of this year’s Fall Musical, Urinetown, written by Greg Kotis and composed by Mark Hollmann. Following the performance, CRLS Alumni Association will be hosting a meet & greet in the Media Cafe with fellow alumni, students, cast & crew.
Friday, November 16, at 7:00 pm in CRLS’ Fitzgerald Theater

Football Game & Tailgate – Cambridge CRLS vs. Somerville High School
For the first time in years, the Thanksgiving Day Football game will be played against Somerville! CRLS Alumni Association invites you to “Tailgate” with us before and during the game with hot coffee and doughnuts.
Thursday, November 22, at 10:00 am at Dilboy Stadium in Somerville

“Back to the Future” – The New CRLS Open House
Tours of the renovated CRLS (it’s fantastic!), meet and greet, alumni roundtable, refreshments.
Friday, November 23, from 10:00 am – 2:00 pm. Drop in anytime. FREE EVENT.

The CRLS Homecoming is enthusiastically sponsored by the Alumni Committees of Celebrate CRLS and Friends of Cambridge Rindge and Latin School.

Bring your friends.  Pass the word.

FOCRLS is now accepting need-based applications from students for domestic and overseas school trips for the 2012-2013 academic year.

Students must have at least a B average and demonstrate financial need.

Here is the overview of the fellowship, and here is the application to apply for funding.

Travel funds are limited. Please make sure you see the faculty trip sponsor for details about the trip, and apply for a travel fellowship as early as possible.

If you have any questions, please contact Friends of CRLS at focrls@gmail.com, or call us at (617) 275-6338.

We look forward to hearing from you!

City officials and others in attendance:
-city council: Minka van Beuzekom, Tim Toomey
-school committee: Patty Nolan, Fred Fantini, Mark McGovern
-CRLS: Damon Smith (Principal), Rene Meshon (Tutoring Center Director), Angelica Brisk (Media Arts faculty), Larry Aaronson (CRLS/CPS Photographer), and students
-Whole Foods: Peter Sharon (Prospect St.), David Remillard (River St.), Claire Davies (Fresh Pond), Ivy Welch (Prospect St.)

At a lively little ceremony marked by excitement, enthusiasm, and goodwill, Whole Foods officials presented a Big Check for $15,287.91 to Friends of Cambridge Rindge and Latin School (FOCRLS) on Thursday, October 18, 2012 at the high school. This check will contribute to funding programs at CRLS, in particular faculty and student grants in the areas of ecology, the environment, and nutrition. The donation represents five percent of Whole Foods’ sales from all three Cambridge Whole Foods stores on “5% Day” on September 12, 2012.

“The four key themes that frame the back story for this event are Investment, Mission, Community, and Partnership,” said Elaine Schear, FOCRLS President, thanking the Whole Foods marketing team, city officials, Principal Damon Smith, school staff, and FOCRLS and student volunteers for 5% day.

“Investment – community investment – in our CRLS high school youth is a core value of FOCRLS and its programs. More investment will make all of our programs more robust, in particular faculty grants for projects exploring environmental, health, nutritional, ecological ideas and issues,” she said.

“Secondly, our missions – CRLS/CPS/Whole Foods – mesh, reinforce, and echo each other: the health of our children – care for the environment, team work, diversity, opportunity and respect in workplace and schools.”

“Third – community – the teamwork at work behind today’s event – the Whole Foods marketing and design people, the FOCRLS volunteer parents, student shoppers, communications people, volunteers in the stores on September 12, student journalists on the CRLS school newspaper, other businesses supporting business and the school, like the Cambridge Trust Company.”

“And last not least, partnership – what doesn’t show on the surface – relationships developed over time with Whole Foods, and continuing into the future, based on our missions to invest in the community, our youth, to promote healthy eating and the whole health of our young people, to promote their stewardship within the school environment and outside, to encourage social responsibility while they’re here as our students and beyond.”

Photos from the event are posted here.

As a result of the “5% Day” held on behalf of FOCRLS at the three Cambridge Whole Foods locations on September 12, 2012, Whole Foods will donate 5% of its profits that day. The day generated a lot of excitement on the part of the Cambridge Rindge and Latin School families, volunteers, staff, and students. Over twenty parents, staff members, and students turned out to volunteer in the stores, greeting customers and telling them about the high school. And many more came out to support CRLS and Friends of CRLS by shopping that day.

Peter Sharon, Marketing Director at the Prospect Street store, said, “I could not be more pleased. Thanks so much for rallying the troops! One aspect of my job as a marketer, arguably the most important one, is to create a feeling of connectedness between the store and the community. Seeing the FOCRLS volunteers and students greeting friends and neighbors in the store and sharing the news about that partnership exemplified that perfectly… the day was an absolute success!”

We couldn’t agree more. Thank you Whole Foods!

–See the photos taken that day in this online album.

–See the front page article on the event in the September 2012 issue of the Register Forum, the student newspaper at CRLS, here.

We are thrilled to report that Wednesday, September 12, 2012, is FOCRLS 5% Day at all three Whole Foods Cambridge locations!

The informational poster for the event can be downloaded here. Please help spread the word!

Here’s your chance to stock up on healthy snacks, beautiful produce, hormone-free meat, fair-trade coffee, and much more, while helping support FOCRLS programs that benefit our Cambridge students.

Five percent of the net proceeds of all sales on September 12 will be donated by Whole Foods to FOCRLS, at these three stores:

Prospect Street: 115 Prospect Street (near Central Square) – 7:30am-10:30 pm
River Street: 340 River Street (near Memorial Drive) – 8am-10pm
Fresh Pond: 200 Alewife Brook Parkway – 8am-10pm

This very generous donation by Whole Foods will support FOCRLS grants to CRLS faculty and students in the areas of ecology, the environment, and nutrition. For more on FOCRLS programs, including Faculty Grants, Student Travel Fellowships, Unsung Heroes, Faculty Distinction Awards, First Scholars, Saheed Future Educators Scholarships, and It Takes a Village college readiness program, click here.

We encourage you to check out the Whole Foods website for their mission & values statements, information on their product lines, recipe tips, and menu suggestions.

Make out your shopping list now! See you at Whole Foods on September 12!

We thank the management team of the Hyatt Regency Hotel in Cambridge for their first-of-its-kind partnership with the Rindge School of Technical Arts (RSTA) and Friends of CRLS, which will add new paid internships at the Hyatt for advanced Culinary Arts students, starting fall 2012!

The Hyatt visit, initiated by FOCRLS, took place on  5-8-2011 with a tour of the school and lunch at the Falcon’s Nest.  The visit culminated in this partnership between the Hyatt, which offered paid internships to Culinary Arts students, and CRLS/RSTA.