Local cadettes from Girl Scout troop 60385 – Makena Large, Kaitlyn Seymour, and Nika Wallach have grown up together, joining the Troop in 1st and 2nd grade. So when they decided to go for the Girl Scout Silver Award, the highest honor a Cadette can achieve, they decided to do it together.
First, they had to identify an issue they cared about. Makena’s family had begun donating to Casa Pacifica in honor of her late mother who was also a foster youth, so she immediately pitched the idea of a project that would benefit Casa Pacifica and also qualify them for the Silver Award. After visiting Casa Pacifica’s campus and seeing the Rotary Clubs of Camarillo library in person, the girls were excited about the space and its potential. The library originally opened its doors in 1995 and the girls latched onto the idea of renovating, reorganizing, and restocking the library.
The girls had their hearts set on repainting the room, so they reached out to Frontier Paint in Ojai who generously agreed to donate. Next up – a complete inventory and sorting of all the books currently in the library, getting rid of outdated ones or ones that were too elementary for the mostly pre-teen and teen-aged population. They reached out to their alma mater, Cabrillo Middle School, who generously offered their surplus library books. To add to their haul, the girls put out messages on the Nextdoor app and Facebook, offering to pick up books from people’s doorsteps. They ended up collecting almost a thousand books, carefully curating each one and recreating a library catalog.
The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic made earning their Silver Award even more difficult when Casa Pacifica had to close its campus to visitors. But the girls persevered…
Did you know March is National Nutrition Month? Our youth spent time in the Bauer Teaching Kitchen talking about healthy living and learning about superfoods like ginger, kale, turmeric, grapefruit, flax seeds and more! They even came up with yummy recipes they could try that incorporated superfoods. They ended the class by making their very own superfood smoothies! Most of the kids were pleasantly surprised at how “okay” the smoothies tasted. Cheers to healthy living and learning every day!
By Juan Ros, CFP®, AEP® Financial Advisor, Forum Financial Management, LP, Thousand Oaks Immediate Past President, Conejo Valley Estate Planning Council
Did you know you can make a gift to charity that can also increase your personal income?
With bank savings accounts paying next to nothing and short-term interest rates forecast to stay near zero indefinitely, those on a fixed income may be looking for ways to increase their cash flow. It might be tempting to look for yield in the stock market but as we learned in early 2020, the stock market can turn volatile very quickly and unexpectedly, even for dividend-paying stocks.
Ideally, income planning takes into account your long-term goals, your tolerance for risk and your overall financial and tax situation. If your goals include giving to charity, you might want to consider some tools and strategies that can provide you with a boost to your income while supporting the causes you hold dear, like Casa Pacifica.
Want to make a difference in a child or family’s life? Casa Pacifica is always looking for motivated people to join our team at one of our four locations in Ventura and Santa Barbara Counties. Current positions include:
Youth Development Specialist
Cottage Supervisor
Child and Family Specialist – Santa Barbara
What’s It Like To Work At Casa Pacifica?
“My favorite thing about working in the classroom is helping students and talking to them about their future goals. They are able to thrive because we aren’t a typical classroom setting – we make sure to tie in their mental health issues and how they affect their day-to-day instead of making them push through it. Sometimes that’s just not the priority.”
– Karla Llamas,Youth Development Specialist/Paraeducator
CEU Opportunity: A Lens on Multicultural Competency
In this workshop, multicultural humility is the lens through which the competency areas of clinical supervision will be addressed. Emphasis will be on clarity of supervisor roles, self-awareness and knowledge, in the context of racial and cultural personal identities across the supervisory triad (client(s), supervisee, supervisor), balancing hierarchy with collaboration, infusing metacompetence, respectful discourse, ongoing feedback, attention to emotional reactivity, trauma and emotion regulation, and legal and ethical aspects.
Friday, April 16, 2021 | Via Zoom 9:00am – 4:00pm (1-hour lunch break) WHO SHOULD ATTEND | Casa Pacifica clinical staff and licensed mental health professionals from the local community. COST | $99 Registration for Community Participants
Click HERE to browse upcoming trainings. For additional information, including continuing education policies, contact [email protected] | 805-366-4064
Ways You Can Help
SHOP Check out our registry or our wish list and have items shipped directly to our Camarillo campus!
DONATE
Make an online donation to help us support the greatest needs of our youth and families we serve.
BE AN ANGEL
Become a Casa Pacifica Angel to volunteer, join a committee, plan events or just support Casa Pacifica with your membership fee!
BE AN AMIGO
Share knowledge, teach skills and provide activities for our youth as an Amigo!
Thank you to our Corporate Leaders!
Our Corporate Leaders contribute to Casa Pacifica through sponsorship of the agency’s major fundraising events annually. These events are essential in meeting the 10-13% in private funding that must be raised each year toward Casa Pacifica’s operating costs, none of which would be possible without our generous Corporate Leaders. For more information about our Corporate Leader Program, email Chief Development Officer Carrie Hughes at [email protected]
Our Mission
Casa Pacifica restores hope, enhances resilience, and strengthens community connections for children, young adults and families at the most challenging times of their lives.
