Special Merit Awards of Excellence 2013-2014
Special Merit Awards of Excellence for 2014
The GAA is happy to recognize the following clubs for extraordinary accomplishments in the 2013-2014 year.
Atlanta Carolina Club for Extraordinary Tar Heel Service Day Project
Charleston Carolina Club Extraordinary New Events
Chicago, Dallas, and Boston Carolina Clubs Extraordinary ACC Collaborations
Denver Carolina Club Extraordinary Improvement
Fearrington Village Carolina Club Extraordinary Scholarship Participation
New York Carolina Club Extraordinary New Event (Eve Carson Dance Party)
Orlando Carolina Club Extraordinary Hometown Involvement
D.C. Black Alumni Carolina Club Extraordinary Perseverance In Event Planning
D.C. Carolina Club Extraordinary First Time Scholarship Event
If you would like to read further details about any of these awards, please see below.
Atlanta Carolina Club
Outstanding Service Project!
Tar Heel Service Day | October 12, 2013
We sponsored 30 students with a backpack of Tar Heel school supplies. The majority of students attending Ivy Preparatory Academy are low income/high risk students who may not realize college is an option for them. In order to change the mindset of the students, the school has decided to name each homeroom after a college or university so they begin to associate themselves with a college/university early.
The students’ back pack will have a UNC T-shirt a 3-ring notebook, pencils, pens, highlighters, ruler, Tar Heel stickers, and an UNC brochure.
We then turned the classroom into a little bit of Carolina. We painted the walls blue, painted ceiling tiles with Tar Heel feet and other symbols of Blue Heaven. We also created a UNC pictorial wall of great images of UNC.
In January, we had the 8th graders to one of our viewing parties. We watched the game and cheered for the Heels and fed them lunch.
Boston Carolina Club
The Boston Carolina Club works year round to keep the ACC schools in their area connected. Through season kick-off events, happy hours, networking events, fundraisers and more, the Boston Club is a leader in their area for excellent ACC collaborations.
Chicago Carolina Club
It’s been a busy year for the Chicago Carolina Club. You said to brag, so here we go….
For starters, members of our leadership designed the first-ever t-shirt for the Club. Not only do they help increase awareness and visibility of the club within Chicago and bring in more members, but proceeds went to our scholarship fund. And speaking of our scholarship fund, we increased our contributions this year! Giving back to our Tar Heel community is the best thing about continued involvement with UNC, and we are so proud that we were able to give back a bit more this year.
We’re also really proud of the relationships that we’re building with our fellow ACC schools. We’re participating in ACC intramural sports and philanthropy projects together. And, each Christmas, we host a joint ACC holiday party that also serves as a Toys for Tots drive. Good friends. Good times. For a good cause.
Then there’s the Chicago Marathon. As part of the 2013 Tar Heel Service Day, UNC handed out beer at the finish line of the Chicago Marathon. We had a phenomenal turnout – alums brought along friends and family, even a few fellow ACC-ers we’ve met along the way. But most importantly, we brought the Carolina spirit to one of the most iconic finish lines in the country. I lost count of how many Thank Yous, Go Heels and Boo Dooks we got during the day. And because I know you’re curious, yes, we’ve already started the process of volunteering at the marathon again this year.
Hark the Sound.
Charleston Carolina Club
Because of two transitions in leadership over the past few years, the club wasn’t holding events regularly. We held four football game viewings, six basketball game viewings, two service events (Tar Heel Service Day and one other, both with Habitat for Humanity), hosted club members at a Charleston River Dogs baseball game, and started holding Tar Heel Tuesdays where Carolina alumni and fans come together on the 2nd Tuesday of every month to network and socialize over happy hour. We have a lot of other things we want to do but are definitely making progress!
Dallas/Fort Worth Carolina Club
Our significant achievement for this year has been building the relationships with other ACC clubs in the Dhave allas – Fort Worth area and holding several joint events – Wine Tasting, Christmas Party, Happy Hour, Baseball Game Outing, Brewery Tour. These events have also brought out different people than the usual game watching events.
Denver Carolina Club
With our new leadership team in place, we were excited to offer events in addition to just viewing parties. I would like to nominate ourselves for the Most Improved Carolina Club (is that a thing??). We wanted to offer events that highlighted and supported local alumnae as well as support the new students heading to Carolina with a new student sendoff. Our DiFanco’s and Copper Kettle events were very well received and we were proud to help support our local businesses operated by former UNC Tarheels.
Fearrington Village Carolina club
The main and overriding goal of our club every year is to raise money for the UNC scholarship fund. This year we set a very challenging goal of $5000 for our scholarship fund in honor of Philip Cree who for years worked so tirelessly in raising money for the kids. We blew past our goal and came in at $6000.
Again, helping out our Chatham County kids is what our club is all about.
New York Carolina Club
Holding a new and exciting event that had an impact on alumni in your community:
Eve’s Late Night Dance Party
This year (Fall 2013), the NYCC had large influx of new young alumni members with high energy and a passion to make awesome Tar Heel events happen on the NYC scene. Several NYCC young alumni were fortunate enough to know and spend a great deal of their undergraduate experience at Carolina with the late Eve Carson. While Carolina has developed the Eve Carson Memorial Scholarship (and several key events in Chapel Hill, including Eve’s Dance Party to remember Eve), the NYCC Young Alumni wanted to bring Eve’s story to New York. While many Tar Heels were unable to make it back to Chapel Hill for Homecoming this past year, we celebrated in New York – remembering Eve and raising money for the Carolina scholarship fund in her honor. The Tar Heel family extends way beyond Chapel Hill — and this was a very special example of that. We’re really looking forward to this year’s event.
Orlando
Our club frequented the high school basketball games of freshman and basketball recruit Joel Berry. We met his family and welcomed him into the Tar Heel family. We traveled to watch his team win their state championship game. And while we doing all this visiting, we got to meet everyone’s favorite coach Roy Williams who was in town checking on Joel at a regular home game that the club attended
DC Black Alumni Carolina Club
This past year, I am proud of the consistency and high quality of the events that the UNC Black Alumni Carolina Club produced for the alums in the area. From a Christmas Party for 300 people to a Linked-In/Resume Building event joint with Virginia Tech Black Alumni, we were able to reach a spectrum of alums to get them engaged with the club. The club has been dedicated to ensuring that there is diversity within our programs and to show our value towards education and service at all times. One of the most interesting service projects we participated in was with the Grassroots Education Project where we worked to beautify a school building in a low-poverty area. This experience was interesting because we didn’t just label library books or paint a mural… nope, we got on all fours and cleaned BATHROOMS! None of us expected to play that role, but we all did it with the joy of being with fellow alums and for the love of children and education. I have two highlights from this year that I think are most important to discuss at the moment. 1) This board has done an amazing job with collaborating with other alumni groups in the area. We have very strong working relationships with NC State, NC Central, NC A&T, and now even Virginia Tech. These relationships have been built off a shared value of wanting to provide alums with an opportunity to see more than Carolina, but the greatness that North Carolina as a state has produced within its university system and beyond (hence VA Tech). This is an effort that prized by this board and we will continue to build those ties to pass on to upcoming board members. 2) This year, we put on our very first Light On The Hill Scholarship Brunch. This was such as big undertaking for our 6 member board to do…. and we did it! It was such an amazing experience and I believe the board is so much better now for taking a risk to make this happen. Just to give you an idea of how we worked together until the very last minute; on the Monday before the event, we had only raised $260. We needed $2800 to break even. We met that Monday night, said a prayer as a team, and began making phone calls. By the end of the event, we were able to raise $4500, which allowed us to break even as well as be able to give to the scholarship. This would not have been possible without the hard work of the board members and the supportive alums that we have on our side. This has been an amazing year with the board and I am looking forward to another great one.
Washington DC Carolina Club
Our first annual Scholarship Dinner, held in Novemer 2013. Our speaker was Woody Durham and we raised $7600 through sponsorships. All proceeds went towards our donation to the UNC scholarship fund.
This was our first attempt at creating and implementing such an event. The response and attendance from our local alumni was very positive and we look forward to holding similar events in the future.