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Christopher Boyce Awarded Ana Alvarez-Holmberg Scholarship

Christopher Boyce was officially awarded the Ana Alvarez-Holmberg Scholarship on September 21, 2015, at the PMI MN dinner meeting in Minneapolis. Residing and working in Jamaica, Christopher was not able to be present for the award. However, the announcement was also a part of that night’s webcast.

Loras Holmberg, speaking on behalf of the selection committee, said, “Chris came across as enthusiastic with dreams and goals. All of us should shoot for that.” One of Christopher’s references described him as… ”very thoughtful. He is not one to respond carelessly to impulses, this is reflective of a discipline that will ensure he completes what is required of him, but more so, an ability to think critically about what he is doing, and what is before him… making an impact on Caribbean lives… [displaying] not only competence, but also caring…” 
Christopher, a native of Barbados, currently works for Sandals Resorts International within their Projects & Engineering Management team. He has also acted as project lead for the Sandals Foundation. He led a community project to give the Ciceron Children’s Home on the island of St. Lucia a face lift. “Whenever I can, I also go to schools to read to the children with the Sandals Foundation Reading Road Trip.” Christopher holds a PMI CAPM and will be using his scholarship to further his PMBOK training and certification. He hopes to announce his PMP certification soon.

Ana Alvarez-Holmberg was a local leader and volunteer in project management and corporate training, Her legacy lives on with a scholarship. Together, both the PMI MN chapter and the Twin Cities chapter of the American Society of Training and Development (ATD-GTC) offer an annual scholarship in her name. The scholarship is presented each year to an adult learner who exhibits Ana’s fine characteristics in their own life. The selection committee looks for individuals who have volunteered to help enrich the lives of others. View Past Recipients

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Congratulations to PMI-MN Volunteer of the Month for October 2015

October 2016 - Greg Stignani 
has been a member of the sponsorship committee for over a year now. During that time, he stepped up and took over the role of Partners Coordinator and has done an excellent job setting up the Partner of the Quarter Program. He has been a consistent and a valuable contributor to our committee and we feel lucky to have him aboard. Greg has helped in running other areas of PMI-MN as well. Greg has stepped so willingly that deserves to be recognized.

PMI-MN would like to thank Greg for his time and dedication. Congratulations Greg!!!

To read more, visit the Volunteer of the Month page.

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Charitable Giving Update - Members Select United Way and Second Harvest Heartland for 2015 Charitable Donations

PMI Minnesota members selected United Way as their #1 pick for a charitable donation in the annual membership survey.  As part of the 2015 charitable giving campaign PMI Minnesota will make a donation to the United Way, on behalf of the membership, in the amount of $500. 

Member responses to the charity selection question showed there is high level of interest about which charities PMI Minnesota supports.   Almost one-half of the people responding to the question added a charity not in the pre-determined list.  The range of other charities noted was broad and showed our members are charitable and have widely varied charitable interests; an important learning that will inform future identification and selection of charities.    

Second Harvest Heartland is the food shelf which will receive food gathered at the October dinner meeting (Monday, October 19th at the Crowne Plaza in Plymouth, MN). Bring a non-perishable food item and receive a coupon for $10 off the price of a future PMI Minnesota dinner meeting.  

Donations to member selected charities are one part of PMI Minnesota charitable giving.  Project management education is our primary charitable activity.  We contribute to scholarships locally and nationally, and are actively working to form partnerships with local K-12 education systems to deliver and help fund project management instruction. 

One of our annual donations for education goes to the Project Management Institute Education Foundation (PMIEF).  PMI Minnesota has a long history with PMIEF.  The Robert Yourzak scholarship awarded by the Foundation annually is named after PMI Minnesota’s first president, and funded by an endowment from our chapter.  Our donation supports PMIEF development of project management education materials.  Any member of PMI has access to the Foundation’s materials; see www.pmief.org.

Thank you to the survey respondents who provided information about local schools interested in working with PMI Minnesota.  We will contact those organizations and update you on our education-related charitable activity in future newsletters. 

Finally, giving to charity takes effort.  As PMI Minnesota grows education-related giving, we will need more volunteers for relationship management, administration, content development and content delivery.   If you have an interest in volunteering your time to help in any of these areas, please write to volunteercoordinator@pmi-mn.org.

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