Dear friends,

Please help me in raising money for Oakland Public Schools in this charity bike ride. I will be riding 68 miles from Suisun City to Sacramento on April 26th. I've lived and worked in Oakland for nearly 5 years, and it has become a dearly loved home. 

Ragged on in the news, ravaged by government mismanagement, and steeped in decades upon decades of racial inequality and maltreatment, the beauty and resilience of Oakland and it's people are often underestimated and ignored. This town deserves better. The future makers, shakers, and doers of this town—Oakland's youth—deserve more. In this small way, I hope to give back an ounce of what Oakland has given me during my time here. 

In addition to the students, we also need to recognize that underfunded public schools greatly negatively impact public school teachers. Teachers often spend out of their own pockets—even though they are often paid below a living wage in places like the bay—to support their students and their classrooms, work many hours beyond what they are paid for, and often spend much of their summer vacations prepping for the next school year.

If you know me, you know how wonderful my mother is—a devoted public school teacher who gave so much of her time, intelligence, kindness, and loving energy to her students. Later in her career, she crafted her very own career technical education program in developmental psychology and careers with children, training up the next generation's teachers.

So, for incredible humans like my mother and the deserving students of Oakland, please consider donating $10, $20, $50, or however much you would like to this fundraiser. Any amount helps! Your donation, should you choose to give, will be split evenly between the Parent-teacher-student organizations of each Oakland public school to be used for things like field trips, sports uniforms, and school events. 

Peace and love,

Jo

From the event organizers: 

There’s this poem that I keep seeing on the internet:

Everything is on fire, 

but everyone I love is doing beautiful things

and trying to make life worth living,

and I know I don’t have to believe in everything,

but I believe in that.

- Nikita Gill

I hope that the world doesn’t quite feel on fire for you. From the perspective of public education, however, it often feels like fire, after fire, after fire.  And yet teachers and students persist in doing beautiful things every day.

I’m writing to you because I count you among the people I love who are also doing beautiful things and I hope you’ll join me in this endeavor to support the teachers and students of Oakland and Alameda.  I’m hopping on my bike in April to join Ride 4A Reason- an annual fundraiser and bike ride to Sacramento and I am asking you to join my fundraising efforts.

Last year, thanks to the riders and supporters of Ride 4A Reason, more than 6,000 kids in eleven public schools in Oakland and Alameda had field trips, got to visit their school libraries, experienced the awe of river rafting, and wore official team uniforms for their sports teams -- for many, these were firsts.  

This is the 17th year that R4R will be making the trek to Sacramento and I’m proud to be part of it. Over this time we have raised close to $1.8 million for public schools in Oakland and Alameda. 

COVID-19 highlighted the glaring inequities in our education system, and, especially now that the short-term funding from the pandemic years has expired, the challenges facing our school children are as great as ever. I’m even more committed to ride and raise awareness for our dismally underfunded school system that affects us all as students, parents, teachers, and neighbors.

My goal is to raise $_____ by the time I hop on my bike on April 26th - can you donate today to help me get there?  100% of the funds I raise will go directly to these public schools in Oakland and Alameda. Please consider donating $10, $50, $100 or more to help me get there!

Thank you so much!

PS. If you want to send in a check, you can make it payable to "Social Good Fund" and put "R4R 2024" in the memo line.  You can mail it to:

Tax ID: 

Ride 4A Reason
PO Box 11386
Oakland, CA  94611