Annual Founder's Day Awards Local PTA Superstars

Local families, officials and PTA members gathered at ’s Neher Auditorium for the 2011 Founder’s Day celebration and ceremony Tuesday night.

Founder’s Day was established in 1910 to honor Alice McLellan Birney and Phoebe Apperson Hearst founding the PTA in 1897, according to the 2011 Founder’s Day program. San Marino’s first PTA began in the early 1930s at Huntington and Stoneman schools.

Founder’s Day honors PTA volunteers throughout the district by distributing various awards, interspersed with different entertainment.

The three types of awards given out Tuesday were, according to the program:

Honorary Service Award: given to an individual in special recognition of outstanding service to the children and youth of San Marino over a period of many years.

Continuing Service Award: given to an individual who may or may not have previously received the Honorary Service Award and who continues to demonstrate outstanding service to young people.

Very Special Person Award: given to an individual who exhibits extraordinary service to the youth and community.

A list of the award recipients can be found at the end of this article.

“We’re very fortunate here in San Marino to have such dedicated women and men who volunteer,” said San Marino High School PTA President Lisa Link, who presented the new SMHS PTA board at the event. “We have women here who are professionals who are volunteering in addition to working. Some of them are retired in their jobs. It’s amazing how much time they put in.”

Founder’s Day co-chair Justene Pierce said it’s a three-month process to get the school sites to nominate award honorees and turn in their names and then a council committee oversees the rest of the process.

Pierce and her co-chair Earlene Cheung were honored Tuesday evening, but said they more enjoy being behind the scenes.

“We kind of didn’t even want to go up,” Cheung laughed.

Pierce added, “We’re not speakers; we are definitely runners and doers. We work well as a team together and we’ll be working on a team together so we’re still friends after the whole thing.”

This year’s Founder’s Day theme was Back to the Future, complete with Master of Ceremonies and San Marino Tribune editor Mitch Lehman as Doc Brown.

“We chose Back to the Future because we wanted to take a look back at honoring our PTA Affiliates group—a group of volunteers who did the jobs we are currently doing now,” said Pierce. “It was a way to bring past recipients back and talk about the groundwork that was done and then look to the future with the new boards.”

San Marino students created video montages of past photos from the PTA and students performed singing and dancing numbers like “Don’t be Cruel” and a sock-hopping choreographed dance by the San Marino High School Dance Company, who donned poodle skirts.

“Traditionally we’ve had a skit where the administrators go through and learn lines, practice and rehearse,” said Founder’s Day co-chair Earlene Cheung. “Truthfully they don’t have time to do that anymore because they’re doing double duty with all sorts of stuff, so we decided to utilize the skills of our students.”

None of the award recipients know they are being honored until the ceremony, said Pierce, and since the recipients’ families hide backstage until the recipient’s name is called, some plotting and scheming was required to make sure recipients were surprised.

“Vivian is fond of saying, ‘This is the one time it’s appropriate to lie,” Cheung joked, referring to Vivian Chan, PTA Council First Vice President for the Founder’s Day Committee.

The 2011 Founder’s Day award recipients are:

San Marino PTA Council:

Mary Falkenbury- Continuing Service Award

Steve Morgan- Very Special Person Award

PTAffiliates- Honorary Service Award

San Marino High School PTSA:

Jennifer Chen-  Honorary Service Award

Cynthia Scannell- Honorary Service Award

Linda Fouche- Honorary Service Award

Mary Johnson- Honorary Service Award

Henry E. Huntington Middle School PTA:

Mark VanRiper- Honorary Service Award

Ruth Roberts- Honorary Service Award

Jane Young- Honorary Service Award

W.L Valentine Elementary School PTA:

Tricia Stenwall- Honorary Service Award

Dina McCall- Honorary Service Award

Mary Hsu- Honorary Service Award

Jeanne Lipps- Continuing Service Award

K.L. Carver Elementary School PTA:

Eileen Cameron- Honorary Service Award

Janny Cheng- Honorary Service Award

Sue Kim- Honorary Service Award