While Bob was in New York Monday and Tuesday, I was here in Washington, accepting an award on behalf of the show (my first time speaking in front of such a large group of people!). I tried not to embarrass Bob and the show too too much. And much to my relief there weren’t any video cameras which could be used as evidence at a later date!
That night the National Network for Youth honored The Bob Edwards Show with a Champion of Youth Homelessness award. Virgin Mobile was honored with a Golden Pen Award for their advocacy work for homeless youth. It’s exciting to see such a popular and progressive company donate resources to homeless children. You can see what they’ve done and help make donations from their web site. Among their many efforts, they advocated on Capitol Hill to make November National Homeless Youth month, hosted an art auction in New York to promote awareness for homeless teens, and partnered with American Eagle to provide clothes to homeless teens. It’s yet another reason to admire Sir Richard Branson’s entrepreneurial spirit.
Representative Ruben Hinojosa from Texas was also honored with a Champion Award and spoke about the importance of the “A Place to Call Home Act,” his bill which he hopes will increase funding for services for homeless youth. He rushed to the award ceremony after casting his vote for the economic stimulus package, a show of his commitment to the homeless children.
All in all I felt like The Bob Edwards Show was in pretty good company – and even better, all for a good cause.
-Ariana
Ariana Pekary produced our documentary–so she’s the one who deserves the recognition. In the above photograph, that’s Ariana in the tasteful gray slacks, sitting in the middle of the front row.