Speaker Dennis Mangers

The Sacramento Branch members who gathered on Saturday, Dec. 12 to celebrate the holidays were in fine form as they shared another enjoyable afternoon with friends at the beautiful Northridge Country Club. Mary Williams provided lovely background music and accompanied the group as they sang holiday musical favorites.

The afternoon’s speakers were Rachel Jahnsen* and Dennis Mangers. Jahnsen will receive her degree in Theater Arts from California State University, Sacramento in 2016. She shared her journey to college and the challenges of raising three children, going to school, and performing with a theater group and thanked AAUW for awarding her a scholarship that made her education possible.

Scholarship Winner Rachel Jahnsen

Mangers, President of the Board of Trustees of the Sacramento Region Community Foundation, spoke about the Sacramento community’s rich artistic environment and described plans to upgrade the Sacramento Community Center, provide performance and teaching space for the Sacramento Ballet at the remodeled Fremont School, and discussed ideas on more utilization of the Wells Fargo Pavilion when the Music Circus is not in season.

Special thanks are due to Donna Holmes, Dawn Boyd, Mary Williams, Ruth Burgess, and Gloria Yost for organizing the festivities.

* Please note that the newsletter assembler originally misspelled scholarship winner Rachel Jahnsen’s last name.  Apologies for the error.

Members Listening to the Talk

Member Mary Williams playing Christmas Carols

Introducing speaker Dennis Mangers