Magic of Mateo Back to Basics with the Bearcats was a huge success! Held at the Foster City Crowne Plaza Hotel on Saturday, October 17 we had over 180 people in attendance. The evening festivities began with the Bearcat Bravo Champagne Cocktail Pre-Party to celebrate the high level donors. This was followed by the silent auction where guests bid like crazy on over 100 silent auction items. At 8:00 we adjourned to the main ballroom. Andy Stern, SMHS Foundation Board President, welcomed everyone and spoke about what the Foundation means to SMHS. After dinner our live auction raised over $20,000.

Fund-a-Need is a portion of the live auction where people contribute to a specific school need. This year two teachers, Mr. Marco Rainaldi and Ms. Valerie Krieman-Cintas, demonstrated the use of SMARTboards. We currently have four SMARTboards that have been funded by the Foundation and our goal was to raise enough money to purchase an additional eight SMARTboards. We achieved this goal by raising $35,000 for Fund-a-Need!!

SMHS students were well represented at Back 2 Basics! We had student volunteers to help with Auction checkout, student photographers capturing our event on film, members of the amazing SMHS Drama Department performed songs from the first play of the season, "Leader of the Pack", dancers from SMHS Dance Department performed several exciting dances and musicians from SHMS Music Department played jazz music during the silent auction. There is lots of talent at SMHS and the performances were truly a highlight of the evening!

Our net proceeds from Back 2 Basics are over $101,000. Thanks to everyone who attended, contributed, and volunteered to make this happen. We couldn't do this without your support and generosity.

A heartfelt thank you to our Co-Chairs: Jodi Babbs and Candace Savoie. Their leadership was critical to our success.

SMHSF would like to extend a heartfelt thank you to the sponsors for Back 2 Basics with the Bearcats. This is a list in progress:
Nova $5,000
Chef Thomas Keller, French Laundry
Shooting Stars $2,500
BCA Architects
Borel Private Bank and Trust Company
Franklin Templeton Investments
Stars $1,000
Mario Perelli-Minetti Winery
Pinnacle Ventures
Wells Fargo Insurance Services, Inc.
Bright Lights $500
Glenn S. Belen, DDS
Mark and Claudia Helenius
Jo Mork

Bearcat Benefit 2010: Bearcat Benefit: Building for the Future was a huge success!   Read all about it and see the pictures.