Network Partners: Rock Star Supply Co has a gig opening!

The Minnesota Rising 2011 Un/Conference: Building A Network For What’s Next will be held on Saturday, October 22, 2011 from 10:00AM – 4:00PM at the CoCo coworking and collaborative space in St. Paul, MN. Hosted by and for emerging leaders, the Un/Conference will engage emerging leaders across Minnesota in an energizing day of innovative learning and dialogue, skill-building, and network-building with their peers!

Minnesota Rising is pleased to collaborate with Network Partners, emerging leader group organizations, to help cross-promote our parallel efforts to provide leadership development and community-building. Below, we highlight the efforts this week of one 2011 Network Partner,Young Professionals of the Twin Cities (YPOTC), which engages creative arts and community leaders to improve educational outcomes for teens!

Wanna change a teenager’s life? Good timing.

Rock Star Supply Co has a GIG OPENING.

What’s that? Rock Star Supply Co? That’s right. In 2009, we started Rock Star Supply Co(RSS Co), a 501c3 nonprofit organization, to engage creative artists and other community leaders in improving educational outcomes for teens. We believe anyone who wants to change a teenager’s life is a rock star, and we’re in the business of supplying them to Twin Cities high schools.

By bringing the community to the classroom, RSS Co provides support to teachers so they can more effectively engage their students in their curriculum. Our in-school tutors work with at-risk students so they can catch up on assignments, develop a passion for learning and meet creative and interesting adults along the way.

RSS Co was inspired by the writing centers author Dave Eggers has established in various parts of the country. Named after the street address of its original location in San Francisco, 826 Valencia Street, the 826 centers provide writing support to students ages 6-18. And they do it with an enduring mix of hijinks and hard work. (See, for example, their Pirate Supply Store.)

As a group, we marvel at Dave Eggers' mission and are striving to create a culture around in-school volunteerism in the Twin Cities. Eggers has long been a supporter of public school teachers. We loved his April 30th editorial in the New York Times, "The High Cost of Low Teacher Salaries." And we agree that it should be a national priority to recruit top graduates to the profession, to pay them well, and to provide them the support and encouragement they deserve.

If you’re interested in Rock Star Supply Co’s GIG OPENING, please contact Nathan Frederickson at Nathan@rockstarsupplyco.org for the inside skinny. Or if you’d simply like to learn more about us, visit rockstarsupplyco.org or find us on Facebook and Twitter.

Thanks for your interest, we’ll see you at the Un/Conference. Rock on!