United Way of Olmsted County
7th Annual Power of the Purse

June 19, 2012

Power of the Purse is presented by United Way of Olmsted County's Women's Leadership Council. This event raises money for the Imagination Library. Imagination Library provides a book a month to over 6,000 enrolled Olmsted County children, ages birth to 5.

Power of the Purse Invitation - please share

Event Sponsors 2012 - click here 

Registration Information

• To REGISTER for the 2012 Power of the Purse - click here
• Group ticket pricing - click here
• To pay by check or to register by phone, please contact Kris Brewer at 507-287-2487.
•  If you are unable to attend this event but still want to contribute to Imagination Library - click here.

Event Schedule

Silent Purse Auction - 10:30 am - 12 pm
Windsor Room - subway level

• If you’d like to donate a new or gently used purse or a cash donation to be used to purchase purses for the Power of the Purse Auction, call 507-287-2487 or email rd@uwolmsted.org.
• Hundreds of fun and unique handbags to bid on and some include value ad items like certificates and tickets.
• Individual 2012 donation list - click here
• Business 2012 donation list- click here

VIP Reception with Michele Norris (registration required) - 11 am - 12 pm
This is your opportunity to meet Michele.
Elizabethan Room - ground level

Luncheon and Keynote Speaker Michele Norris (registration required) - 12:15 pm - 1:30 pm
Keynote address:  The Grace of Silence and the Power of Words.
Heritage Hall - subway level

Event Sponsorship Information
As an event sponsor at the Distinguished, Notable, Tribute or Friend level, you will get tickets to the luncheon and more. For more information on sponsorship levels for this event - click here.

Keynote Speaker Michele Norris
Host of NPR’s All Things Considered

Michele Norris, an award-winning journalist with more than two decades of experience, hosts NPR's newsmagazine All Things Considered, public radio's longest-running national program, with Robert Siegel and Melissa Block. Norris began hosting the program in December, 2002.

In September, 2010, Norris released her first book, The Grace of Silence: A Memoir, which focuses on how America talks about race in the wake of Barack Obama’s presidential election, and explores her own family's racial legacy. It has been called one of the best books of 2010 by The Christian Science Monitor.

Copies of The Grace of Silence: A Memoir are on sale at the University of Minnesota bookstore in University Square downtown Rochester.

Before coming to NPR, Norris was a correspondent for ABC News, a post she held from 1993 - 2002. As a contributing correspondent for the “Closer Look” segments on World News Tonight with Peter Jennings, Norris reported extensively on education, inner city issues, the nation's drug problem, and poverty. Norris has also reported for the Washington Post, Chicago Tribune, and Los Angeles Times. Her Washington Post series about a six-year-old who lived in a crack house was reprinted in the book Ourselves Among Others, along with essays by Václav Havel, Nelson Mandela, Annie Dillard, and Gabriel García Márquez.

A four-time Pulitzer Prize entrant, Norris has received numerous awards for her work, including the 2010 Alfred I. DuPont-Columbia University Award for she and co-host Steve Inskeep’s program, “The York Project: Race and the 2008 Vote”; the 2009 Journalist of the Year award from the National Association of Black Journalists; the National Association of Black Journalists' 2006 Salute to Excellence Award, for her coverage of Hurricane Katrina; the University of Minnesota's Outstanding Achievement Award; and the 1990 Livingston Award. In 2007, she was honored with Ebony Magazine's eighth Annual Outstanding Women in Marketing & Communications Award, and in 2009 was named one of Essence Magazine’s “25 Most Influential Black Americans.” Norris also earned both an Emmy Award and Peabody Award for her contribution to ABC News' coverage of 9/11. She is on the judging committee for both the John Chancellor Award for Excellence in Journalism, and the Livingston Awards. Norris is also a frequent guest on The Chris Matthews Show on NBC News.

Norris attended the University of Wisconsin, where she majored in electrical engineering, and graduated from the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis, where she studied journalism. She lives in Washington, DC, and is married to Broderick Johnson. She has two young children and a step son who attends college in California.

Imagination Library
Proceeds from Power of the Purse supports early literacy by helping to fund the Imagination Library. A free book program which delivers a book each month to children age birth to five years in Olmsted County. For more information on Imagination Library - click here.

For more Information
Bonnie Schultz, CFRE
Major and Planned Gifts Director
United Way of Olmsted County
507-529-4830
bonnies@uwolmsted.org