Volunteer Spotlight- Charles, board member
Charles Perrecone – Board Member, 2017 - present Charles Perrecone lives in the Roscoe Village area of Chicago with his fiancé. Charles has been involved with GiGi’s Playhouse Fox Valley since 2017. His initial involvement developed from a desire to give back to the community, but he did not know...
Volunteer Spotlight: Katie, board member
Katie Finke- Board Member, 2015 - present Katie Finke got involved with GiGi’s when her family moved here from North Carolina five years ago. She was looking for a place to connect with the Down syndrome community and heard great things about GiGi’s Playhouse. She started attending the Fox Valley...
Volunteer Spotlight: Amanda, board member
Amanda Rooney- Board Member, 2015 - June 2019 Amanda has been president for 4 years and has loved every minute of it! She came to the Playhouse 5 years ago with Maddie and instantly fell in love and knew she needed to get more involved! In the past 4 years...
Volunteer Spotlight: Audrey, literacy tutor and summer intern
Audrey Tutoring since 2016 Personal Interests: Special Olympics, Best Buddies, NEHS, and GSLC youth group and fusion program Why I tutor at GiGi’s: “I tutor at GiGi’s because of the relationships that come out of it. I love not only seeing the progress of their literacy skills, but seeing the...
Volunteer Spotlight: Shreya, literacy tutor
Shreya Tutor since 2017 Personal Interests: This school year Shreya will be a junior at Metea Valley High School. At school, she's a part of extracurricular orchestras within the school as well as outside the school (Naperville Youth Symphony Orchestra and Chicago Youth Symphony Orchestra). She is also part of...
Volunteer Spotlight: Emma literacy tutor
#generation G in Action! Emma Tutoring Since 2017 Personal Interests: Tennis, Special Olympics, Best Buddies and GiGi’s of course! Why I tutor: I tutor at GiGi’s because I love the environment and being able to help children with Down syndrome. I’ve been involved with the special education community since 8th...
Volunteer Spotlight- Katrin, literacy tutor
Katrin Tutoring Since January 2018 Personal Interests: Key Club, Special Olympics, Best Buddies, Tennis, Youth Government Why I tutor: I love tutoring at GiGi’s because it’s so rewarding to see the improvement in my students! I’ve had the opportunity to help my students begin to read and become more confident...
Playhouse Inspiration: LASO at OHS and ER from AU
GiGi’s Playhouse has been a big presence at both Oswego High School and Aurora University this past year. We visited Oswego High School to do a generation G presentation to the Key Club and the Latin American Student Organization (LASO). After the presentation LASO chose GiGi’s as their volunteer project...
Volunteer Spotlight: Veronica, parent and program leader
Veronica is an active parent at our Playhouse with her 4 year old daughter Selma. When she saw that we may have to cancel a program when we didn’t have a program coordinator she stepped right in! When asked why she decided to become a program leader Veronica states, “I...
Participant Best of All: Meghan
Megan has been a regular participant since we have started our weekly programming. In our winter session we had Fantastic Friends and Meghan is showing in Cooking Club that she knows what it means to be a good friend. We have so many participants at Cooking Club that we have...
Participant Best of All: Julian
Julian, and his parents Kelly and Eric, are active participants at GiGi’s Playhouse Fox Valley. From Little Aces, bowling, yoga and balloon tennis at Friends, Fun & Fitness Julian is always a willing participant and continues to wow us with what he can do. "Julian absolutely LOVES going to GiGi's...
Volunteer Spotlight: Aurora University Interns: Joey and Ana
Reflections on Experience at GiGi’s Playhouse Ana: “These past 7 months at GiGi’s Playhouse have been a life-changing experience that confirmed my passion for working with children and their families. I have grown no only as a professional but also as an individual. Before GiGi’s Playhouse, I didn’t have any...