Sahra – Volunteer Spotlight

Over this past year, Sahra, an amazing mother and leader in our GiGi’s Playhouse Twin Cities community, has inspired many other Somali mothers to get their children involved with the free, progressive, purposeful, educational and therapeutic programming at GiGi’s Playhouse Twin Cities. Families immediately hear Sahra’s story of her life with her almost seventeen-year-old son Mustaf. She always takes the time to really get to know every single family. Sahra helps all the families learn about the impact of GiGi’s Playhouse Twin Cities on Mustaf and her entire family – which then inspires new Somali families to immediately get involved.

Sahra participated in our gala in February 2020 as well as personally fundraised in the Somali community. She reached out to Somali business owners of day cares in the metro area to tell them all about GiGi’s Playhouse Twin Cities. At these outreach meetings, she provided information to the owners about the free programming we offer to help people of all ages with Down syndrome, as well as informed them about our need to raise money so we can continue to exist. Many of the Somali day care business owners donated to our playhouse, as well as Sahra invited many of the owners and the moms with their families to sit at her table to attend this special event.

Since March 13^th, Sahra has consistently reached out to all the Somali families that have been involved with GiGi’s to check in on how they are doing during this time. She has also been constantly on the look-out for any new families that she can bring into our community. On top of all of this outreach work, Sahra has stayed in close weekly communication with GiGi’s Playhouse Twin Cities staff about various needs that have come up during the pandemic, such as technology and food needs – so that we can all work together to find solutions that empower our families.

Sahra is an outstanding leader on the newly formed Equity Advisory team that started this summer. Her work is helping GiGi’s Playhouse Twin Cities strive for more access to and benefit from GiGi’s programming, events, and resources, for people across all cultural backgrounds and historically marginalized communities.

We made exciting growth this past year in our outreach with Somali families. We grew from one Somali family being engaged with our programming (Sahra and Mustaf), to many Somali families being involved over this past year. In addition, we received the Walser Grant, where a portion of it was used to build Somali outreach and participation in our programming. This was all made possible through our partnership with Sahra, our new Somali Outreach Coordinator.

We are honored to have Sahra be an amazing leader in our GiGi’s Playhouse Twin Cities community, as well as keeping us all connected to and with our Somali families. Thank you Sahra and Mustaf for representing GiGi’s so well, and inspiring so many more people to get involved with our community!

Check out our blog we wrote last year titled, “Sahra and Mustaf – A Mother’s Love for her Son and Her Community”, which provides even more background to this amazing family: HERE

Are you interested in volunteering virtually at GiGi’s Playhouse Twin Cities?

The first step is to sign up: HERE

Are you interested in getting a family member involved with our GiGi’s Playhouse Twin Cities Programming?

The first step is to sign up for our local newsletter: HERE

Then, check out our Local calendar: HERE (October 2020 will be our next month of local virtual programming)

Also, check out all the details for On Demand and Live National virtual programming: HERE