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Treat Your Children Well

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© Kornilovdream | Dreamstime Stock Photos & Stock Free Images

© Kornilovdream | Dreamstime Stock Photos & Stock Free Images

A Look at Some of the Nonprofits Serving Children

What could be a more universal cause than striving to give children a brighter tomorrow and a more fulfilling future? Literally hundreds of opportunities exist to give back to children in the community. Unfortunately, we can’t include them all. Here’s a look at just a few of the many organizations working to on behalf of children’s issues and the solutions to their problems in the areas of at-risk youth; education; arts; and medical, emotional and physical health and safety.

Family Service Agency is Santa Barbara County’s first and oldest non-profit human service agency, offering several programs, including Healthy Start, which connects at-risk families with existing community resources; the Family Build Project, which addresses the needs of families living in government subsidized housing; and a variety of counseling and child guidance programs.

Another veteran organization offering a variety of services to at-risk children and others is the United Boys and Girls Clubs. It has been working with young people in town since 1945, and now has four clubhouses that offer day care, summer camps, and a plethora of programs including sports, art, academics and leadership development. While the organization once emphasized servicing children from disadvantaged backgrounds, “today we’re open to everyone, because all children are at risk,” says Executive Director Sal Rodriguez.

Also serving both at-risk youth and the wider community is the Police Activity League (PAL), which offers opportunities for instruction in art, digital editing, hip hop dance, martial arts, and basketball, as well as a tutoring center and a teen youth leadership council that are open to all children. PAL also has a Campership Alliance Program that collaborates with a number of organizations–including the City of Santa Barbara Parks & Recreation Department, United Boys & Girls Clubs, Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History, Santa Barbara YMCA, Santa Barbara Zoo, Refugio Junior Lifeguard Program, Elings Park Camps and Money Camp for Kids –to provide summer camp scholarships.

Endowment for Youth Committee is another broad-reaching organization, which provides a wide variety of educational, social, cultural and recreational achievement programs for children, with a special emphasis on assisting African American, Native American and Latino youth.

Girls Inc. also offers an expansive array of programs, but with an all-girl atmosphere that emphasizes learning to resist gender stereotypes and encouraging girls to take risks, acquire skills, gain confidence, become self-reliant, and practice leadership. Girls are also front and center for Affirm, another program that works only with girls, in this case focusing on empowerment, education, and identity for teenagers that are in the juvenile correction system.

Kids in trouble are also the focus for Noah’s Anchorage, operated by the YMCA. The group provides a Youth Crisis Shelter, which is the only program in Santa Barbara County that offers year-round 24-hour access to counseling, shelter, referrals, food and clothing for runaways, homeless youth and youth in crisis.

The Big Brothers Big Sisters program, run by Family Service Agency, also targets at risk youth, matching them up with adult mentors who provide positive role models and a one-on-one relationship. Another mentorship-based program is the Wilderness Youth Project, which offers after school, weekend and summer programs that utilize “nature-based mentoring,” where being out in nature facilitates crucial life lessons and connection with the natural world.

Working on the health and wellness front is CALM (Child Abuse Listening and Mediation), which acts to prevent child abuse from occurring and offers professional treatment for the entire family when abuse does occur. CALM works closely with police, the district attorney, child protective services and medical personnel to investigate alleged abuse in a supportive and child-friendly fashion.

The Teddy Bear Cancer Foundation is another organization that works with entire families, endeavoring to ensure that children with cancer receive the undivided comfort of their parents during the treatment and recovery process. Teddy Bear provides financial aid for rent, mortgage, utilities, and car payments, as well as other supportive services, thereby allowing families to focus on their children. “Teddy Bear is unique in that it adapts to each family’s distinct needs. We don’t provide just one service–we do whatever’s needed to help,” said Founder/Executive Director Nikki Katz.

On the education front, the Children’s Project is focused on developing an innovative boarding school and college preparatory academy for foster children and selected youth with mental health or delinquency issues. “People often ask me, ‘Why foster children? So many kids need help.’ While that is true, there is one big difference that separates foster youth from others in need. That is that we not only have a moral obligation to help them…we have a legal obligation. …The moment the judge removes the child from a parent’s care, WE become the parents to that child. We, as the community, step into that role. And I am convinced we can do a better job,” says Founder and CEO Wendy Read.

Another education nonprofit, the Computers for Families program, seeks to eliminate the negative consequences of the Digital Divide by providing students from low-income families with refurbished computers, Internet access and training. Thanks to this innovative program, Santa Barbara will be the first community in the United States to ensure that every child from a low-income family, beginning in the fourth grade, has a computer with Internet access.

For more than 43 years, the Scholarship Foundation of Santa Barbara has helped local students pay for their higher education, giving out more than $7 million in student aid for the last school year.

Emphasizing the arts is Art Walk for Kids, an outreach program that focuses on benefiting special needs, developmentally disabled, at risk, terminally ill youth and adults in their positive environments through a specialized curriculum of art and vocational education. Art Walk projects have benefited a diverse group of nonprofits, including the United Nations, Summit for Danny, United Way, the Red Cross, Sarah House, the Santa Barbara Symphony, the Lobero Theatre, I Madonnari, the Multi-Cultural Dance and Music Festival, Vieja Valley School, Santa Barbara County Juvenile Hall, El Puente School, and Hillside House, among others. Its latest collaboration is with the Patricia Henley Foundation, a new nonprofit that offers unique, free opportunities for students to learn all aspects of theatre arts production and develop their creative talents.

The Family Therapy Institute’s Academy of Healing Arts for Teens (AHA!) also incorporates creative expression into its programs, which emphasize the development of character, imagination, emotional intelligence, and social conscience in teenagers, and helps them learn to set goals, stop bullying and hatred, support their peers, and serve their community.

These excellent organizations are but a small percentage of all of the nonprofits serving children in Santa Barbara. For a more comprehensive list visit the Family Service Agency referral service at www.211sbcounty.org/.

Originally published in Santa Barbara Magazine

JON AND LILLIAN LOVELACE

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Lillian & Jon Lovelace, courtesy Santa Barbara Magazine

Lillian & Jon Lovelace, courtesy Santa Barbara Magazine

SEASONED PHILANTHROPISTS

You won’t find their names plastered on buildings and placards around town, yet, in their quiet, generous way, Jon and Lillian Lovelace give graciously of their time, intellect and millions to a wide range of worthy organizations.

“We’re a little bit camera shy, publicity shy,” Lillian, explains.

Click here to see the story in Santa Barbara Magazine.

“A lot of people seem to do it [donate] to get their names in the paper. We’d like to be helpful without getting our names in the paper,” says Jon.

The arts rank high among their interests. Lillian, whose eclectic collection of modern art and Pacific Island artifacts decorate their Montecito home, was on the board of the Santa Barbara Museum of Art for 20 years and is now a sustaining trustee. In addition to fine art, the Lovelace’s share a love of music, dance and theatre and spend about a third of their time traveling around the world combining philanthropic and cultural endeavors.

Locally they are strong supporters of the Santa Barbara Dance Theatre, Camerata Pacifica, Music Academy of the West, UCSB Arts and Lectures, and the State Street Ballet, as well as having served on the boards of the Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA) and the Getty Museum in Los Angeles, where Jon served as chairman of the board during the construction of the Getty Center.

“If we can be helpful, when something strikes Lillian’s fancy or something that she’s connected with, as with me, we get involved with that,” says Jon, who is also very supportive of wilderness preservation groups like the Nature Conservancy, the Sierra Club, and the Yosemite Fund.

Jon, Lillian and their four grown children (Jim, Jeff, Rob and Carey) were avid hikers and campers when the kids were young. “The outdoors has always been an interest,” says Jon, who ranked number 354 on Forbes list of the 400 richest Americans and recently retired from the Los Angeles-based Capital Group, one the world’s largest mutual fund management companies. Jim and Rob now work for the Capital Group, which was founded by their grandfather, Jonathan Bell Lovelace, in 1931.

The Lovelace children are also involved in giving back to the community, through organizations such as California Institute of the Arts and Idyllwild Arts Foundation–it’s a tradition of generosity that goes back generations. “My family was very much involved in social action and caring about other people and giving back to the community. They instilled that that was important. Jon’s father was involved with philanthropy and hospitals,” says Lillian.

The Lovelace’s have carried on the legacy of supporting healthcare by donating generously to medical institutes around the world, including Sansum Clinic and Phoenix of Santa Barbara, which provides care for mentally ill adults.

“I think that mental health is an area that is vastly ignored, it’s kind of a scary thing and not something people like to talk about. They used to not talk about cancer but now anybody can say cancer any time they want to but there’s still some avoidance of talking about mental health problems and I think that it needs all the support it can get,” explains Lillian, who majored in psychology at Antioch University, where she is now a sustaining trustee.

While many of the Lovelace’s philanthropic efforts have started with this type of a personal connection, there really is no typical scenario for their involvement. “It depends very much on the situation–there’s no single type of organization or way we try to help,” says Jon.

The Lovelaces–they married 56 years ago and used to celebrate their anniversaries in Santa Barbara until they moved here from Whittier in 1972 after their son Jim developed an allergy to the smog–share a strong interest in travel and the arts, often meeting up with their children to catch a performance or an exhibit somewhere in the world. They like films as well, and were investors in their friend Garrison Kellior’s 2006 movie, A Prairie Home Companion, starring Meryl Streep.

Friends like Kellior are an important part of the Lovelace’s lives.

” We mentioned family but we have so many wonderful friends that we’ve met over the years,” says Lillian.

“Throughout the world, actually,” Jon says.

“We’re recluses that love people,” concludes Lillian. Or perhaps people who love life.

Originally published in Santa Barbara Magazine

SB People: Randall J. VanderMey

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Randall Vandermey in Santa Barbara Magazine

Randall Vandermey in Santa Barbara Magazine

Westmont College‘s popular English professor is more of a modern Renaissance man than a typical academic. With a blue-eyed twinkle and a sparkling turn of phrase, this Grand Rapids, Michigan, native who’s been at Westmont since 1990 can engage you in intellectual conversations about art, poetry and religion as fluidly and captivatingly as he can turn the dialogue toward the joys of getting down on the floor to play blocks with his 2-year-old granddaughter, Jasmine Marie.

Despite his many literary accomplishments–he’s written eight books, published short fiction, nonfiction and poetry, and produced three plays–VanderMey is really a teacher at heart, who describes the Christian liberal arts college as having “an atmosphere that’s really quite filled with trust and joy.”

It wasn’t always that way. “When I came to Westmont 16 years ago, I would say that, at best, the spiritual climate was sketchy,” says VanderMey, who credits the leadership of former President Stan Gaede (who left in 2005) for much of the turnaround.

These days, “People’s politics differ and religiously differ, maybe academic politics differ. But still my colleagues are people I could have lunch with, talk with, respect.”

A highlight of VanderMey’s professional and personal life was escorting 43 students through a semester in Europe in 2003, where they spent four months traveling through 23 cities in 12 countries. One of the best parts of the trip was spending a week each in four different religious communities: the abbey on the Isle of Iona in Scotland, where Celtic monks are believed to have produced the Book of Kells, a marvelous example of medieval illumination; Woodbrooke Quaker Study Centre in the United Kingdom; a Catholic monastery in Teze, France; and the Schloss Mittersill Study Centre in Austria, which VanderMey describes as a castle housing a Protestant evangelical community.

As a professor, VanderMey prizes and encourages independent thought. “I guess I have a model in my mind of what kind of student I want to produce–a student who’s a little bit contrary. They should be willing to stand up for themselves against what they read, not to be hostile to it, but to think for themselves,” says VanderMey. This idea, he acknowledges, “might surprise people who think of a Christian college as a place where students are taught to think in lock step. But that’s not how Westmont is and that’s not how I am at Westmont. I want to make them better critical thinkers and open-minded. I mean, if the Christian faith can’t stand up to critical thinking, why embrace it?”

That critical examination of faith is a recurring theme in VanderMey’s work. “I’m writing out of my core convictions, which is why things germinate for 10 years before I write them,” he says, over lattes at downtown’s Finestra cafe. While certainly heartfelt, his work is also a bit irreverent. For example, his 1993 book, God Talk, is a critical look at “the triteness and truth in Christian cliches,” taking on routine phrases such as, “God wants you to succeed,” “Act of God,” and “There must be a reason,” and examining what people really mean when they use them. Writes VanderMey: “The habit of using stock phrases can sometimes be not only a symptom, but also a cause of spiritual paralysis.”

Language, both spiritual and otherwise, is a topic close to VanderMey’s heart. He’s the author of The College Writer: A Guide to Thinking, Writing and Researching, which is now in its second edition. And locals may know VanderMey’s work from the 2004 production Kenosis, a theatrical staging of his spiritual poetry set to contemporary music, which played at the Center Stage Theater. He has also taught poetry writing classes (partnering with Peri Longo) at Hospice of Santa Barbara and is currently at work on another textbook, with the working title of The Contrary Reader.

He writes and teaches with the same zest for life he embraces with his family. VanderMey–who loves golfing and bowling–is an enthusiastic grandpa and 54-year-old father and stepfather to four grown children (Gabrielle VanderMey, Julia and Jason Clark, and Mike Sakkers), as well as the self-proclaimed “biggest fan” of his wife Dana VanderMey, who is the supervisor of volunteers for Hospice of Santa Barbara.

There’s never a dull moment at home, says VanderMey, whose daughter Gabrielle and stepdaughter Julia were both married in Santa Barbara this summer, coincidentally to two young men named Matt.

VanderMey, who once considered writing a book about marriage communication, chuckles at what kind of advice he might offer the newlyweds. An editor discouraged him from writing the book, asking why– with so many experts–they would want a marriage book from him.

There’s that twinkle in VanderMey’s eyes again. “I’m thinking about making it a humor book,” he says. “My wife (who can sometimes be found doing stand up comedy at Soho) is a very funny lady.”

Originally published in Santa Barbara Magazine

SB Magazine story on Randall Vandermey

Forward Thinking Farm

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Center for Urban Agriculture at Fairview Gardens

Fairview Gardens Story

Fairview Gardens Story

As one of the oldest organic farms in Southern California, Fairview Gardens is often referred to as “the little farm that could,” for its unique diversity of products and as an internationally respected model for small scale urban food production, agricultural land preservation, farm-based education, and the integration of farms and the communities that they serve. The fertile fields — on Fairview Avenue near Cathedral Oaks Road in Goleta — have been chugging along since 1895. But since the farm’s 1997 evolution into the nonprofit Center for Urban Agriculture at Fairview Gardens, lessons in organic farming and sustainable living have been added to the menu.

The produce stand is clearly visible from the street, but a closer look reveals the beginnings of avocados hatching from enormous trees in the “cathedral” orchard and long rows of asparagus poking their heads out of wet soil. Between rows of trees, a variety of squash stand at attention and you can smell the apples blossoming in preparation for the next Farmhouse Cooking Class, where participants will learn canning and preserving, and how to make apple muffins and apple and butternut squash soup.

While most of Goleta’s once fertile fields have been paved over — and indeed the farm is surrounded on all sides by tract homes, shopping malls, and suburban thoroughfares — the Center for Urban Agriculture’s founder/executive director Michael Ableman’s foresight enabled Fairview Gardens to escape that fate. To prevent the land from being turned into housing, he turned the farm into an agricultural conservation easement, and it will remain that way in perpetuity — to continue to delight neighbors with fresh organic fruits and vegetables, and sometimes annoy them with the early morning chicken cacophony and compost cologne.

Ableman chronicled the center’s founding in a book, On Good Land: The Autobiography of an Urban Farm (Chronicle Books, 1998), and Meryl Streep narrated Beyond Organic, a PBS documentary about his work.

While appreciative of the national recognition, much of the center’s efforts are focused on the local community.

About 5,000 school kids come through the farm each year, estimates Administrative Director Matthew Logan. “We just had a Goleta Valley Junior High group come through here and they were amazed that carrots grow in the ground,” he laughs. ” So that’s our main mission in so far as school tours is reconnecting kids with where their food comes from and (the benefits of) farming without chemicals or pesticides.”

The center is open to the public every day for self-guided tours, which highlight the farm’s crops and techniques, and include information on larger agricultural and environmental issues such as biodiversity, soil erosion, and pesticide use.

The use of grey water and compost, growing rows of crops between trees, rotating crops and “disking under” the old crops so that their roots add nutrients to the soil are just a few of the techniques used to maintain the farm in the most environmentally friendly fashion.

Not only is the message getting out to school kids; they’re passing it on to their parents.

“It’s amazing how many of the kids actually bring their parents out here after for at least one visit,” says Logan.

“…We’re growing food, we make enough money to support the farm and be able to pay our employees but we can also put on a number of educational events with the money that we make from the farm. … So our point is … you can farm it wisely so that you can make enough money to sustain yourself. That it can be done.”

Originally published in Santa Barbara Magazine in spring 2006.

Click here to read Giving Back: Fairview Gardens in Santa Barbara Magazine

Sweet Dreams

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Profile of Brent Torson, En Gedi Beds

Growing up in Portland, Oregon, Brent Torson spent his boyhood days dreaming of living in California where “the sky was blue and the sun always shined,” and designing “the fanciest cars he could imagine.” Now happily ensconced in sunny Santa Barbara, Torson’s fertile imagination has been transported by another kind of vehicle entirely – a new line of custom-made children’s furniture, En Gedi Beds by Torson Design.

Inspired in part by his three children – five-year-old Jaden, three-year-old Elliana and baby Lissette – Torson’s beds charm both the young and the young-at-heart.

“I’m going for that romantic era, I think that kind of journey, as opposed to doing a shiny spaceship. I’ve in fact talked to many of my wife’s friends, that have said ‘Yeah, I would sleep in that now if it was big enough,'” laughs Torson, the twinkle in his eye leaving no doubt about his own delight in new venture.

“I like wondering what’s something that hasn’t been done yet? So that’s what drives me, or what drove me even as a child was … trying to think of what’s next or what’s right around the bend,” says Torson, whose wife Leanne is also an accomplished artist whose paintings grace the walls of their Riviera cottage.

“Having kids I was just opened up to this new world of wow, there’s all these things that kids need and want and would love to have. And then I was like what would I have liked to have (as a kid) and then it just came about.”

Though his children, who are home schooled by Leanne, offer plenty of input and advice at the drawing board of his home design studio, Torson says, “Really the target market is also the parents. I want the parents to fall in love with these things. They are the ones that are going to buy them. And then they have kind of a timeless, romantic quality about them.”

The Coach Bed, the first in the En Gedi collection, conjures up Cinderella fairytale fantasies with its timeless design that Torson based on old European horse-drawn carriages.

Elliana is definitely a fan, Torson says. But then, what little girl wouldn’t want to fall asleep in such a magical setting to dream of her prince.

For adventures inspired by the high seas (and a lot of input from Jaden), there’s the Privateer Bed, a pirate ship style indoor playhouse, complete with two decks, sails, a crow’s nest, and even working Nerf ball cannons.

Torson’s skills as an architectural model builder (his “bread and butter” business) came into to play as he worked out different motifs for the beds.

“I think (both designs) have old world charm and that’s why I chose these two to begin with,” says Torson. They also reflect his romantic sensibilities, as does his life with Leanne, whom he met in an acting class at Santa Barbara City College in 1998 and married six months later.

While the designs are being marketed as beds that will draw upon the talents of local artists and craftspeople, Torson explains that they are really meant to provide complete living spaces for their young owners. Built-in dressers, bookshelves, toy storage, writing desks, lighting and even guest beds can be incorporated into the designs. Also on the drawing board are several new designs, including an indoor tree house, a Polynesian jungle hut and a super hero hideout. And in addition to the one-of-a-kind furniture pieces, Torson is an accomplished muralist who can literally set the scene for each fantasy adventure.

“The heart behind this business, my heart, is that it would employ local creative people,” says Torson.

Originally published in Santa Barbara Magazine in March, 2006.

Direct Relief’s Home Team

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A group of Santa Barbara High School grads is having a positive impact on worldwide healthcare while headquartered in their hometown. No less than four SBHS alumni are part of the 24-person staff at Direct Relief International, the locally based global nonprofit agency that provides essential materials to areas hit by disaster.

Annie Maxwell, a 1997 SBHS graduate, was the first in a wave of Dons. She caught wind of the organization in 2002, when CEO Thomas Tighe was on the cover of Santa Barbara Magazine.

Click here to read this story in Santa Barbara Magazine

“My mom, in probably one of her valiant efforts to try to get all of her children close to home, sent it to me at Michigan when I was at school and said, ‘you should work here,'” said Annie, who started as an unpaid intern and is now Chief of Staff.

She’s currently on special assignment in New York, working at the United Nations under former President Bill Clinton, the Special Envoy for Tsunami Recovery.

In a matter of days, “I went from a warehouse in a beach town to a UN high rise with security and dogs sniffing bombs,” said Annie. “I keep waiting for the director to call cut.”

Her longtime friends — Lucy Anderson, Damon Taugher and Brett Williams, all class of 1998 — are also stoked at their good fortune in being able to have a positive impact on relief efforts such as Hurricane Katrina.

The organization’s gotten this great lift from having them here, said Thomas, who praises his young colleagues as hard working, incredibly smart and disarmingly polite.

Plus their affection and respect for each other and for the mission of Direct Relief is contagious.

“It’s great work because the more you do, the more people are directly affected,” said Brett, the warehouse manager, calling from Ecuador, where he detoured from sightseeing to visit potential partners for Direct Relief.

Lucy also took time off from serving as development manager to visit Direct Relief hospitals while vacationing in Nepal. “It was far and away the highlight of my trip, just seeing the difference that one Direct Relief shipment can make was incredible.”

Based on his own vision, Damon is now directing a new program that has provided $12 million in free medicines to clinics throughout California, a new direction for Direct Relief.

“I don’t think anyone when they’re 14 says ‘wow do you think we could be influential in running the largest international aid organization in California in ten years,'” said Annie. “It’s just not something that you usually say over lunch in the quad. … I was more worried about not failing my English quiz and hoping that we’d beat San Marcos.”

How Direct Relief Helps

Hurricanes Katrina and Rita

August 29 and September 24, 2005

At least 37 tons of medical and personal care supplies–soap, toothbrushes, toothpaste, etc.–have been shipped (FedEx did it free of charge) to at least 41 health facilities in the Gulf region. DRI also donated $1.1 million in cash grants to clinics and hospitals there.

India Flood Disaster

July 26, 2005

More than $800,000 of anti-infective and antiparasitic agents, analgesics, rehydration salts and water purification tablets were sent to the Mumbai Public Health Department.

Earthquake/Tsunami in Southeast Asia

December 26, 2004

More than $32 million in cash and supplies–enough to administer full courses of pharmaceutical treatment to at least three million people–were donated to healthcare facilities and nonprofit organizations in the affected countries.

Southern California Wildfires

October 21-November 4, 2003

With a donation from Alcon Laboratories, 6,000 units of eye lubricant were sent to firefighters and public safety officials in San Diego.

To donate, contact Direct Relief International, 27 S. La Patera Lane, Santa Barbara, CA 93117, 805-964-4767, www.directrelief.org.

Originally published in Santa Barbara Magazine in Winter 2006.

Dr. Ayesha Shaikh

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Click Here to Read Dr. Ayesha Shaikh From Santa Barbara Magazine

Dr. Ayesha Shaikh

Dr. Ayesha Shaikh

Having practiced obstetrics and gynecology in Santa Barbara for the past 20 years, Dr. Ayesha Shaikh (rhymes with “bake”) has a hard time walking through town without someone recognizing her.

Her daughter Sarah, 20, a student at Middlebury College, says she can’t go anywhere without someone recognizing her mom.

Her husband of 25 years, Mohammed, an engineer who owns Image-X, frequently quips that he’s “the only Indian Muslim who walks six feet behind his wife.”

He might have to widen that perimeter in January, when his wife’s network will expand even further as she takes over as Cottage Hospital’s Chief of Staff.

Her new assignment, to serve as a liaison between the hospital’s administration and its medical team, comes at one of the most exciting and tumultuous times in the facility’s history, as construction gets underway on a $500 million new hospital, which is not expected to be completed until 2013.

As anyone who’s been through a home remodel can testify, living through years of construction can make you feel like taking a hammer to the closest available target, and Dr. Shaikh will be right there to absorb the blows.

“You know how physicians are,” she said. “If they want to be heard they can be heard. … I think I’ll be hearing a lot of, ‘where’s my parking!'”

Soothing frazzled nerves comes naturally for Dr. Shaikh, having delivered thousands of babies over the years (she stopped counting after her first 250). She hasn’t lost a father yet, although there have been a few close calls.

“You know when they start turning funny shades of color, you say, ‘okay, there’s a chair, why don’t you take a seat and sit down. I’ll take care of the baby and the mom,'” laughs Dr. Shaikh, her lilting Indian/British accent having the desired calming effect.

“It’s amazing how these guys can talk and do all this Rambo-style stuff and when it comes to delivery they become like little ducks … They see that little baby and they burst into tears.”

The joy in sharing these moments is one of the reasons why Dr. Shaikh plans to continue delivering babies, despite her new administrative responsibilities at the hospital.

“It’s fulfilling — I don’t want to say you feel great, but you feel nice, especially when things go well and it’s someone who you’ve seen through a lot of difficult times. You just feel so good.”

Originally published in Santa Barbara Magazine in winter 2006.