Sheilah Tandy was 14 years into recovery and employed full time in customer service when she suddenly and inexplicably lost her hearing. Doctors and specialists couldn't explain what happened, and she didn't know what to do next.

"I didn't have any direction from medical professionals for how to live with this," Sheilah shares, "so I decided to just check out of life. I headed down a destructive path abusing drugs again worse than I ever had before." Quickly, Sheilah lost everything she worked for in her life and found herself homeless, hopeless, and further and further into her addiction.

A few years ago, Sheilah was given hope when started hearing "little bits." She was tired of abusing herself and wanted a change; she wanted to get back into the workforce, but who, she wondered, would want to work with someone with her disability? Her past experience was in customer service, and she feared having to communicate with the hearing world. She also felt like a dinosaur and knew her computer skills were out of date.

Living in Antioch, Sheilah passed by Opportunity Junction on her way to BART every day. Something inside her told her to go in and see what they had to offer. "I didn't think they would accept me with my disability, but I met Jesse Golden who told me about the Job Training and Placement Program and encouraged me to apply," Sheilah remembers. "I found a place where I was supported and encouraged. Opportunity Junction gave me the foundation to know that if I keep trying and I participate in my life, then anything is possible."

During the internship phase of the program, Sheilah found a job with Wakeland Development Corporation, which develops properties for low income residents. As a Site Coordinator, Sheilah is responsible for developing curriculum for a program that provides enrichment activities for adults and children including a computer lab and summer camp experiences.

"I show up to work and I don't have panic attacks or anxiety over working with people. I have a sense of calm about communication that I didn't have before," Sheilah says. "I could not have done any of this without the support of the staff and my fellow interns. Everyone was so supportive of my needs and showed me that I did not need to be embarrassed by my disability. The friendships I made showed me that I have something to offer the world, and I am more comfortable with my reality."

The May 3rd Function for the Junction, presented by Chevron and emceed by Cheryl Hurd of NBC11, was a huge success for the organization, raising almost $90,000 to support Opportunity Junction's training programs and capacity-building initiatives. We are grateful to the sponsors, donors, guests, bidders, and volunteers who made that happen. The party was a huge success as entertainment, too. While guests arrived, by limousine and otherwise, a capella quartet HouseBlend (925-957-9655) and Cal Berkeley's Golden Overtones serenaded the crowd in the registration and silent auction areas. Almost 60 silent auction items, ranging from a cake a month to a weekend in Tahoe, gave everybody something to bid on, and caterer Culinary Excellence served a meal that was both delicious and beautiful. A huge part of the entertainment was the assembly of guests themselves, who bid up the live auction items (helped along by auctioneer Dennis McCormac) and then filled the dance floor. Check out all of our photos on Picasa Web! We want to once again recognize the event's sponsors and thank all of the auction donors: Presenting Sponsor: Chevron Platinum Sponsor: Wells Fargo Silver Sponsors: Citibank Comcast ConocoPhillips Cosmetic Dental Spa Dow Chemical GWF Power Systems Morrison & Foerster Nelson Staffing SMART Modular Temen, Kaiser and Cameron Valero Benicia Refining Gold Sponsors: Mechanics Bank Pacific Gas & Electric Bronze Sponsors: Allied Waste Services Criterion Catalyst Emerald Consulting J. Stokes and Associates John Muir Health Kaiser Permanente Mirant California NECA-IBEW United Way USS-POSCO WestAmerica Bank Media Sponsor: Contra Costa Times Auction Donors: 1515 Restaurant * Alhambra Valley Ranch * Cakebread Cellars * Cakes by Laurel * Concannon Vineyard * Cosmetic Dental Spa * First Republic Bank * Gigi Restaurant * Greenhorn Creek Country Club * Hafner Vineyards * Hotel Hana-Maui * Jane Norman Skincare * Kathleen Burke Design * Kendall-Jackson Wine Estates * Kimpton Hotels and Restaurants * Lark Creek Restaurant * Linda Johnson Photography * Lone Tree County Club * Loring Wine Company * Meritage Hall Ranch * Moraga County Club * Oakland Athletics Baseball Co. * Renaissance Club Hotel * Robert Hall Winery * Rosenblum Cellars * Rossmoor Golf Course * Round Hill Country Club * Scott Valley Bank * Smuin Ballet * Steve Silver Productions, Inc. * The Secret Spa at Blackhawk * Tiffany and Co. * Va Di Vi Restaurant * Village Pizza * Wente Family Estates * Zachary's Pizza * Bill Roberts * Tim and Beth Joyce * Betty Stokes * Dan and Carol Altwarg * Debbie Sawin * George Birdsong * Jane Collett * Janey Edwards * Jim Stokes * Kathy Leahy * Maureen and Mike Wilhelm * Mitzi Wardini * Nancy Gates * Paul and Mary Ann Shattuck * Rae Ann Stackpole * Rick Kaiser * Sandi and Ron Lutsko * Sheila Duggan * Sue George and Family * Trish Shattuck

Transportation Challenge Eases for Some Program Participants

We held information sessions (the first step for people applying for our Job Training and Placement Program) in locations including the Antioch library, the Oakley library, the Bay Point Career Center, and the Brentwood One-Stop EASTBAY Works office. In addition, we're trying out a new program with our incoming Job Training class, Class 26 - we're offering bus passes to those residents of selected outlying communities who may need that help to make it possible to attend the program.

We're hoping that these innovations will help more residents of Bay Point and Far East County to learn about and participate in the Job Training and Placement Program. If you're a service provider in those areas, please let us know how we can better reach your clients - and thanks as always to all our recruiting partners, who help us get the word out to people in need.

High Marks for DIY Tax Assistance

During January through April of 2008, thanks to a generous grant from the PMI Foundation, Opportunity Junction piloted Do-It-Yourself Tax Assistance in Contra Costa County. The program teaches low-income families how to prepare their own taxes, mentoring them through a web interface called I-CAN! eFile developed by the Legal Aid Society of Orange County. Through the support of the PMI Foundation, we were able to present 25 sessions, three of them in Spanish.

The I-CAN eFile program is a simple web interface that enables taxpayers to prepare and electronically file their federal and California tax returns at no charge. While not as slick as commercial web interfaces like TurboTax, I-CAN! eFile covers all of the tax situations most often encountered by low-income taxpayers, and it is easy to use. (84% of Opportunity Junction taxpayers rated it “Easy," and another 11% rated it "Understandable, but not easy.") There is no charge for any element of the program (federal, state, or eFile).

At Opportunity Junction, we did our best to automate our Do-It-Yourself Tax Assistance using commonly available web tools:

• We took session sign-ups via the Internet, using Eventbrite (which also allowed us to easily send reminder emails to participants before each session);
• We developed a web page that listed all sessions and linked to our own surveys and the I-CAN! eFile interface (http://www.opportunityjunction.org/taxes); and
• We used SurveyMonkey to collect demographic information, provide targeted information about food stamp eligibility and health insurance availability, and solicit feedback from participants.

I-CAN! eFile is available in Spanish, and we translated all of our web elements into Spanish, too. We hired a bilingual alumna of our Job Training and Placement Program to perform the translations. Altogether, five Opportunity Junction alumnae were hired to lead Do-It-Yourself Tax Assistance sessions on Monday evenings and Saturdays, in English and Spanish.

A total of 91 low-income taxpayers filed returns as a part of this program. The funds returned to the community were substantial:

• $134,233 in Federal tax refunds; including
• $61,061 in Earned Income Credit; plus
• $16,007 in California tax refunds.

Taxpayers felt empowered by being able to prepare their own taxes and many seemed to enjoy the process generally (“This is fun!"). More than 94% of those who completed our post-tax-preparation survey indicated that they would use the I-CAN interface again if it were offered, and 100% of those who responded indicated that they would recommend the I-CAN sessions to a friend or relative who knows how to use the Internet. Our most significant challenge was simply finding enough taxpayers who felt comfortable enough with their computer and math skills to take advantage of our Do-It-Yourself approach.

Individual Donations - Ambitious Goal Met!

When we started our fiscal year last June, we set ourselves an ambitious goal - to more than double the donations we receive from individual contributors, from just under $19,000 last fiscal year, to $45,000 this year. That's a big leap for a small organization, and we wondered if we had overstepped ourselves, especially given that some contributors might focus their support on buying items at our Gala auction, which wouldn't be reflected in the individual donations numbers.

We've still got more than a month to go of our fiscal year, but we've hit our $45,000 goal! That figure includes your contributions to:

• Our holiday fund appeal last December, when we sent a mailer titled "Because of you" that told some of our alumni's stories;
• Our spring fundraiser and phone-a-thon, just concluded, with a new edition of "Because of you";
• The 14 wonderful individuals and families who became Major Donors with a gift of $1,000 or more; and
• All of you who responded to our matching challenge, thanks to the support of the East Bay Community Foundation's Anonymous Fund (the matching funds are not part of the $45,000 figure).

We want to acknowledge the graphic design work of Thomas Morris on our mailings, which drew many favorable comments. Thomas is very generous in his support of our mission. You can see more of his work at http://thomasmorrisdesign.com.

Reaching this goal is a huge milestone for us, and we hope that those of you who are new donors will continue your generosity in our next fiscal year - when we'll have a new and ambitious fundraising goal to meet!

Ask the Tech: Ryan Fernandes

Dear IT Tech,

My home computer, which runs Windows XP and seemed blazingly fast when bought four years ago, has slowed to a crawl, especially when doing things like opening programs or a Windows Explorer window.  I have tried every free program I know about - checked hard drive memory (20% free, or about 10 GB), run all the Microsoft System Tools, and used the free anti-malware programs AdAware and Spybot. I'm running a free anti-virus tool - either CA or AVG, I can't remember which.

I suspect the source of the problem is the monthly game downloads that one household member gets through a subscription to Real Arcade. I'm thinking that buying a powerful anti-virus/anti-spyware program might be what I need to do, if I can find one that doesn't make the computer go still slower (I tried buying Norton's suite a few years back and that slowed the computer down even more).

I know that reformatting the hard drive will help hugely, but that's not something I can do myself, and I suspect it will cost me about half the price of buying a new computer.  If I do make that investment, I still would like to find out if there's software that will prevent this from happening again.

Hoping you can help,
Anxious in Antioch

Dear Anxious,

There can be several issues that can affect a computer's performance and it is difficult to pin-point the exact issue without having access to the computer. However, below, I have listed recommendations that could assist in improving the performance and security on your computer.

Titles marked with an asterisk (*) indicate periodic maintenance.

Applies to Microsoft Windows XP (Home/Pro)...

*Clean up temporary files:

When installing applications or updates, several temporary files are left behind in certain folders. Delete files from the following locations.

Note: if you do not see the 'Local Settings' folder, launch explorer, click Tools > Folder Options > View > Select "Show hidden files and folders" > ok
C:\Documents and Settings\YourLoginName\Local Settings\Temp\
C:\Temp\
C:\WINDOWS\Temp\

Delete browser cache on close:

In Internet Explorer-7x...click Tools > Internet Options > Advanced (tab) > Scroll down to 'Security' section > check box "Empty Temporary Internet Files folder when browser is closed" > 'ok'

In Firefox-2x...click Tools > Options > Privacy > In 'Private Data' section > check box "Always clear my private data when I close Firefox" > Settings (button) > check box "Cache" > 'ok'

Optimize system performance:

Click on Start > Control Panel > System, in the 'System Properties' window, 'Advanced' tab > 'Performance' section, > 'Settings' > 'Visual Effects' tab > Select 'Custom' and uncheck all boxes, except the last three boxes > 'Advanced' tab > 'Virtual memory' section > 'Change' > Select 'System managed size' > 'Set' > 'ok' > 'ok' >'ok' >'ok' > 'yes' to restart computer.

*Defragment your hard disk drive:

Close all applications. Click Start > All Programs > Accessories > System Tools > Disk Defragmenter > select drive > Defragment

*Update operating system:

Make sure your computer has the latest Microsoft Windows XP Service Pack and recommended updates installed. The latest service pack is SP3.

Click on Start > Control Panel > System, in the 'System Properties' window, 'General' tab, 'System:' section you will see version of your operating system and the service pack number.

To update your system, click on Start > All Programs > Windows Update, in the browser window, click the Express button, the system check begins and then a list of available updates is displayed, install all the recommended updates. Also, if you use Internet Explorer as your browser, update it to the latest version (IE7x)

Install a PC Security Suite (anti-virus, anti-spy/malware, firewall):

Unfortunately, in today's world, this is a requirement; however, most security suite products can significantly slow down an older computer and you may need to upgrade your system hardware.

Free Products: AVG (anti-virus), Microsoft Windows Defender (anti-spy/malware), Windows Firewall (built-in to XP).

Retail products: ZoneAlarm® Internet Security Suite, BitDefender Internet Security 2008 (Include annual recurring updates subscription).

*Clean the dust collected inside your computer:

Do this only if you feel comfortable and confident in doing so (does not apply to laptops). Most computers come with an easy to open side cover.

Increased dust in the computer increases the heat and degrades performance over time. Turn power off and use a pressurized air can to blow away dust.

Addressing your specific issue, if the above does not improve your computer's performance, then...