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Much Shelist and Its Founders Receive "Making a Difference Award"

The Abraham Lincoln Marovitz Lend-a-Hand Program recently selected Much Shelist and its founders to receive the 2006 "Making a Difference Award" in recognition of the firm's $35,000 contribution to the organization. Along with several other honorees from the legal community, Much Shelist was recognized during the 3rd Annual My Hero Awards and Volunteer Recognition Luncheon on July 12 at the Standard Club in Chicago.

In celebration of its 35th anniversary in August 2005, the firm chose to honor its five founders—Morrie Much, Michael R. Shelist, Michael J. Freed, Howard M. Denenberg and Joseph D. Ament—with a monetary contribution to the Lend-a-Hand program to fund the new Much Shelist Founders' Award. During each of the next five years, $7,000 will be awarded to an up-and-coming tutor/mentor program in Chicago that has been in existence for less than five years. The recipient of the 2006 inaugural award was Inspired Youth, Inc., a one-year-old tutoring program that provides assistance with reading, writing, arithmetic and homework for low-income children in the Uptown/Edgewater community.

About Lend-a-Hand

Initiated in 1995 by the Chicago Bar Association and the Chicago Bar Foundation (CBF), the Abraham Lincoln Marovitz Lend-a-Hand Program strives to help young people in disadvantaged communities by providing them with the guidance and support they need to succeed in school and to reach their full potential as independent and productive adults. In 2003, the Lend-A-Hand Program was re-launched with a $100,000 contribution from the CBF, made possible by a major gift from the Hon. Abraham Lincoln Marovitz Trust.

The mission of the Lend-A-Hand program is to promote long-term, one-on-one relationships between mentors and young people through various means:

  • Raising awareness in the legal community of the importance of mentoring disadvantaged youth
  • Recruiting volunteers from the legal community and beyond to serve as mentors in area programs
  • Recruiting lawyers to serve on the boards of tutor/mentor programs
  • Awarding grants to provide much-needed financial support to exceptional volunteer mentoring programs

For more information, please visit http://www.lend-a-hand.net/.