it is a big one. let's hear it, give yourselves a big round of applause? i love the echo in here. this is big moment now and happy to be here. my name is franco finn, a native of this great city, san francisco, and proud to be a san franciscans to the core and also product of this great city, and i'm also proud film commissioner for city county of san francisco and many may know me as a long time voice for your favorite basketball team here. what is that? the golden state warriors! yes. and it is such a honor to be here with all of you, because it is about you today.

congratulations. give your is selves a big hand. bridge to excellent ceremony and scholar shf award and so proud to be here to give this alongside our great mayor along with you. you have gone through the journey and here you are to embark on the next chapter of your are live. lifep. life. are you excited? probably nervous too, but what a big step and will have a awesome time i'm sure where you may go, but it starts here and we want it just make sure we award you properly from your family and friends, in front of our mayor. with that said, proud to introduce our 45 mayor of great city and county of san francisco, make, some noise, for mayor london n breed!

[applause] >> goodness franco, me already? how is everybody doing today? you guys don't look exseated. come on! [applause] i got to say, this is something that was really important to me. when i first became mayor, it was really important that i did two things. number one, i started a program called, opportunities for all that provides paid internships-has anyone done opportunities for all? good. good. paid internships for young people, because that is how i got my start and i also wanted to provide scholarship opportunities as well. some of you know that i was born and raised in san francisco and in fact, i grew up in public housing in the city where my grand mother raised me. i never knew my biological father, i sadly have a sister who i lost to drug overdose and brother still

incarcerated. i lived in a community gun violence was all too common and on a regular basis i attended more funerals then i can count. i saw my community crumble before me, and it inspired me to want to do something different to invest in and work with the city and county of san francisco in some capacity. i didn't know what it was, but i know when i got a opportunity through the mayor youth employment training program to get paid, because i had no money, to get paid and an opportunity to eventually go to college. i went to uc davis. it was really hard and yes i got a couple scholarship, but i worked cleaning houses, i worked baby sitting kids because my grand mother had nothing to provide me with resources and i also wanted to take care of her because she took care of me. the reason it is so important

to share this with all you, because i read all the stories. i read each and every story and when i wanted to do the scholarship, it was so important i look at the young folks in san francisco and look at kids who might be the first in their families to go to college, who may have had challenging experiences and despite everything you have been through, the fact that you are here and you are going to a number of universities all over the united states is extraordinary, and i am so incredibly proud of each and every one of you for this major accomplishment, because the environment to a certain extents around you, don't always make what you doing normal and you are making going to college and you're making success normal and that's why the scholarship is so important and this opportunity to see you thrive is so important

to me personally. so, i want to say congratulations for despite the obstacles still succeeding. despite the challenges, but here's the thing, it is not done. you still have a mountain to climb, so don't get discouraged. stay focused and more importantly, make sure that you keep positive people around you, because the reason why you are here for whatever reason, it is not just because of the people around you, it is because of the decisions you personally have made to get here. you have made those decisions. you have succeeded in life and you are choosing to go to college and continue that success and so stay the course, stay focused, stay positive and keep positive people around you. i remember when i went away to college, it was really hard, because again, my grand mother was older and things were really challenging.

they took down the projects i living in so i didn't have a home to go back to. people were dying funerals i couldn't make it to, it was crazy and i got to a point i just felt lost and felt hopeless and felt i wanted to give up and walk away, and the people in my community when i show said up, they told me not to give up. they encouraged me. they supported me. you know what? they told me to stay off the block. they pushed me out of danger, because they want ed something more for me and that's why every day i do this job, i give it all i got for this city and for the people that made it possible for me to be here. and just remember that as you go through life and what you do, what you do matters and also, so many people are watching you. they are watching you be trailblazers in whatever career

[audio cut out] hoping we get graduates and i know today you will be hearing from one of those graduates, cecilia gomez, thank you for being here and congratulations graduated from college and you will be hearing from her, but she didn't give up and looking forward hearing her story and how she is doing great things, and i want to take this opportunity to again thank franco finn, he is like a super rock star. [applause] >> i was hoping he would bring warriors tickets or something. i want to also recognize for those of you, all of you in our public school system, the persons who are responsible for making all those decisions, include people like a lita fisher on the school board, so thank you so much for being here today and supporting our

students. continue onward and upward and to much success, i will keep you in my prayers to insure that i'm always thinking about just the challenges that you will continue to overcome to be successful in life. thank you to the parents and all the folks from the different non profit agencies that made the recommendations of the students. [applause] thank you for being there for them. thank you for supporting them and keep them encouraged as they go through this journey called life. thank you all so much. [applause] >> thank you mayor breed. thank you for being such a inspiration and you are truly the inspiration here as well, so congratulations again and we are going to hear from one of our alums from this bridge to excellence scholarship award recipient. a graduate now to talk about her experience, how important this

changed her life, so please welcome to the stage, ms. cecilia gomez, our alumni speaker. come on up! praech [applause] >> >> good afternoon. thank you for having me here and congratulations to the class of 2024. [applause] my name is cecilia gomez and as of a month ago today exactly i'm a recent graduate olmcallister college with bachelor in education and spanish, and a 2020recipient of the bridge to excellence award. for four years ago i reconsidered whether going out of state was worth it or even a possibility. with the financial implications of the pandemic and the unknown uncertainty of university open again, i thought perhaps the best decision was to stay closer to home instead, even

though my dream was to go to liberal art institution. fortunately with the support of mayor london breed and the bridge to excellence award, i didn't have to sacrifice my education and with the support i can now say i graduated summa cum laude from mcallister and will be starting the stanford teacher education program in two weeks. [applause] the bridge to excellence award was proof i was capable of achieving my dreams and i had support systems that believe in me. even when i didn't always believe in myself. this award was a reminder to carry home pride everywhere i went. whether was in main minnesota or spain, i always had sunnydale, bayview and san francisco in my heart and made priority to return home back to my roots. believe me when i say, we all believe in you. be the light and hope we need.

bring the invasion and the strength to create the solutions to tomorrow's problem. channel your strength to keep moving forward and most importantly, always remember to shoulders you stand on, those sholders that hold you with love and pride and hope. thank you. [applause] >> thank you so much cecilia, congratulations to you. the moment we have been waiting for, the honor roll of scholarship recipients ready to announce, mayor breed if you can join on stage. i will announce them. this is a great moment, huge chapter in these lives and we are going to have fun while we are doing it. they brought the hypoman for a reason, so let's hype it up. you ready! make some noise! bridge to excellence

scholarship recipients, here we go. in order. we reedy? ready? first up is arele larkin [applause] photo, yes. go to morgan. give a round of applause to arele! [applause] okay. next we have kami zou! [applause] uc san diego representing here. let's go ucsd. next we have scholarship

recipient d'antonio samuel, cal state la. going to socal. [applause] and now we have the [indiscernible] going to jackson state university! [applause] those are nice certificates right there, i tell you.

next we have daniel romero! [applause] going to columbia university everybody. out of lincoln high. we'll get the order--that might have been my fault. now we have--this happens all the time. derel brown. let's hear it for derel brown. jackson state university! [applause] next we have out of lowell high school,

[indiscernible] going to uc santa cruz. future banana slug here. banana slug in the house. [applause] and next we have, aya [indiscernible] going to san francisco state university, local right here. go gators! [applause] congratulations. next we have, jeremiah jovana gomez! [applause] coming out of sota high school and going to uc santa cruz, everyone. congratulations. next we have out of galileo high

school, kelly wu, going to san diego state! going down south. [applause] great job. next we have, out of academy, kalil going to san jose state university. go spartans! [applause] next, out of balboa high school, let's go bal, mandy going to williams college! [applause] alright. out of lincoln, let's see--actually , no. kipp sf college prep.

nazir travis! [applause] out of lincoln high school, --going to cal poly! [applause] and out of galileo, we have waylen tang, uc irvine representing in the house! [applause] and last but not least, out of lincoln high school, wilson lee going to san jose state university. another spartan in the house! [applause] let's hear to ladies and

gentlemen to bridge to excellence scholarship recipients here tonight! wow, congratulations. you are going to make our city so proud. we cannot wait to see your next journey here and hopefully come back to share your experiences and inspire more people. once again, let's hear it for 2024, bridge to excellence scholarship recipients tonight. [applause] thank you so much. thank you mayor breed. now, we will have a group photo of everyone here together. the rotunda we will get out there and get oen the steps, do a nice little photo. we got our professional paragraphs to stand by. congratulations one more time. we'll see you at the rotunda and once again our 2024, bridge excellence scholarship resip yntd recipient in san francisco. family and friends, what a great honor. see you next year.

thank you for being a inspiration. keep doing what you are doing and thank you for making san francisco proud. see you at the rotunda and shout out to ms. gomez for sharing your story with us.

>> the stewardship program is a (indiscernible) based program. we work with student kind r garten through 12 grade and work with scrks fusd and (indiscernible) focus on 5 themes. sense of place, plant adapation and animal adaptation, water soil or (indiscernible) depending on the grade level and accommodations the class may need the educators work to adapt the programming to be whatever works best for the class, so they can gain activities (indiscernible) some don't, we try to meet students where they are at and get comfortable connecting in the space and feeling a sense of ownership and safety within their (indiscernible) >> the first component of a youth stewardship program trip will be a in clasds visit where we go to the school,

we give a presentation on the natural history of san francisco, we talk about the concept of a habitat, so what does a habitat contain, understood, water, shelter, space. >> children at this age, they learn best through using their senses, having the real life experience and (indiscernible) students also learn about responsibility and it is a great message for student to learn, if you take care of environment, the environment will take care of you. >> so, when we finally get the kids outside, we have two main components to the field trips. one is going to be the restoration component where we are working on the habitat and parks by pulling out (indiscernible) or maybe watering, and then the other side of our trip

is going to be the educational component, which can range from a nature walk with a sensory theme where we are talking about what we smell and hear, to a focus on plant adaptation and animal adaptations. >> (indiscernible) >> just a great opportunity for students to learn more, connect with nature, and hopefully what they learn from the youth stewardship program they can take with them for the rest of their lives, and they will appreciate their environment more. hopefully, when they appreciate it, they take care of it more every day. >> (indiscernible) >> so every year we open the application up in the fall. interested teachers can apply for a classroom visit and up to two field trips to the city park of their choice. field trips are 2 and a half

hours long and like i said, they can happen in any city park (indiscernible) >> working with kids, they keep you young. they keep you on your tones -- on your toes. >> teaching them, at the same time, us learning from them, everything is fulfilling. >> ready? go. [♪♪♪]

>> we really wanted to find a way to support women entrepreneurs in particular in san francisco. it was very important for the mayor, as well as the safety support the dreams that people want to realize, and provide them with an opportunity to receive funding to support improvements for their business so they could grow and thrive in their neighborhoods and in their industry. >> three, two, one! >> because i am one of the consultants for two nonprofits here for entrepreneurship, i knew about the grand through the renaissance entrepreneur center, and through the small business development center. i thought they were going to be perfect candidate because of their strong values in the community. they really give back to the neighborhood. they are from this neighborhood, and they care about the kids in the community here. >> when molly -- molly first told us about the grant because she works with small businesses. she has been a tremendous help for us here. she brought us to the attention of the grand just because a lot

of things here were outdated, and need to be up-to-date and redone totally. >> hands in front. recite the creed. >> my oldest is jt, he is seven, and my youngest is ryan, he is almost six. it instills discipline and the boys, but they show a lot of care. we think it is great. the moves are fantastic. the women both are great teachers. >> what is the next one? >> my son goes to fd k. he has been attending for about two years now. they also have a summer program, and last summer was our first year participating in it. they took the kids everywhere around san francisco. this year, owner talking about placing them in summer camps, all he wanted to do was spend the entire summer with them.

>> he has strong women in his life, so he really appreciates it. i think that carries through and i appreciate the fact that there are more strong women in the world like that. >> i met d'andrea 25 years ago, and we met through our interest in karate. our professor started on cortland years ago, so we grew up here at this location, we out -- he outgrew the space and he moved ten years later. he decided to reopen this location after he moved. initially, i came back to say, hey, because it might have been 15 years since i even put on a uniform. my business partner was here basically by herself, and the person she was supposed to run the studio with said great, you are here, i started new -- nursing school so you can take over. and she said wait, that is not what i am here for i was by

myself before -- for a month before she came through. she was technically here as a secretary, but we insisted, just put on the uniform, and help her teach. i was struggling a little bit. and she has been here. one thing led to another and now we are co-owners. you think a lot more about safety after having children and i wanted to not live in fear so much, and so i just took advantage of the opportunity, and i found it very powerful to hit something, to get some relief, but also having the knowledge one you might be in a situation of how to take care of yourself. >> the self-defence class is a new thing that we are doing. we started with a group of women last year as a trial run to see how it felt. there's a difference between self-defence and doing a karate class. we didn't want them to do an

actual karate class. we wanted to learn the fundamentals of how to defend yourself versus, you know, going through all the forms and techniques that we teaching a karate class and how to break that down. then i was approached by my old high school. one -- once a semester, the kids get to pick an extra curricular activity to take outside of the school walls. my old biology teacher is now the principle. she approached us into doing a self-defence class. the girls have been really proactive and really sweet. they step out of of the comfort zone, but they have been willing to step out and that hasn't been any pushback. it is really great. >> it is respect. you have to learn it. when we first came in, they knew us as those girls. they didn't know who we were. finally, we came enough for them to realize, okay, they are in the business now. it took a while for us to gain that respect from our peers, our male peers.

>> since receiving the grant, it has ignited us even more, and put a fire underneath our butts even more. >> we were doing our summer camp and we are in a movie theatre, and we just finished watching a film and she stepped out to receive a phone call. she came in and she screamed, hey, we got the grant. and i said what? >> martial arts is a passion for us. it is passion driven. there are days where we are dead tired and the kids come and they have the biggest smiles on their faces and it is contagious. >> we have been operating this program for a little over a year all women entrepreneurs. it is an extraordinary benefit for us. we have had the mayor's office investing in our program so we can continue doing this work. it has been so impactful across a diversity of communities throughout the city. >> we hope that we are making some type of impact in these kids' lives outside of just learning karate.

having self-confidence, having discipline, learning to know when it's okay to stand up for yourself versus you just being a bully in school. these are the values we want the kids to take away from this. not just, i learned how to kick and i learned how to punch. we want the kids to have more values when they walk outside of these doors. [♪♪♪] >> nice to see you here and we welcome to june 18, 2024 meeting of the san francisco health commission. secretary morewitz, will you please call the roll? >> commissioner green, present. commissioner guillermo- [roll call] >> thank you.