Rolodex

WE ASKED Christine Knapp, executive director of Penn Futures, to send us her Rolodex, or at least the top names of people she consults for her work on sustainable issues. Here's who she's got on speed dial: Green jobs: Leanne Kreger-Braneky, director of Sustainable Business Network. Convener of the Green Economy Task Force. Kate Houstoun, new Green Jobs coordinator. Fran Pettricione, Philadelphia Area Labor Management. Sally Silver, head of Smart Energy Initiative of SE Pa. Tom Tuffey, director, PennFuture Center for Energy, Enterprise and the Environment.

It was Christmas 1993, Micki Gorman-Rouse says, when she became disenchanted with academia. "I remember looking at one of my professors at the time and thinking, 'Everybody thinks you're so bloody brilliant, but what have you done in your life?' " Gorman-Rouse left Michigan State University, where she had been pursuing a doctorate in political science and economics, and began cultivating her Rolodex of philanthropists - the people with the clout, she says, to move education forward.

I was still awake when it started snowing late last Wednesday . I walked to the window of my apartment, cupped my hands around my eyes and pressed my face against the cold pane. Outside, the snow lay fresh and unspoiled, reminiscent of a Hallmark card.The thought reminded me of my Christmas card duties, and it seemed the perfect time to get to business. I pulled out my revolving Rolodex and turned to the A's. I went down the names , working my way through the A's, the B's, the C's. I came to Jim C. "Gosh," I thought halfway through the note I was scribbling to him on the card.

Send a business card in response to Kathy Willets' personal ad, and you never knew where it would lead. For some, it led to a visit to her home, small talk beside the red-brick fireplace, champagne in crystal glasses and a trip to her heavy, wood four- poster bed. Other men sent business cards after reading her personal ad in the newspaper - "turquoise eyes, great tan, hot body" - but then dared not show up even once. At least one man sent Willets the business card of a friend, before joining the wispy-haired blonde for a bedroom interlude himself.

Bryn Mawr College has an illustrious and long history - 118 years to be exact - as a sterling academic institution for serious, bright young women, historically bypassing such traditional areas of study as education and the arts. This was not the place for prancing girls in black leotards or those lost in the world of their journals, a perception that continues to this day when a third of its 1,330 undergraduate enrollment major in the sciences. But Bryn Mawr "wants to encourage a greater balance in life, and is raising its profile in the arts," says provost Ralph Kuncl.

The recent deaths of several grassroots community leaders remind me that I have to revise my personal phone book. The names that come to mind off the top of my head include Randy Urquhart, a police officer and political activist; Jim Francis, a retired gang-control police officer and plumber; Jim Lester, a former gang-intervention worker; Alice Walker, a South Philadelphia youth and community worker; Mattie Humphrey, a 1960s social and health activist...

To the advancing avalanche of acronyms, I, Thomas L. McArdle, have decided to add a few of my own. I have long felt that the males in society have suffered from a severe societal lack of imagination in their given names. Sometimes it appears that every other Tom, Dick and Harry, is named John, Joe, Mike or Bill. No quarrel with the quality of these names, just the sheer saturation of them. To this end I'm forming "Take Another Name Guys" or T.A.N.G. Forget those lame explanations from your parents: "But we had to name someone after Grandad" or Uncle or Daddy.

I got the call shortly after Christmas. Would I outfit The Sixth Sense's M. Night Shyamalan for the Golden Globes on Jan. 23, less than a month away? With my background in writing for fashion-industry publications, I figured getting one snappy-looking tux for a high-profile evening would be a cinch, and agreed to take on the task, gratis. New Year's weekend, I rifled through my Rolodex and left messages with Calvin, Giorgio, Ralph and Donna. Ralph's people said they were already booked.

In two years at the Delaware County Courthouse, Joe Barbato has never served on a jury, shackled a scofflaw, hurled an objection at a judge or hushed a witness with the crack of a gavel. You won't find his name inscribed in any of the employee ledgers in the court administrator's office. You won't spot his face among the smiley photographs in the county's annual Judicial Report. So just what has Barbato been doing so diligently, all day long, all this time, at the courts? Well, nothing much.

One-part human Rolodex and one-part role model, Michael Schmidt has a memory - and a tableside manner - that would put any Macintosh to shame. At the flick of a cerebral synapse, he can call up an almanac of arcana such as Diana Ross' birth date (March 26), the number of word-search puzzle books he has averaged per year for the last two decades (97), and the precise order of arpeggios in Beethoven's Fifth Symphony. Schmidt, 41, a resident of the CK Center for developmentally disabled adults, put all his powers to good use recently when he polished off his 2,000th word-search puzzle book amid a delighted audience, which celebrated the occasion with cakes, balloons and the hoisting of banners.

WE ASKED Christine Knapp, executive director of Penn Futures, to send us her Rolodex, or at least the top names of people she consults for her work on sustainable issues. Here's who she's got on speed dial: Green jobs: Leanne Kreger-Braneky, director of Sustainable Business Network. Convener of the Green Economy Task Force. Kate Houstoun, new Green Jobs coordinator. Fran Pettricione, Philadelphia Area Labor Management. Sally Silver, head of Smart Energy Initiative of SE Pa. Tom Tuffey, director, PennFuture Center for Energy, Enterprise and the Environment.

A mentor can lift a struggling youngster toward a better life. That's why leaders in the field vowed two years ago to double the number of mentors in the United States by 2010. The bad news from the Census Bureau is that mentoring is not on track to double by then - not even close. In 2006, about two million adults mentored a young person for an hour or more per week and for at least the duration of a school year. Today, there are only about 160,000 more such mentors, and the Census Bureau projects slower growth from now until 2010.

Bryn Mawr College has an illustrious and long history - 118 years to be exact - as a sterling academic institution for serious, bright young women, historically bypassing such traditional areas of study as education and the arts. This was not the place for prancing girls in black leotards or those lost in the world of their journals, a perception that continues to this day when a third of its 1,330 undergraduate enrollment major in the sciences. But Bryn Mawr "wants to encourage a greater balance in life, and is raising its profile in the arts," says provost Ralph Kuncl.

The recent deaths of several grassroots community leaders remind me that I have to revise my personal phone book. The names that come to mind off the top of my head include Randy Urquhart, a police officer and political activist; Jim Francis, a retired gang-control police officer and plumber; Jim Lester, a former gang-intervention worker; Alice Walker, a South Philadelphia youth and community worker; Mattie Humphrey, a 1960s social and health activist...

It was Christmas 1993, Micki Gorman-Rouse says, when she became disenchanted with academia. "I remember looking at one of my professors at the time and thinking, 'Everybody thinks you're so bloody brilliant, but what have you done in your life?' " Gorman-Rouse left Michigan State University, where she had been pursuing a doctorate in political science and economics, and began cultivating her Rolodex of philanthropists - the people with the clout, she says, to move education forward.

I got the call shortly after Christmas. Would I outfit The Sixth Sense's M. Night Shyamalan for the Golden Globes on Jan. 23, less than a month away? With my background in writing for fashion-industry publications, I figured getting one snappy-looking tux for a high-profile evening would be a cinch, and agreed to take on the task, gratis. New Year's weekend, I rifled through my Rolodex and left messages with Calvin, Giorgio, Ralph and Donna. Ralph's people said they were already booked.

Part of series of articles on local volunteers - the heart of the Presidents' Summit for America's Future, to be held this month in Philadelphia. Like most teens, Leslie Slingsby spends much of her time with one ear attached to the phone. But a moment listening to her conversations makes it obvious that she is no ordinary teenager. There's no giggling. No "he said/she said," or shrieks of "Oh, my God!" Just a lot of questions as she flips through a Rolodex that starts with the category "abuse," and ends with the category "women.

In two years at the Delaware County Courthouse, Joe Barbato has never served on a jury, shackled a scofflaw, hurled an objection at a judge or hushed a witness with the crack of a gavel. You won't find his name inscribed in any of the employee ledgers in the court administrator's office. You won't spot his face among the smiley photographs in the county's annual Judicial Report. So just what has Barbato been doing so diligently, all day long, all this time, at the courts? Well, nothing much.

One-part human Rolodex and one-part role model, Michael Schmidt has a memory - and a tableside manner - that would put any Macintosh to shame. At the flick of a cerebral synapse, he can call up an almanac of arcana such as Diana Ross' birth date (March 26), the number of word-search puzzle books he has averaged per year for the last two decades (97), and the precise order of arpeggios in Beethoven's Fifth Symphony. Schmidt, 41, a resident of the CK Center for developmentally disabled adults, put all his powers to good use recently when he polished off his 2,000th word-search puzzle book amid a delighted audience, which celebrated the occasion with cakes, balloons and the hoisting of banners.

I was still awake when it started snowing late last Wednesday . I walked to the window of my apartment, cupped my hands around my eyes and pressed my face against the cold pane. Outside, the snow lay fresh and unspoiled, reminiscent of a Hallmark card.The thought reminded me of my Christmas card duties, and it seemed the perfect time to get to business. I pulled out my revolving Rolodex and turned to the A's. I went down the names , working my way through the A's, the B's, the C's. I came to Jim C. "Gosh," I thought halfway through the note I was scribbling to him on the card.