"What do we live for if not to make life less difficult for each other?" George Eliot

I can?t believe that we are already two full months into 2007! It seems that time just keeps moving faster and faster.

Already this year, Common Ground has worked in Denver and New York City, Amsterdam and London.

The next few months all include extensive travel domestically and abroad. Here in the U.S. we?re about to begin a series of regional training conferences for mentoring grantees of the Department of Education. We?ll begin in Chicago in March and then move to Boston in April and Seattle in May.

We will also return next month to Skopje, Macedonia to continue a major engagement with the Institute for Sustainable Communities (ISC) and USAID. This Civil Society Strengthening Project is one of the most exciting USAID initiatives I?ve seen. At the end of the month, we?ll be joining the ISC team in Belgrade, Serbia for what promises to be an exciting long-term collaboration in that country as well.

Some of our time in both countries will also be used to cultivate relationships with several new international organizations who have contacted us about working together in 2007.

Later this summer, Common Ground will be launching our first fellowship program. We?ll be offering one position to a graduate student interested in being a part of our international NGO development activities. If you or someone you know is interested, please contact us for more information!

If you haven't visited our website yet, I hope you'll take a look. When you get to our site, go to the login area under "Members" on the left, and enter the email address where you are receiving this; and create a password.

After that simple step, you'll have access to dozens of fully downloadable resources (many new resources just added!) to help you in your work. You'll also be able to view our snapshots gallery; and I'll be able to involve you directly in our cutting-edge work around the world!

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If you have a colleague who could benefit from knowing about our work and our free social profit resources, please feel free to forward them this email (Click "Forward this email" below).

If they are interested, they'll be able to sign-up, otherwise, we'll leave them alone. You have my word!

I can't wait for you to get involved in our online community! For almost two decades, Common Ground Consulting LLC has been providing mission-critical consulting services to social profit organizations. We look forward to strengthening our relationship with you. See you on the web!

In Community, Craig