Annual Meeting and Election Persian Cultural Center of San Diego
September 20, 2020
32 Years of Service
PCC’s Annual General Assembly took place on Sunday, September 20, 2020, at 2 p.m. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the annual meeting was postponed from mid-May to September and was conducted online via Zoom. At the assembly, the annual report was presented, followed by the election of the new board members.
PCC’s 2019-2020 president, Fariba Babakhani-Ghazi, reported last year’s activities. Shahla Salah presented the financial report and Ali Sadr presented the reports for the Iranian School of San Diego (ISSD) and Peyk magazine. A summary of last year’s activities is listed further below.
PCC’s 2019-2020 Board of Directors and Committee Members
PCC’s board of directors and committee members for the past year were Fariba Babakhani-Ghazi (President), Nikoo Atefi (Vice-President), Shahla Salah (Treasurer), Farideh Fazel (Secretary), Amir Farshad Babakhani, Parnian Badii, Hamid Beikzadeh, Hossain Hajimowlana, Ali Sadr (ISSD Principal), Venus Safaei, and Golsa Soraya. The advisory board consisted of Shahri Estakhry, Saeed Jalali, Rosita Bagheri, Shaghayegh Hanson, and Hamid Rafizadeh.
The PCC board of directors held monthly meetings over the past year, while committees held meetings as needed. At its first meeting, the board of directors elected its executive committee members and established the following committees:
Art and Culture: Hossain Hajimowlana (Head), Ali Sadr, Fariba Babakhani-Ghazi, Amir Farshad Babakhani, Parnian Badii, Anahita Babaei, Abdy Salimi, Mahmoud Reza Pirouzian
Membership: Parnian Badii (Head), Fariba Babakhani-Ghazi, Golsa Soraya, Venus Safaei
PR: Farideh Rasouli Fazel (Head), Golsa Soraya, Fariba Babakhani-Ghazi, Amir Farshad Babakhani, Nikoo Atefi, Mahmoud Reza Pirouzian
Grant and Finance: Fariba Babakhani-Ghazi (Head), Rosita Bagheri, Amir Farshad Babakhani, Hamid Rafizadeh, Hossain Hajimowlana, Shahla Salah
Fundraising and Nowruz: Nikoo Atefi (Head), Fariba Babakhani-Ghazi, Farideh Rasouli Fazel, Shahla Salah, Venus Safaei, Amir Farshad
Babakhani, Parnian Badii, Hamid Beikzadeh, Bahar Bagherpour, Mohammad Ayari
PCC Charity: Shala Salah (Head), Fariba Babakhani-Ghazi, Venus Safaei, Parnian Badii
Education: Ali Sadr (Head), Fariba Babakhani-Ghazi, Parisa Amini, Shahnaz Ahmadian
Charshanbehsoori & SizdeBedar: Hamid Beikzadeh (Head), Hamid Rafizadeh, Amir Farshad Babakhani
Building: Hamid Beikzadeh (Head), Ali Sadr, Fariba Babakhani-Ghazi, Hamid Rafizadeh
PCC Youth: Fariba Babakhani-Ghazi (Head), Farideh Rasouli Fazel, Venus Safaei
Peyk: Ali Sadr (Head), Saeed Jalali, Shahri Estakhry, Anahita Babaei, Aria Fani, Saeid Noori Bushehri, Shahrzad Julazadeh, Shaghayegh Hanson, Reza Khabazian, Ali Sahebalzamani, Rachel Tait
Governance: Ali Sadr (Head), Shaghayegh Hanson, Nikoo Atefi, Shahla Salah
PCC’s 2019-2020 Cultural Activities
Over the past year, PCC was not only active in organizing traditional celebrations and programs for the Iranian American community, but also collaborated with other organizations to reach out to the community at large. PCC continued promoting cross cultural activities, and sponsored or co-sponsored the following programs:
1- Book fair in collaboration with Naakojja publication at IAC
2- Setar workshop with Kourosh Taghavi at IAC
3- Art show by Ali Sadr
4- Comedy show and book signing with comedian K-von at IAC
5- Two play readings of Morghe Sahar, directed by Mahmoud Behrouzian at IAC
6- Fourth writing workshop with Hossein Mortezaeian Abkenar at IAC
7- Screening Rahman 1400 (2019) at Reading Cinemas Town Square in collaboration with the Sheed Persian Film Festival
8- Author talk with Abdi Nazemian in collaboration with the Mission Hills/Hillcrest public library
9- Book drive collaboration with Mobile Library to send books to refugee camps in Greece
10- Mehregan celebration in collaboration with the San Diego Museum of Art (SDMA), Reza Rohani, and Sara Naeini concert
11- Screening Nabat and Q&A with Iranian director and actor Shahab Hosseini at IAC
12- Collaboration with San Diego’s Asian Film Festival and the Pacific Arts Movement (Pac Arts)
13- Yalda celebration at Sufi Restaurant with singer Armin Vigen
14- Universal Children’s Day in collaboration with Child Foundation and Dollar a Month at ISSD
15- Annual charity bazaar in December
16- Special documentary night at IAC
17- Art gallery “A Dream of Humanity” by Reza Deghati at IAC in collaboration with UCSD
18- Screening Texas 2 (2019) at Reading Cinemas in collaboration with the Sheed Persian Film Festival
19- Mohsen Namjoo concert at Qualcomm
20- Setar solo concert “The Subline Sound of the Setar” with Kourosh Taghavi at IAC
21- Screening Castle of Dreams in collaboration with CinemaNex
22- Lecture and book signing by Professor Yann Richard at IAC
23- Electric Oud Trio concert at IAC
24- Nima Janmohammadi solo concert at IAC
25- Art show with Parvin Heydarinasab and Majid Fadaeian at IAC
26- Play reading of Orange Garden with Mahmoud Behrozian at IAC
27- Candlelight vigil for the victims of the downing of the Ukrainian Airliner, in collaboration with House of Iran and AIAP
28- Nowruz preparation at ISSD
29- Presentation of the haft-seen along with literary, cultural, and historical exhibits in seven public libraries throughout San Diego
30- Persian Night “On the Steps” at the SDMA
31- A Night of Poetry and Literature at IAC on the third Wednesday of the month (5 events)
32- Family Game Night at IAC (4 times a year)
33- Film and Discussion Series on every third Friday of the month at IAC (8 Events) (online during COVID-19 pandemic)
34- Jonge Farhanghi on every second Friday of the month at IAC (10 Events)
35- Art exhibition at IAC
36- Collaboration with Docunight to show a documentary movie on the first Wednesday of the month (online during COVID-19 pandemic)
37- Multicultural festival in Linda Vista
38- Multicultural festival in Balboa Park
39- Free remote tutoring
ISSD: Academic year 2019-2020 was ISSD’s 32nd year of operation, with 281 students attending both branches of the school at Mt. Carmel High School. ISSD’s Persian language program is accredited by all local school districts as well as the Western Association of Schools and Colleges (WASC), which means that high school students can fulfill their second language requirements by taking Persian language courses at ISSD. The first branch of ISSD offers 21 classes on Sunday mornings, which are separated into six levels. ISSD also offers two Persian classes for adults, three classes for kindergarten, and three classes for pre-kindergarten. Extracurricular classes such as Dance, Theatre, and Setar have been offered as well. The second branch is held on Thursday evenings and has a total of 5 classes.
The Parent Teacher Association (PTA) of each branch of ISSD was instrumental in preparation of the Mehregan and Yalda celebrations. The PTA also helped a great deal to raise funds for the school. In addition, students at ISSD raised approximately $2,200 for the Dollar a Month Foundation’s “Project 200,” aimed in helping the street children of Iran.
The school’s Nowruz preparation program was held on March 8, 2020, but the Nowruz celebration was canceled due to COVID-19 as was ISSD’s end of year event. Due to the pandemic, the last two months of the academic year for all classes, including the extracurricular ones, were conducted online. The cooperation of parents and students in coping with the sudden change was exemplary. The virtual graduation for the Class of 2020 took place on July 12, 2020.
PCC’s Education Committee has completed six textbooks for teaching Persian as a heritage language. Many active Persian schools around the country use our textbooks and our curriculum. ISSD has a website (issd.pccsd.org) and is also active on Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube.
Persian Cultural Dance Academy: With 55 students, the Academy met on Sundays at ISSD Branch I. The dance students performed “On the Steps” at the SDMA. Dance classes for adults were also offered this year.
The IAC: IAC has hosted a variety of cultural activities for the Iranian community (such as the Iranian American Scholarship Fund [IASF] and Dollar a Month Fund [DMF], San Diego State Unversity, and UCSD) and has a library with more than four thousand books.
Peyk Magazine: Peyk, PCC’s bimonthly and bilingual cultural publication, is one of our most successful outreach instruments. Every two months, Peyk is mailed to approximately one thousand subscribers in San Diego County and other parts of the country, with several thousand more issues distributed through business and cultural centers in San Diego, Orange, and Los Angeles Counties, the Bay Area, Chicago, Washington, D.C., Maryland, Dallas, Atlanta, and many other cities.
This year we were finally able to develop and present Peyk online. Our web address is peykmagazine.com. This site is interactive, and you can directly communicate and send your comments to us. Past issues of Peyk are still available at our archive at pccsd.org/peyk.
Outreach Programs: PCC enjoys continued joint programs with local organizations such as the Association of Iranian American Professionals (AIAP), House of Iran, San Diego Public Library, San Diego Museum of Art (SDMA), UCSD, Dollar a Month Fund (DMF), Iranian-American Scholarship Fund (IASF), and Iranian American Bar Association (IABA).
PCC has worked with SDG&E’s “Energy Solutions Partners” campaign. As an “Energy Solutions Partner,” PCC has joined other nonprofits and environmental groups in a collaborative effort to make all of California’s consumers aware of how they can save energy and money through energy efficiency. PCC was chosen as a partner because of our ability to target a specific demographic and translate important emergency news alerts into Persian, as necessary.
Membership: PCC continued advertising and inviting members of the community to join PCC. After PCC provided new online membership software by (Join-it), membership increased by 10%. PCC also issued membership cards to its members, who receive a special discount to PCC events and from various Iranian businesses.
Public Relations: Thousands of people all over the world view PCC’s Website, www.pccsd.org, and its Facebook, Instagram, Telegram, and Twitter accounts. PCC issues a weekly electronic newsletter that reaches thousands of community members, and its website provides quick access to Peyk, PCC’s ongoing programs and activities, as well as other cultural information and events, membership information, and tax-deductible contribution information. In the past year, several PCC events were featured on KPBS radio in San Diego, KIRN Radio Iran in Los Angeles, Chekhabar.com, Kodoom.com, and on the San Diego Arts and Sol website. These programs not only reached out to the Iranian American community, but also other communities who attended our featured programs.
The PCC Foundation: This charitable organization continues to raise funds for the following projects:
Helped an Iranian woman and her teenage daughter with food and housing (Project MM)
Raised money to help members of our community who are facing many challenges with layoffs and furloughs due to COVID-19
Helped a young lady and paid for one month of food and rent
Helped others with food
Continued to support two young students who lost their parents and need help (long-term project)
Youth Committee: This committee has been behind the planning of many PCC events, both for members of the center and for charity. They are responsible for organizing Family Fun Night every other month and work on the logistics and promotion every month. The committee helped plan for PCC’s Nowruz celebration and worked behind the scenes to put together the gifts and display tables. Committee members helped organize PCC’s office and spent hours working together to clean out the library and organize the files. The student board organized fundraisers for Dollar a Month Fund and within PCC, collecting 41 pounds of food for the San Diego Food Bank. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, committee members also offered free remote tutoring to any students who need help while attending classes from home.
Outgoing Board Members: We would like to take this opportunity to thank the following board members who have served their terms and are leaving the PCC board. We are grateful for the time, energy, and talents they generously gave to PCC and our community. We look forward to having them back on the PCC Board again: Fariba Babakhani-Ghazi, Farshad Babakhani, Hamid Bekzadeh, Farideh Fazel, Shahla Salah, and Golsa Soraya. With the exception of Fariba Babakhani-Ghazi and Golsa Soraya, who have served their two consecutive terms and are subject to“term limits,” the others can run for re-election.
We are continually looking for volunteers to join our committees and sub-committees. Please step forward and GET INVOLVED with various groups to HELP US better serve the community.
2020 PCC Board of Directors Election: After the Board of Director’s report, candidates to fill the vacancies in the Board introduced themselves and presented their plans for joining the Board. Mr. Kohbodi, Ms. Alaghehband, and Mr. Shoushtari observed the election, which was done by secret ballot. After counting the ballots, including the absentees and electronic votes, the results were announced.
The following were elected as voting members of the Board of Directors:
Shahla Salah
Farideh Fazel
Amir Farshad Babakhani
Hamid Beikzadeh
Mahmoud Reza Pirouzian
Hamid Rafizadeh
These new members will serve along with the current board members: Nikoo Atefi, Parnian Badii, Hossain Hajimowlana, Ali Sadr, and Venus Safaei. The general assembly was adjourned at 4 p.m.
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The first meeting of the Board of Directors was held on October 14, 2020. Subsequently, the Board elected members of the Executive Committee, who will serve PCC for one year:
President: Shahla Salah
Vice President: Amir Farshad Babakhani
Treasurer: Hamid Refizadeh
Secretary: Nikoo Atefi
Advisory Board: Shahri Estakhri, Shaghayegh Hanson, Saeed Jalali, Fariba Babakhani-Ghazi
Other members of the Board of Directors will be leading various committees such as Art and Culture, Education, Charity, Building, Grant & Finance, Fundraising and Nowruz, PR, PCC Youth Group, Charshanbehsoori, and Membership.
Please join us. If you are interested in joining any of the committees, please contact PCC by phone at (858) 552-9355 or email at pcc@pccsd.org.
