About Our Chapter

NCL, Inc., Manhattan-Hermosa Chapter is a group of mothers and daughters who have come together in a commitment to community service, leadership development and cultural experiences.
Members shall reside in Manhattan Beach and Hermosa Beach. Like all NCL, Inc. Chapters, Manhattan-Hermosa aims to foster the mother-daughter relationship by serving its communities together.

Established in 2009, the Manhattan-Hermosa Chapter is the beach cities’ oldest NCL Chapter, with more than 600 past and current members who volunteer at philanthropic organizations throughout Southern California. In our 2022-2023 NCL year, we volunteered 16,464 hours together across all of our philanthropies! We are so grateful for all of our incredible philanthropy partners and believe they are a huge part of what makes our NCL Chapter so unique!                                                       

Join Our Chapter

Interested in joining our chapter? Membership opportunities are dependent on chapter openings.

If you know someone in our chapter, talk to her about getting started, membership obligations and our membership drive timeline.  If you do not know someone in NCL, you are invited to complete this Membership Inquiry Form.

Membership Inquiry Form

For any questions regarding Membership, requests for transfers or assistance with connecting as a Sustainer, email us.

Thank you to everyone who submitted an application for the 2024-2025 NCL year. You will be notified of your status on April 1st. Our membership drive for 2025-2026 begins in early 2025. Please check back here in late 2024 for more information, or send us an email using the Membership Inquiry Form.

Our Chapter’s annual membership drive begins in mid-January each year. NCL is a six-year program that begins when your daughter is in 7th grade. If you live in Manhattan Beach or Hermosa Beach and have a daughter currently in 6th grade, we encourage you to contact one of our members to learn more about NCL, our Chapter, and the application process.

 

Community Service

We understand and serve communities in partnership with local and national nonprofits. Each NCL, Inc. chapter promotes social awareness by considering the local community’s needs and selecting appropriate non-profit organizations to support through different volunteer activities.

We work with the following philanthropies:

• 1736 Family Crisis Center
• American Heart Association
• American Red Cross
• Angel City Sports
• Any Soldier
• Children’s Dental Health Clinic
• City of Hermosa Beach
• City of Manhattan Beach
• County of Los Angeles Public Library, Manhattan Beach Branch
• Family Promise
• Food Forward
• Habitat For Humanity of Greater Los Angeles
• Heal the Bay
• ICAN
• Jimmy Miller Memorial Foundation
• Leukemia & Lymphoma Society – Greater LA
• Little League Challenger Baseball
• Momentum
• Mychal’s Learning Place
• National Day of Service – Martin Luther King, Jr. Day of Service – January 15, 2024
• One Voice LA
• Operation Gratitude
• PS I Love You Foundation
• Richstone Family Center
• Saint Sebastian Sports Project
• Shared Bread
• Special Olympics Southern California
• St. Joseph Center
• Switzer Learning Center
• The Lovejoy Foundation
• Wreaths Across America

 

Class of 2024 Senior Project

Every year our NCL Senior Class organizes a project to give back to one of our philanthropy partners. The Class of 2024 chose to refurbish, relocate, and renovate the library at the Switzer Learning Center.

Founded by Dr. Janet Switzer in 1966, the Switzer Learning Center began as a Center for Educational Therapy for students with learning disabilities. Since its founding, the Switzer Learning Center has helped over 5,000 children with educational impairments and learning disabilities, continuing its mission to promote their core values of diversity, equity, accessibility, inclusion, and anti-racism. 

Our NCL seniors worked with the Switzer Center twice a week over the summer. Ticktockers and Patronesses sorted the Center’s books by grade level and reorganized them, implementing a new organizational system that sorted the books based on reading level. New shelves and furniture were then installed and two senior Ticktockers, Ellie Penczar and Sienna Kingston, painted a gorgeous mural on the library’s wall. 

Following the completion of this wonderful project, the city of Torrance awarded each Class of 2024 Ticktocker with a Certificate of Recognition, commending their dedication to the relocating and refurbishing of the Switzer Learning Center Library. 

Thank you to our amazing Class of 2024!

Leadership Development

We build capable, courageous leaders through opportunities to learn, reflect and develop. Our leaders become successful in their education, career and communities by learning the necessary skills during their NCL experience.

Examples of skills developed include:

• Confidence
• Consensus building
• Team building
• Conflict resolution
• Event planning
• Parliamentary procedure

Our Chapter Board of Directors:

• President: Louisa Cushman
• President Elect: Kimberly Rosenfeld
• Secretary: Jennifer Buchsbaum
• Treasurer: Kelly Brookie
  Keri Herczeg
• Parliamentarian: Lisa Valde Severin
• Vice President Communications: Julie Schmirler
• Vice President Membership: Monique Vranesh
• Vice President Philanthropy: Nancy Neal
• Vice President New Members: Christine Shultz
• Vice President Ticktockers: Jennifer Morrow
• Sustainer Liaison: Hilary Mahan
• Vice President Chapter Engagement and Inclusion: Shauna Mullins

 

Cultural Experiences

We preserve National Charity League traditions and core values, while appreciating the growth that comes from connecting with different communities and cultures. We continually strive to build stronger ties with our communities and the individuals within them. It is through this understanding that we grow and develop broader worldviews that will shape and support our lives.

• Traditions – We celebrate the richness of our history through traditions that honor the past while serving the future.
• Values – We embrace values that make us strong as an organization of mother-daughter leaders.
• Community Connections – We build connections through experiences that impact our communities.
• Etiquette – We encourage and mentor kind, respectful and gracious social conduct.

Why We Are Unique

 Awards & Accolades

Blue Rose Chapter Award Recipient (2022, 2021 & 2020)
Mychal’s Place Angel Award Recipient (2021)
Leader of the Year – Patroness: Bonnie Vogel (2020)
NCL, Inc. Ticktocker Advisory Council Representation: Ticktocker Meredith Kenney (2021-2022)
NCL, Inc. Ticktocker Advisory Council Representation: Ticktocker Madeleine Driscoll (2020-2021)
Outstanding Chartered Chapter Program (2016)
Outstanding Ticktocker Program Award (2013)

Our well established history has afforded us the opportunity to have recognized so many of our members with not only NCL Service Awards, but also Presidential Volunteer Service Awards. Since our inception in 2009, our Chapter has received more than 1,000 awards! And 350 of those are Presidential Volunteer Service Awards. 

The PVSA program began in 2003 as a way for volunteers across the country to be recognized for their role in America’s strength and national identity. We are so proud that so many of our girls have been honored for their contributions at such a high level.

The Manhattan-Hermosa Chapter is also pleased to have presented over 450 Mother-Daughter pairs with awards for completing at least 30 philanthropy hours together. We’ve also handed out more than 30 Awards to Ticktockers that have completed 100 philanthropy hours or more in a given year. 

 

                                         

Each year, the Merci Award is given to the Ticktocker who completes the most philanthropic service hours during the year. At our Fall Joint Mother-Daughter meeting, we were very happy to present the honor to Brynnan Schmirler from the Class of 2026. Brynnan was able to volunteer a whopping 138 hours during the 2022-2023 calendar year!

The 1736 House Crisis Center and Shared Bread are among Brynnan’s favorite philanthropies. Planning a meal, shopping, and cooking with other moms and daughters has been a great way to get to know other members of the chapter while providing a meal to our friends in need at 1736 House. Similarly, Shared Bread allows Brynnan to instantly impact our local community in need by providing restaurant-style meal service.

Brynnan’s favorite part about volunteering is the feeling she gets while helping people. She states: “Helping out someone in need is such a great feeling. I feel lucky that I can make an impact for the better on someone’s day. NCL has given me so many opportunities to be useful in our community.”

For Brynnan and her mom, Julie, volunteering as a mother-daughter duo has been the best part of their NCL experience. Every volunteer hour provides them with memories to cherish during these busy school years. Their favorite philanthropic activity happens each December when they both look forward to participating in Wreaths Across America at the Los Angeles National Cemetery. It is always a beautiful day and gives them both a powerful feeling of gratefulness while placing holiday wreaths on the graves of our soldiers. They both agree that volunteering with NCL is not just something they have to get done, it’s something they are both lucky to GET to do, together.

                                                   

  

Ticktocker Focus

                                                   

Our Chapter is always looking for ways to incorporate ideas and concepts from our Ticktockers. And because of that, a new program, GUIDE, was born a few years ago as the brainchild of Class of 2023 Ticktocker, Ellie Meyer. Standing for: Generosity, Unity, Inclusion, Diversity & Equality, Ellie calls GUIDE a “much needed and overdue program”. Ellie was initially approached by her Grade Level Advisors about working on a Kindness Initiative, but she wanted something more inclusive that would teach her fellow Ticktockers about the importance of truly embracing others.

Ellie created the original set lesson plans for the 2021-2022 NCL year. Each month a new topic was presented and discussed at both Ticktocker meetings as well as Patroness meetings. The first lesson in September focused on National Hispanic Heritage Month. Other topics that were addressed included mental health, LGBTQ+ History Month, women empowerment, Black History Month, self-identity, and bystander intervention training. Ellie feels strongly that all of these issues are important, but “particularly with a group of developing girls”.

There is now a Ticktocker representative in each class and together the GUIDE team creates a new spin on each subject every year. Allowing the program to evolve ensures that the content’s messages stay fresh. Ellie says she’d love for other NCL Chapters to notice her program and implement something similar. We hope so too! We’re so proud of you, Ellie, and so impressed by your dedication to such a worthy endeavor. 

 

Thriving Sustainer Program

After six or more years of building relationships with fellow mothers of an NCL Chapter, many Patronesses feel a sense of loss upon the graduation of their Ticktocker(s). Engaging in philanthropy with others brings a sense of pride and community that is unmatched, inspiring many Patronesses to want to continue their efforts.

The NCL Forever Sustainer program is inspired by this need. Sustainers are members who have completed the core program and wish to remain active in their community and with the NCL family. Among the many benefits are networking with fellow NCL members, both at a local and national level, as well as leading and mentoring others to ensure the NCL experience is available to future generations.

The Manhattan-Hermosa Chapter has a thriving group of 100+ active Sustainers and GOSH (Got One Still Here) Patronesses who participate in monthly activities together that vary from focusing on community, leadership, and philanthropy. Whether it’s a wine-tasting social, packing care packages for Sustainer Ticktockers away at college, or participating with both national and our chapter’s philanthropies, our Sustainers stay active and connected!