More than 20 years ago, the Twenty Pearls Foundation, Incorporated, was created to provide scholarships and to give support to the Oakland community. The activities of this non-profit foundation are funded through fundraising and donations.

Over the years, we have granted more than $200,000 to qualifying graduating seniors.  These selected students have shown high academic achievement and have been accepted into some of the country’s best colleges and universities.  Their potential for service to the community is considered in the selections.  Several recipients have planned to attend the HBCUs.  We have some scholarships, called “named scholarships,” which are separately funded by individuals, often in honor of family members and have specific criteria, as determined by the donors.  Most, of the scholarships, however, are funded by the Foundation.  Selected students must, also, show the need for the scholarship to continue their education.
Our fundraising efforts have taken many forms, holding golf tournaments, hosting professional authors, selling tee-shirts, and holding formal dinner dances.  Our current fundraiser is a dinner-dance with silent and live auction, called “Glitz and Glamour.”   We invite you to join us.

For our community service, we have addressed the needs of the community.  Each year, we have held a Community Health Expo where we join with other service providers in the Oakland community.  Some of the partners over the years include the West Oakland Health Center, the Ethnic Health Institute, the Alameda County Health Department, the Oakland Fire Department, the Black Nurses Association. State Farm Insurance Company, Lifelong Medical, American Cancer Society, American Heart Association, Kidney Fund, American Diabetes Association, Breath Mobile Asthma Clinic, Oakland Unified School District, and multiple community-based organizations.

We have been joined at the Health Expo by other members of the Divine Nine, the Kappa Alpha Psi and Alpha Phi Alpha fraternities, and sometimes, Delta Sigma Theta Sorority.Of all fundraisers and donations, the Twenty Pearls Foundation, Inc., uses less than five (5) per cent of those funds for administrative costs.  In other words, for every dollar raised, 95 cents funds scholarships and service to the community.

We invite you to join us in this worthy effort.

Erma Cobb, Ed.
President