Annual Meeting and Election
Persian Cultural Center of San Diego
May 21, 2023
35 Years of Service

Report of Persian Cultural Center’s 2023 Annual General Meeting and Election

PCC’s annual meeting took place on May 21, 2023, online. The annual report was presented and was followed by the election process for new Board of Director members. The past year’s activities were presented by Mrs. Shahla Salah-PCC’s chair, and the ISSD and Peyk reports by Mr. Ali Sadr Principal of the Iranian School of San Diego and editor–in chief of Peyk, and the Financial Report by Ms. Farideh Fazel – PCC’s Secretary. A summary of PCC’s annual report is as follows:

The Board of Directors and Committee Members for the past year were as follows:

Shahla Salah (President), Mahmoud Reza Pirouzian (Vice-President), Hamid Rafizadeh (Treasurer) Farideh Fazel (Secretary). Farshad Babakhani, Fariba Babakhani-Ghazi, Parnian Badii(Alternate) Hamid Beikzadeh (Alternate), Soheil Bigdeli, Ali Pirouzian, Ali Sadr (ISSD Principal), Baharak Shademan and Sara Taghavi.

Executive Board:

Shahla Salah – President

Mahmoud Reza Pirouzian – Vice President

Hamid Rafizadeh – Treasurer

Farideh Fazel- Secretary

Ali Sadr- ISSD Principal

Advisory Board: Shahri Estakhry, Saeed Jalali, Rosita Bagheri, Shaghayegh Hanson.

The Board had twelve meetings in the past year. Sub-committees held meetings as needed. At their first meeting, the Board elected its Executive Committee and established the following committees:

Arts and Culture: Soheil Bigdeli & Sara Taghavi (Head) Hossain Hajimowlana, Ali Sadr, Fariba Babakhani-Ghazi, Farshad Babakhani, Baharak Shademan,  Anahita Babaei, Mojgan Poursadighi, Abdy Salimi, Ali Pirouzian, Mahmood Reza Pirouzian, and Mehdi Tayaranian Nourani.

Membership: Soheil Bigdeli (Head), Fariba Babakhani-Ghazi, Farideh Fazel, Sara Taghavi, and Shahrzad Julazadeh.

Public Relations: Mahmoud Reza Pirouzian (Head), Ali Sadr, Soheil Bigdeli, Hossain Hajimowlana, Ali Pirouzian, Sara Taghavi, Anahita Kalantar, and Shahrzad Julazadeh

Grant and Finance: Fariba Babakhani- Ghazi (Head), Shahla Salah, Hamid Rafizadeh, Shahrzad Julazadeh  and Cheryl Encine

Fundraising and Nowruz: Shahla Salah (Head), Nikoo Atefi, Fariba Babakhani-Ghazi, Farshad Babakhani, Farideh Fazel, Baharak Shademan, Venus Safaei, Parnian Badii, Hamid Rafizadeh, Bahar Bagherpour, Mohammad Ayari, and Hamid Beikzadeh.

PCC Charity: Parnian Badii (Head), Fariba Babakhani-Ghazi, Shahla Salah, Venus Safaei, Nikoo Atefi and Shahrzad Julazadeh

Education (ISSD): Ali Sadr (Head), Fariba Babakhani-Ghazi, Parisa Amini, and Shahnaz Ahmadian

Chaharshanbeh Soori & Sizdahbedar: Hamid Rafizadeh (Head), Hamid Beikzadeh.

IAC: Hamid Rafizadeh (Head), Ali Sadr, Fariba Babakhani-Ghazi, Hamid Beikzadeh, Shahla Salah and Shahrzad Julazadeh

PCC Youth: Fariba Babakhani-Ghazi (Head) Farideh Fazel

Peyk: Ali Sadr (Head), Shahri Estakhry, Shahrzad Julazadeh, Shaghayegh Hanson, Reza Khabazian, Ali Sahebolzamani and Rachel Tait

Governance: Ali Sadr (Head), Shaghayegh Hansen, Shahla Salah, Farideh Fazel, Fariba Babakhani-Ghazi, Shahrzad Julazadeh

Summary of Persian Cultural Center Events and Activities

During 2022-2023, PCC was active in organizing traditional celebrations and programs for the Iranian American community. PCC also collaborated with other organizations to reach out to the community at large. These events were in-person or virtual or both.

PCC sponsored or co-sponsored the following programs:

1-Improvisation in Rast-Panjgah in collaboration with UCSD

2- ISSD End of the year celebration

3- Passport to Pesian Calligraphy Performance Art in collaboration with Encinitas Friends of the Arts

4- Book Fair by the PCC Youth Committee

5-Virtual Writing Workshops with Hossein Mortezaeian Abknar

6- Electric Ud  Trio concert with Farhad Bahrami

7- Trio Concert with Pejman Hadadi, Kourosh Taghavi, and Amir Jojan

8- Max Amini Live in San Diego in collaboration with The Laugh Factory

9-  Commermorating Hushang Ebtehaj in collaboration with AIAP

10- Mehregan Celebration in collaboration with SDMA, Afra Music Ensemble “Voices of Mothrland” at SDMA

11- The Art of Improvisation in collaboration with UCSD Division of Arts

12- Food and Toy Drive by the PCC youth committee for the San Diego Food Bank

13- Collaboration with Pacific Art Movement San Diego Asian Film Festival

14- A Journey in the Folk and Traditional Music of Iran in collaboration with UCSD Division of Arts

15- Turkey trot 5K Walks by the PCC Youth Committee

16- Family and Friends Movie Night by the PCC Youth Committee

17- Voices From Iran  in collaboration with a world premiere by the Moaaser Foundation and Students of UCSD

18- Yalda Celebration at IAC

19- Voices Unveiled Concert at IAC

20- Family Night by the PCC Youth Committee

21- Nowruz Preparation at the Iranian School of San Diego

22- Presentation of Haft-Seen along with literary, cultural, and historical exhibits in seven San Diego Public Libraries.

23- ISSD Nowruz Celebration at Del Norte High School

24- PCC Nowruz Celebration at IAC

25- Nowruz Celebration in collaboration with Poway Public Library

26- Nowruz Celebration in collaboration with Escondido Public Library

27- Clara Breed Civil Liberties lecture featuring Shereen Marisol Meraji in collaboration with Central City Library

28- Sizdahbedar with AIAP and HOI at NTC Park

29- Iranian Singing workshop with Maliheh Moradi

30- Collaboration with Pacific Art Movement Spring Showcase Asian Film Festival

31- Collaboration with Bay Clean up on Earth Day, by the PCC Youth Committee

32- Sitar & Tabla Concert at IAC

33- Concert of Siamak Shajarian with UCSD music students UCSD

34- Nine Virtual Nights of Poetry and Literature (on the third Wednesday of the month)

35- Eight Virtual and In-person Film and Discussion series (on every last Thursday of the month)

ISSD: The academic year 2022-23 was ISSD’s 35th year of operation. This year ISSD had 229 students attending the in-person and virtual classes. The in-person classes were on Sunday morning. The school’s Nowruz program was held on March 12, 2023, at Del Norte High School. The End of the Year event and graduation for the Class of 2023 will take place on May 28, 2023.

ISSD had a total of 24 classes online and in-person, which were separated into six levels, two classes for Kindergarten, one Pre-Kindergarten. and two Persian classes for adults. Extracurricular classes such as Dance, Drawing, and music were offered as well. In the virtual classes, we had students from other parts of the country too.

ISSD is planning to continue and expand the online classes and provide our unique means and methods to more students around the country and other parts of the world. ISSD’s Persian language program is accredited by all local School Districts as well as WASC which means that high school students can fulfill their second language requirements by taking Persian language courses at ISSD. Our six Persian language textbooks for teaching Persian as a heritage language are being used in several other Persian schools around the country. In addition, audio versions of the textbooks are also available. ISSD has a website (issd.pccsd.org) and is also active on Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube.

Persian Dance Academy: With 53 students the Persian Cultural Dance Academy met on Sundays at ISSD. The dance students performed in the PCC Nowruz event, ISSD Nowruz program, Escondido Public Library Nowruz Program, Poway Public Library Nowruz Program, and ISSD End of the Year program.

Iranian-American Center (IAC):  The Iranian American Center (IAC) typically hosts a variety of cultural activities for the Iranian community (such as IASF and DMF, SDSU, and UCSD). The Center has a library with more than five thousand books.

Peyk Magazine: For the past 32 years, Peyk has been one of our most successful outreach instruments. Peyk is PCC’s bi-monthly, bilingual cultural publication. Every two months Peyk gets mailed to thousands of subscribers in San Diego and other parts of the country. Typically, hundreds are also get distributed through the business and cultural centers in San Diego, Orange, Los Angeles Counties, the Bay Area, Chicago, Washington DC, Maryland, Dallas, Atlanta, and many other cities.  Peyk is also available online at peykmagazine.com. This site is interactive, and the readers can directly communicate and leave comments for the editorial board. The past issues of Peyk are still available at the Peyk archive, pccsd.org/peyk.

Grant & Outreach Programs: PCC enjoys continued joint programs with local organizations such as City Libraries, San Diego Museum of Art, UCSD, Dollar a Month Fund, Iranian American Scholarship Fund, Iranian American Bar Association, Pacific Art Movement, Sheed Film, Dornab, Persian Cultural Center of Atlanta, Professional Organization of Iranian Americans, Racism Awareness Project, AIAP & House of Iran.

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 San Diego 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 Farsi, as necessary.

Membership: The Persian Cultural Center continued advertising and inviting members of the community to join. PCC provided new online membership software by (Join-it) and provided newly issued electronic membership cards to its members.  Members get a special discount for our events. PCC also managed to continue getting discounts from various Iranian businesses for its members.

Public Relation: Thousands of people all over the world view the Persian Cultural Center’s Website, www.pccsd.org, Facebook and Instagram Page, Telegram, and YouTube Channel. PCC issues a weekly electronic newsletter that reaches thousands of community members. The PCC website provides quick access to Peyk, our bi-monthly, bi-lingual magazine, our ongoing programs, and activities, as well as other cultural information and events.  People can refer to our website to read about PCC’s many activities and renew their membership and make tax-deductible contributions online.

In the past year, several PCC events were featured on KPBS radio in San Diego, KIRN Radio Iran in Los Angeles, and the San Diego Arts and Sol website. These programs not only reached out to the Iranian American community but also to other communities who attended our featured programs.

The PCC Foundation-a charitable organization: The foundation continues to raise funds for the following projects:

  • PCC raised money to help refugee families.
  • PCC in collaboration with AIAP and DMF help an Iranian couple and their 8-year-old son. They had entered the US as refugees.
  • PCC continues to support two young students who lost their parents and need help. This is a long-term project.

Youth: This committee has been instrumental in supporting the PCC’s and ISSD’s events. Some of the members are actively working as Teacher Assistants at ISSD. They have organized two food and toy drives on behalf of the San Diego Food Bank. They provided free of charge tuttering for other students, particularly refugees. They have provided an Informational Seminar about college applications. They have also organized a hiking trip and participated twice in Creek to Bay Clean up.

Special Thank You: We would like to take this opportunity to thank the following board members who are leaving us. 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.

The following members have served their terms and are leaving the board: Parnian Badii, Farshad Babakhani, Hamid Beikzadeh, Farideh Fazel, Hamid Rafizadeh, Mahmoud Reza Pirouzian, and Shahla Salah. Except for Farshad Babakhni, Farideh Fazel, and Shahla Salah who have served their two consecutive terms and are subject to “term limit” 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 to serve the community better.

Election

After the board of directors’ report, candidates to fill the vacancies on the Board introduced themselves and presented their plans for joining the BOD. The ballot was secret. Ms. Shahri Estakhry, Mr. Mohammad Ayari, Mr. Sina Emami, and Mr. Mehdi Moein observed the election. After counting the ballots, including the absentees and electronic votes, the results were announced.

Election Results:

The following were elected as voting members of the board of directors:

  • Mercedeh Hashemi
  • Hamid Rafizadeh
  • Mahmoud Reza Pirouzian
  • Tayebeh Bahmani
  • Parnian Badii

The following were elected as alternate members of the board of directors:

  • Sara Alavi
  • Marshia (Sadeghi) Hashemi

These new members will serve along with the current board members: Fariba, Babakhani- Ghazi, Soheil Bigdeli, Ali Pirouzian, Ali Sadr, Baharak Shademan, and Sara Taghavi. The general assembly was adjourned at 1 PM.

The first meeting of the board of directors was held on June 14, 2023. Subsequently, the Board elected the Executive Board. The Executive Committee of PCC serves for one year:

  • President: Mahmoud Reza Pirouzian
  • Vice president: Baharak Shademan
  • Treasurer: Fariba Babakhani-Ghazi
  • Secretary: Soheil Bigdeli