JLSD’s Charter Day luncheon brings together Junior League members of all generations — and their friends — to celebrate JLSD’s rich history serving the San Diego community, hear from JLSD leadership, and enjoy a guest speaker on a related topic.  

Unlike many JLSD events, Charter Day is celebratory event — not a fundraiser. The luncheon is designed simply to celebrate JLSD’s work across generations. 

Guest Speaker: Cassie Holmes

Cassie Holmes is a professor at UCLA’s Anderson School of Management, an award-winning teacher and researcher on time and happiness, and author of Happier Hour: How to Beat Distraction, Expand Your Time, and Focus on What Matters Most. This debut book was selected as an Amazon Best Book of 2022, a Forbes and Financial Times Must-Read, and featured in the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, on the Today Show, CBS Mornings, CNN, NPR’s Hidden Brain, GOOP with Gwyneth Paltrow, and numerous other podcasts.

Holmes’s academic research has been widely published in lead academic journals. The course that she developed and now teaches, Applying the Science of Happiness to Life Design, is among UCLA’s most popular for MBAs and Executive MBAs alike.

Prior to joining UCLA, Cassie was a tenured faculty member at Wharton, and she has a Ph.D. from Stanford University’s Graduate School of Business and a B.A. from Columbia.

Presentation Title: Happier Hour: Investing Time for Greater Fulfillment

Presentation Description:

Our most precious resource isn’t money—it’s time. We’re allotted just twenty-four hours a day, and we live in a culture that keeps us feeling rushed and like we never have enough. Since we can’t add more hours to the day, how can we optimally spend the time we do have and feel confident in our decisions and more fulfilled in our lives?

Based on her wildly popular MBA class at UCLA, Professor Cassie Holmes will share how to immediately improve your life by changing how you perceive and invest your time. She provides empirically based insights that will help you experience moments of joy, use your time more optimally by designing your schedule with purpose—all so that you can look back on your days with satisfaction and your life without regret.

Through her groundbreaking research, Cassie will teach you how small changes can have an enormous impact, helping you feel less overwhelmed, more present, and happier—things that money can’t buy. It all starts by transforming just one hour into a happier hour.

Buy the book here: Happier Hour: How to Beat Distraction, Expand Your Time, and Focus on What Matters Most

The History of JLSD’s Charter

In early 1927, Lillian Bradley, in her capacity as Chairman of San Diego’s 18th Annual Charity Ball, visited with the director of the highly-touted Junior League Ball of Pasadena. While there, she also met with the President of the Pasadena Junior League and learned more about the goals of this extraordinary organization. She came away from her visit determined to establish a Junior League in San Diego.

Later that year, Mrs. Bradley and her friend Emily Clayton founded the Junior Committee for San Diego Charities with the express purpose of securing admission into the Association of Junior Leagues of America (AJLA). Their first goal was to establish a Day Nursery to care for the children of working parents. In 1929, with sponsorship from the Junior Leagues in Santa Barbara and San Francisco, AJLA accepted the entry application from the Junior Committee. The Junior League of San Diego became the fifth League in the state of California, and the 105th member to join the Association of Junior Leagues.

Since then, the Junior League of San Diego has been integral in assessing community needs and instituting programs to meet those needs. The Polinsky Center, Voices for Children, LEAD San Diego, and Kids on the Block are just a few of the organizations and events that were created by JLSD single-handedly or through a collaborative community effort.   Over the years, JLSD has partnered with dozens of San Diego non-profits to provide strategic volunteer support as well as financial assistance and Community Assistance Grants. From its inception, JLSD has addressed critical issues such as Domestic Violence Prevention & Intervention, Literacy, and Family Support for Education, reduction of childhood obesity in San Diego and now focuses its efforts on Transition Age Foster Youth.

Please join us in celebrating JLSD’s 94th annual Charter Day at this special event!