Matthew Lafkas
Executive Team - Communications Director
communications@givebackcincinnati.org
Background:
I am a fan of Cincinnati, not the sports as much the people and the city itself. I grew up on the Eastside and went to St. Xavier HS (It is Cincinnati...my high school is important when giving my background...). After which I attended Washington & Lee University studying Accounting and Biology. I returned to Cinci due to my growing family (currently 6 nephews and 1 niece) who all live here still, some on the street I grew up on. I joined an accounting firm and spent four years working for them until I determined that life would be more fun if I was not traveling 60% of my year. I started my own business in 2009 and I have been steadily increasing my involvement with GBC since 2007.
What GBC means to me:
Give Back started out as an outlet for me to simply do something other than go to bars each weekend and little to nothing else. I simply joined like many others because I missed doing volunteer work since college. (In college I was a volunteer EMT for 4 years for the town/county lifesaving crew) After a few events with GBC, I began building new friendships that brought me back to the next event. I eventually met my wonderful girlfriend while at a GBC event as well as building many other great friendships along the way. GBC has given me much, hence my willingness to stay up late working on newsletters or hauling paint all over town for an event. To me, GBC is all about community and finding others who are excited about getting up early on cold winter mornings to work on schools or old theaters. We do amazing work with each passing event, but we also get much in return.
What I do for GBC:
I am the Communications Director for which there is an ever evolving role. I will be in charge of updating the website, getting the newsletters out to you each week, and the relationships with the press. With that being said, feel free to email me about dead links or poor grammar/spelling if you wish.(n.b. - see above section that I studied accounting and biology, both of which encourage brevity and incomplete sentences while communicating) I will do my best to get you timely and valuable content. We are going to continue to make improvements to the site and newsletters over the next few months, hence I will appreciate feedback. My goal is to make sure that you feel connected to GBC, therefore we will continue to be as innovative as the technology allows(we are on facebook and twitter as well).
Fun Facts:
I am rarely a man of few words, but I truly appreciate the "Life is Good" slogan of "do what you like, like what you do" - GBC fits very well into my life given that concept.
