Sweet Readers came to life with our first pilot at the American Folk Art Museum in Manhattan in April, 2011. In less than two years we’ve grown from:
• Eight founding Sweet Readers to over 300;
• Impacting 16 adults at one adult day care program to over 150 adults with AD in five cities!
• One private girls school to now reaching over 40 public and private schools;
• Partnering with one museum to half a dozen great museum program directors from renowned institutions including The Metropolitan Museum of Art, MoMA, The Jewish Museum and The Kreeger Museum in Washington, D.C.
Our community of dedicated people is expanding across the country and around the world with plans for several new locations in 2013.
Sweet Readers Board of Directors
Karen Young. Ms. Young was the Founder and President of an educational board game company, TLI Games, which she ran and developed for twenty years before starting Sweet Readers, Inc.
At TLI Games, Ms. Young was responsible for product development; manufacturing; strategic planning; marketing & promotions; worldwide distribution; managing writers & game developers; special events and benefits; and engaging and interfacing with over 49 corporate sponsors. TLI’s award winning games, sold worldwide at outlets including: Amazon.com, Toys R Us, Barnes & Noble Booksellers, The Metropolitan Museum of Art and QVC, have garnered numerous industry awards and significant media recognition. The New York Times called Ms. Young a “Gamemaker with Unsinkable Spirit”.
Prior to her work with TLI Games, Ms. Young was a Vice President and commercial real estate broker in Manhattan at Cross & Brown Company and Peter R. Friedman, Ltd. where she was responsible for managing and leasing major office buildings including 200 Park Avenue (The Metropolitan Life Building), 551 Fifth Avenue (The Fred F. French Building) and 110 East 42nd Street (The Bowery Savings Bank Building). As part of her job, Ms. Young interfaced with a variety of businesses, legal teams, architects and designers; negotiated lease transactions; trained and managed a team of brokers who worked under her guidance and devised & executed marketing and promotional programs.
Ms. Young has over 35 years of service experience including being Service Vice President while at Horace Greeley High School in Chappaqua, New York; her work with disabled children at the renowned Blythedale Children’s Hospital in Valhalla, NY, placing her on their permanent honor role; serving as co-chair of the alumni fund phonathon and being its top fundraiser for Lafayette College; serving in the Department of Commerce’s Office of Business Liaison in Washington, D.C..; The White House Office of Public Liaison during the Reagan Administration; being Co-chair of the Toy Manufacturers of America’s Toy Bank and responsible for bringing in millions of dollars in toy donations for charity from her peers; and being co-chair of community service for the Parents Association at The Spence School in Manhattan.
Ms. Young is a frequent speaker on business and entrepreneurial subjects and has been featured at NYU’s Stern School of Business; International Business Machines (IBM)’s Marketing Conference; American Express’s Panel on Women in Business; Lafayette College where she guest taught classes on marketing and entrepreneurial studies and was a featured panelist; at the New School in New York, etc. Ms. Young has been featured on CNBC, CNN, Good Morning America, New York 1 News, in The New York Times, The Associated Press, The Chicago Tribune, New York Magazine and The New Yorker. Ms. Young was also a guest host on QVC.
Ms. Young is the mother of a middle school child and the daughter of a mother with early stage Alzheimer’s Disease. That coupled with her work with TLI Games, has given Ms. Young vast experience working with kids and young adults, schools, museums and program directors at senior living facilities. Most important, her experiences have given Ms. Young a deep commitment to fostering compassion in our youth and advocating to protect and support our elders.
Grant Hering. Mr. Hering is Senior Counsel for Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft, LLP, resident in its New York Office. From 1969 to 1998, he was a partner in the firm’s Litigation Department, handling securities, breach of contract, breach of fiduciary duty, partnership, and ship construction cases in courts and before arbitration panels. He currently concentrates in the areas of legal ethics and professional responsibility, partnership law, lawyer liability and professional liability insurance matters, as well as dispute resolution in mediations and arbitrations He also chairs Cadwalader’s professional responsibility and risk management committees.
Mr. Hering previously taught tax law at New York Law School, and currently lectures on legal ethics and law firm risk management at professional meetings and continuing legal education seminars. In November 2000, the New York Supreme Court, Appellate Division, First Judicial Department, appointed Mr. Hering a Special Master in the Court’s Pre-Argument Program.
From 1965-1969, Mr. Hering was an Assistant U.S. Attorney in the Southern District of New York under the then U.S. Attorney Robert M. Morgenthau, where he headed up the Tax Unit from 1968-1969. For five years, he served as a Town Councilman for the Town of Pelham, Westchester County, N.Y.
A graduate of Harvard College, Mr. Hering earned his LL.B. at the University of Virginia School of Law. He was a member of the Editorial Board of the Virginia Law Review and winner of the Law School Moot Court Competition. Mr. Hering received his LL.M. in Taxation from New York University School of Law.
Eileen Neiman. Eileen Neiman is currently President-Elect of the Rye Arts Center, the largest multi-arts center in Westchester County located in Rye, New York. She also serves on the Community Learning Council of the Community Synagogue of Rye.
For 6 years, ending in 2010, Ms. Neiman served as the Milton School chair of the Famous Artists program. Organized through the Rye Arts Center, the FA program provides parent docent training for classroom teaching, at various elementary schools in Westchester County.
Ms. Neiman is a former president of the 40th Twig of Westchester County, a not-for-profit that raises funds for the benefit of the Rye, Rye Brook and Port Chester Emergency Medical Service. She was also a former board member of the Rye, Rye Brook and Port Chester League of Women Voters
Ms. Neiman is a sustaining member of the Junior League of Westchester on the Sound, and she was formerly an active member of the New York Junior League and the Junior League of Washington, DC. While in Washington, Ms. Neiman also served as a docent at the Corcoran Gallery of Art.
Ms. Neiman has a Master of Science in Public Policy Analysis from the University of Rochester, New York.
Ms. Neiman is also currently enrolled in the Arts Management Certification Program at the State University of New York at Purchase. In conjunction with this program, she served as a 2010 summer volunteer at the New York State Council on the Arts.
Ms. Neiman is also the mother of two middle school children.
Dorothy S. Fried. Mrs. Fried is a retired guidance counselor with her masters, bachelors and doctorate degrees in education from Hunter College; New York University and Columbia University’s Teacher’s College. She raised five children (including three eagle scouts!) and served as a boy scout den mother while changing children’s lives as a devoted and dedicated guidance counselor, determined to give disadvantaged kids a chance to go to college and get a great education.
Mrs. Fried served at DeWitt Clinton High School in The Bronx, New York for nearly 40 years before retiring and is now living with early stage Alzheimer’s Disease. She enjoys pilates, tai chi, strong bones and live strong classes!
As an educator, parent, grandparent and now person living with AD, Mrs. Fried brings an invaluable perspective to Sweet Readers, Inc.
