On June 23, 2012 more than 500 Mountain View-based Synopsys employees, their families and friends, and community volunteers transformed the physical environment at Lee Mathson Middle School during a volunteer event celebrating the company’s 25th anniversary. The school serves a low-income community in San Jose, California.
 | Group photo prior to starting work |
Throughout the day, employees ranging from individual contributors to senior managers — including all local executive staff — rolled up their sleeves and dug into projects including mural-painting, bench-building, planting a new garden, replacing basketball backboards, laying a new floor in the gym and much more!
 | Robert Smith (L) and Joe Logan (R) replace the rim on a basketball backboard |
In all, the group donated more than 3,000 hours to improve the environment for the school’s 650 students. “I can’t wait to see their expressions when they come back in the fall to a sparkling and beautiful place to learn,” said Jacqueline Montejano, principal, Lee Mathson Middle School.
 | Front of the school before |
 | Front of the school after |
See the photo essay in the San Jose Mercury News and additional photos on the Synopsys Community Affairs Flickr stream.
The event was launched with a brief formal program, during which California Congresswoman Zoe Lofgren, San Jose Mayor Chuck Reed and Principal Montejano spoke. During the ceremony, Synopsys President and Co-CEO Chi-Foon Chan described the impetus for the company’s 25th anniversary volunteer event saying community involvement is a very important value of Synopsys’. “It’s the right thing and the smart thing to do,” Chan said.
In Partnership with City Year
To help organize the event, Synopsys partnered with the Care Force division of City Year, a nonprofit service organization. Working with City Year made sense because for the last three years City Year San Jose/Silicon Valley has provided young adult volunteers for “near-peer” support to the children of Lee Mathson, helping improve student attendance, behavior and academic performance.
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