Sharing Talent, Technology, Time

On sunny, cold, windy Saturday in March of this year, my kids and I were comfortably settled in our cozy living room. I was on the couch, with my laptop, wirelessly connected to the Internet. My kids were also on the web -- using the family computer in the corner of the room to play in Webkinz World. 

I was catching up on personal email. My friend Maria had sent me a pointer to a video on YouTube, and told me I should check it out.

It was Randy Pausch's Last Lecture.

I saw it on YouTube. (so did more than 7 million other people.) But he was also on Oprah with this; he wrote a book; the whole nine yards.

Randy Pausch touched millions of lives with his lecture on how to achieve your childhood dreams, which was really about how to live your life.

Back to me on my couch on that cold late-winter day... I'm watching Randy Pausch... my kids are playing on the family computer in the corner... they looked over at me.... I'm all teary.... They swarmed over, echoing refrains of "What's wrong, What's wrong?"

Happy tears.

I had just decided -- right then and there. I decided I was going to do something.

In the YouTube version Randy talks about an open source computing platform for teaching children the language of computers called Alice. It's a 3D virtual world, where children learn the fundamentals of object oriented programming -- of Java -- in activity that feels more like play than learning.

Prior to that cold, sunny day, I had never heard of Alice. But after watching the lecture, I saw this enormous opportunity here -- at so many levels. And I figured if I hustle, hustled, maybe I could get something going around it.

To make a very long story short, I'm about to get started.

Starting next month, I will be teaching a group of girls at my local high school the language of computers using the Alice, as my volunteer activity. It will be an after-school club that will meet every other week. We're going to learn Java.

And it's going to be rockin' fun.

(Appropriately) My local high school rocks.

There are dozens of languages spoken there. The vast majority of students come from from working class families whose parent(s) have little or no formal education. 52% of the students get free or reduced lunch, an indicator of income level.

The kids that go to this school don't have their paths in life paved for them, but it is by no means a bleak situation. Excellence defines the teachers and administrators, and is fostered and nurtured in the student body. It's ranked in the top 500 of Newsweek's list of 1,300 Best Public High Schools. 

I graduated from this school more than 20 years ago.

So, as you can imagine, I was so pleased when I got word that we were a go... when I got word that everything came together and I'd be able to do this. 

Today I worked out the details of my new volunteer project on 12seconds.tv

So for the past few weeks, I've been getting ready...

As one of the activities Sun had going in support of Software Freedom Day.... 

... I took over a bunch of stuff so that we could get started, and begin the process of getting the computers in the lab we'll use ready.  

So here we are.

Six months ago I watched a video on YouTube. I hustle, hustled. A whole bunch of other people also hustle, hustled. Tons of really great stuff happened, which we'll talk about as we move along, I'm sure. And now I'm embarking on what I hope will be a multi-year journey with a group of girls.

And in this blog, I will chronicle it.   

My computer club classes will start in late October.

I'm now in the process of pulling together my lesson plans for my volunteer project.

Lucky for me, there are many others who've walked this road before me.

My colleague and fellow Sun employee Daniel Green is my hero on his work. He inspires me. Marla Parker is my co-conspiritor. We're trying to follow in Dan's footsteps -- me with Alice; Marla with Greenfoot.

My personal goals on this one are very ambitious. I intend to change the trajectory of the lives of a group of girls, by exposing them to the language of computers and helping them see the opportunity that exists for them in this space; in the industry that's created so many opportunities for me.

That's what this one is all about, you guys.

I'm hanging my hat on the CHANGE (Y)OUR WORLD movement at Sun. It really seems to fit there and support what that's all about.

But this stuff... it's a great source of energy that charges my batteries.

I've got this "secret IM society" going on w/Dan and Marla. We're always online with each other. Talking, collaborating, sharing. 

Sometimes, when we get something good going... like yesterday when we figured out how to get a Sun executive talking to some key educators about some issues that really need to have attention... and then when I think about how ambitious the goal I'm taking on with this group of girls who don't have a lot of people helping to pave their way in life... how the odds are against them... and against my efforts to try to help them... all the odds are against us... when I think of all of that, I'm reminded of the words of Margaret Mead.

She said: "Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed it is the only thing that ever has."

I've taken my first step in this journey of a thousand miles, people.

Seatbelts, everyone!

:-) 

Mary

Sunday was the Meetup/Mashup event I promoted on this blog about two weeks ago. As you can guess by the title of this entry, it was fantastic. We had 37 participants with strong representation from both the developer and the non-profit communities.

After some networking over lunch, Director of Global Citizenship, Larry Nelson, kicked off the event by welcoming everybody on behalf of Sun. Then Billy Bicket, of our nonprofit partner NetSquared, introduced the planned agenda. This was the second time NetSquared has facilitated an in-person event of this type and Sun's first. Because it's still so new, Billy suggested a format but gave the group option to participate in the design and format of the event. And, with that, in real time, participants both designed and participated in a powerful Meetup/Mashup.

After a round of introductions, developers "speed geeked" (similar to "speed dating") with nonprofit representatives stationed at different tables. These four minute speed geek sessions gave developers an opportunity to identify which projects were most compatible with their skills and interests while providing the nonprofits with an opportunity to hear a variety of perspectives on how to solve their web-based needs. After speed geeking, participants self-organized themselves into groups based on their skills, needs and interests. 

Throughout the event, I noticed CommunityOne developers asking an important and meaningful question; "What can I do to help you?". This question sparked new interactions that resulted in tangible outcomes. Following are snapshots of a few:

• Kevin Braithwaite, Director of a Lebanon based nonprofit called Root Space was able to get help mashing a database of NGO's based in Beirut with Google Maps.
  
• Brian Hamlin and Howard Pearlmutter were able to help one participant, Matt, identify software to help him create a web-app to map the direct impact of rising sea-levels on the Earth's coastal regions.
• Pedro Reyes of the Bay Area organization Streetside Stories was able to get ideas about how to integrate the organization's archive of youth generated content into their web-site.
• Brooke Murray and Dave Caldwell outlined a series of nine steps for the National Center for Lesbian Rights to utilize document management and information organization technologies in their work to efficiently provide legal advice to their clients. 
  
• Joshua Wiese was able to learn about different applications to capture names and emails of individual supporters for project he is working on for Virgin Unite called The Elders Campaign.
  

Throughout the entire event there was an electric sense of stewardship and community. Many of the developers expressed a desire to deepen their involvement with nonprofits and the nonprofits seemed excited to have received expert advice.

And here is what success looks like...

 

We even had some tech celebrities like Scott Mattoon (pictured above with the red ? t-shirt) Sun's Chief Architect for Western U.S. Sales & Services and also Architecture for Humanity Board Member.

Brian and Matt talk about geo-spacial mapping for Matt's vision of creating a web-app that shows the impact of rising sea levels.

 

 

Dave Caldwell thinking through document management and information organization with his group of fellow hackers.
 

Thank you! to NetSquared for collaborating with us. to Julian Edwards of Sun for help organizing this event. to all the developers and nonprofit participants who made this event successful.

We at Sun are well known for our blogging habits. Two volunteers recently shared with me WWVW blog entries that do a fantastic job describing their projects. The first is from a blog kept by Sun Partner Account Manager, Johannes Hogg. You can read about his groups volunteer construction project in Hamburg , Germany here.

Another participant in last Saturday's "Clean and Green" project in Bangalore, India blogged about his experience here. The really cool thing about this blog's author, Tarle-Nagendra HK, is that he is an ex-Sun employee who brought his entire family back to engage with Sun employees for this environmentally themed project.

These are just two of many great WWVW projects happening across the globe!

World Wide Volunteer Week started last Saturday, April 26 and we are already getting reports and pictures from the field. Stella Chan shared these fantastic photos of Sun employees working with children in Guangzhou, China. These employees donated time to play with orphaned and disabled children at the Guangzhou Social Welfare House. During the visit, these generous employees also donated food, stationary and toys to this program.

Stay tuned for more stories and pictures from the field....

Help nonprofits harness the power of the web.

We are doing a really cool thing on May 4th in conjunction with CommunityOne.   We are inviting attendees from CommunityOne & JavaOne, plus student developers, to participate in a Meetup/Mashup to support nonprofits.    Working with the San Francisco based nonprofit, NetSquared, Sun Microsystems, Inc. is leveraging a diverse and talented community of technology experts to help organizations with the technology challenges they face.

The event is happening on May 4 from noon – 5pm at the Moscone Center in San Francisco

Meetup/Mashup provides you an opportunity to direct your talent and programming skills to nonprofits focused on making positive social change, to see how others are using to technology to enact positive social change, and an opportunity meet some passionate people working to make the communities where we live and work a better place.

Participating nonprofits will have a variety of technology needs, including:

Refining some of their ideas about how the data they are using could be rendered in mashups; and
Building mashups using a variety of APIs, products, or coming up with creative technical solutions to particular problems they are facing.

Signup to Participate!

If you are a student developer or an attendee of CommunityOne and/or JavaOne and you want to help make a difference by attending this event, please email: meetup.mashup@sun.com with your:

Name:

• Technology expertise:

• Employer/Nonprofit or/School 

• Interests (for developers: Cause that you are passionate about; for non profits: technology challenge(s) you hope to address)

• Developers, please indicate if you are interested in being a discussion leader at the event

Confirmation of participation as well as logistics will be sent out by Tuesday, April 29.

Space is limited: so please sign up today!

This event is organized by NetSquared and Sun Microsystems.

Help us spread the word about this fantastic event by sharing the following link with your nonprofit and developer communities: http://developers.sun.com/events/communityone/meetup_mashup.jsp

Last night I was invited by an organization I am involved with (Bay Area Wilderness Training) to attend the Goldman Environmental Prize Ceremony. I've attended this ceremony 5+ times and leave each ceremony equally awed by the degree of change made by the award recipients. 

As described on their website: "In 1990 San Francisco civic leaders and philanthropists Richard N. Goldman and his late wife, Rhoda H. Goldman (1924-1996) created the Goldman Environmental Prize. The Goldman Prize continues today with its original mission to annually honor grassroots environmental heroes from the six inhabited continental regions: Africa, Asia, Europe, Islands and Island Nations, North America, and South and Central America. The Prize recognizes individuals for sustained and significant efforts to protect and enhance the natural environment, often at great personal risk. Each winner receives an award of $150,000, the largest award in the world for grassroots environmentalists. The Goldman Prize views “grassroots” leaders as those involved in local efforts, where positive change is created through community or citizen participation in the issues that affect them. Through recognizing these individual leaders, the Prize seeks to inspire other ordinary people to take extraordinary actions to protect the natural world."

One reoccurring theme echoed through participant acceptance speeches was the role that changing our personal habits can have on our planet. Although this theme seems cliche, I was inspired by how it was weaved into multiple facets of the ceremony. Award recipient Ignace Schops of Belguim summed up this theme at the end of his speech by adding, what I think is a fantastic iteration to a common environmental phrase, "Think global, act local". Schops encouraged the jam packed San Francisco Opera House to "Think globally, act locally and change personally". To me, "change personally" is a welcome iteration that emphasizes personal responsibility.

To learn more about the amazing work of this years recipients click here.

 

Global Youth Service Day is the largest annual celebration of young volunteers, when millions of young people everywhere highlight and carry out thousands of community improvement projects. GYSD is organized by Youth Service America with the Global Youth Action Network as its key partner and a consortium of international organizations and over 120 national coordinating committees in participating countries.

Through my own experiences working with youth leadership programs, I have gained insight into the tremendous impact that youth led projects can have on local communities and beyond. Some of my most inspiring role models are youth who have shaped legislation, started their own non-profits organizations and organized communities to fight injustice. Stories about some of my youth heroes can be seen at the Brower Youth Awards web-site.

If you too would like to be inspired, feel reassured about the future, and/or humbled by our next generation of leaders; get involved with a GYSD project happening near you. GYSD dates, April 25-27, just so happen to overlap with our Worldwide Volunteer Week. So, if you are a Sun employee who doesn't have project, Search the GYSD map to find out if a project near you is recruiting adult volunteers. Visit here for US-based projects.

Exciting Worldwide Volunteer Week opportunities are plentiful. However, finding specific projects for Sun employee volunteers to donate specific engineering skills can be more difficult. Grassroots.org is among a growing number of organizations that enable coders to apply their skills to non-profits.

Grassroots.org has over 1000 member organizations working on issues ranging from voter registration to AIDS awareness to homelessness prevention. Most of our organizations have little to no web presence. Grassroots mission is to change that! 

A talented and dedicated web designer is critical to give these websites the usability and creative voice that each nonprofit business requires. Incorporating the greatest and most appropriate tools is essential in giving these groups the online platform they need. For instance, the greatest trend in nonprofits today is online fundraising. Making a website for these organizations not only brings them a step into the future but gives them a chance to really change the world.

Sura Hart, Grassroots Outreach Coordinator, recently created a fantastic Volunteer Bulletin Board to share opportunities for volunteers to help non-profits establish a web-presence. 

If you're a Sun employee who's got the skills, get a small group together to make one of these projects your Worldwide Volunteer Week project.

 

 

I recently connected with Chang Huong Tan from Sun's Global Sales Group in Singapore. Chang has been doing an amazing job organizing Sun Singapore's volunteer activities with The Gentle Fund Organization (GFO).

 
GFO was started by a group of young Vietnamese professionals living in Singapore who wanted to help provide shelter, educational opportunities and medical assistance to orphaned and under-served children in Vietnam. Chang and his group of volunteers (who go by the name Singapore Recreation Club) have served as regular volunteers to provide emotional, informational and social support to Vietnamese children and their families who come to Singapore to receive medical treatment.

For the month of April they are planning two major volunteer events. The first will be a GFO patient visit during which the group will spend time providing moral support to children from Vietnam who are being treated for cancer at National University Hospital in Singapore. During WWVW, their group will hold a massive fundraising event during which they aim to raise funds to go to operations of a GFO learning center to be constructed in Hue, Vietnam. Members of their group hope to present the donation to GFO in person during a May site visit.

By calling themselves the Singapore Recreation Club, Chang and his group truly embody the notion that giving back is fun!

One of the many ways that Sun recognizes our responsibility extends beyond corporate headquarters in the Bay Area is by supporting employee volunteer efforts across the globe.

Each year, Sun employees from APAC, EMEA and LATAM all share amazing stories about the ways that they give back. During Worldwide Volunteer Week 2008, we hope to even further increase volunteer activity at Sun locations outside of North America. To help us meet this objective, employee volunteers are invited to share best practices, identify challenges and create solutions during a hour long brainstorming session on March 20th. This opp. is open to any Sun employee who has experience and/or thoughts about volunteering outside of North America. To participate in this Thursday, March 20th, 7:30 am PST call, please RSVP to daniel.zucker@sun.com.

 

Project planning is happening around the globe in preparation for Sun's Worldwide Volunteer Week. One Sun employee is coordinating a clean-up with a group of youth in a Bergisches Land park in North Rhine-Westphalia region of Germany. Another, US employee, is organizing a group to paint the interior of the Nashua Children's Home, a Nashua, New Hampshire based organization committed to the care, welfare and educational achievement of children and youth that are unable to remain with their families. These are just two of the many projects that are happening this year. If you too are a Sun Employee who is inspired to coordinate a project, it's not too late to start planning.

We will be hosting two Team Manager Info. sessions tomorrow, March 18, at 9am and 7pm Pacific Standard Time. If you are a Sun employee who is excited to lead a project in your community join us at:

Dial in: 866.545.5218
International: 865.544.7028
PC 9469177 

Stay tuned for more WWVW updates as we will continue to share exciting project details as they come in from around the globe. 

It is no secret to the Sun volunteer community that Team India Rocks!. Year round, Team India contributes their time, talent and technology to a variety of causes. Their team managers always seem to motivate a tremendous number of employees to volunteer for the many projects that they organize.

You can bet, that more blogs will be shared about Team India's WWVW 2008 projects as they happen. However, today I received an email that shared how some of Team India's external stakeholders show their appreciation for the team's efforts. To show thanks, a child from the Spastics Society of Kamataka recently drew an amazing picture in appreciation of the team's commitment to this organization (a Non-Government Organisation (NGO) dedicated to the welfare of persons with Neuro-Muscular Disorders and Developmental Disabilities).

 

This drawing represents a type of ancient Indian art called a Worli Painting.

It is great to know that our own admiration of  Team India is shared by many others in such meaningful ways.

 

While walking to work today, I noticed a poster that read, in big colorful letters, "CANDLESTICK FARMS" and showed a cartoon of San Francisco's  stadium (original home of the San Francisco Giants baseball team and still used by the 49ers football team) converted into a community farm. Vineyards in the bleachers, greenhouses in the end zones, crops in the field and community members  tending their plots and enjoying the space. As described on the flickr link above: "This project originated when Packard Jennings and Steve Lambert asked architects, city planners, and transportation engineers, “what would you do if you didn’t have to worry about budgets, bureaucracy, politics, or physics?” Ideas from these conversations were then merged, developed, and perhaps mildly exaggerated by Steve and Packard to create a series of 6 posters for the San Francisco Arts Commission’s Art on Market Street Program. To me represents an amazingly creative vision and "reversed" my assumptions. All of the sudden a stadium is not a place for sports events and concerts, but rather a place to grow food.

Academic courses don't always yield practical applications. However last fall I studied different techniques that fuel creativity and innovation. One of these techniques was referred to as "reversing assumptions". Assumption reversal is when one writes down assumptions about a problem that they are facing. The assumptions are simple statements about the way things are. Then the participants are asked to ask themselves could the reverse also be  true. This site as well as the embedded hand out in this blog  do a great job describing this process.

I can't help but think how valuable this technique has been and will continue to be in innovating the ways that cell phones are being used. Take this reverse assumption as an example; A cell phone isn't for talking, it is for banking. 

For now on, you can assume that I will reversing when it comes to approaching problems.

Some of my friends have pointed out that my work helping to eliminate the digital divide seems paradoxical to my previous career managing outdoor education programs. While breathing some fresh mountain air and making some turns in the Sierras this past weekend, I reflected on how these two passions interrelate, came to some realizations and thought about some interesting projects I'd like to share. 

In his recent book, The Last Child in the Woods "saving children from nature deficit disorder", Richard Louv links numerous factors in certain cultures that keep kids inside to negative social, psychological and spiritual implications. This book has received much attention in the press and addresses an issue that I feel is important; the need for people to be connected to the natural environment. I understand that because computers are included in this list of factors (television, parents fears, structured schedules, increased homework and lack of access to natural areas are others Louv discusses) my passion for eliminating the digital divide could be viewed on the surface as paradoxical to my work in environmental education. After all, for many of us, when we think of computers we think about sitting inside. However, there are numerous areas where my passion for eliminating the digital divide and the environment compliment each other.

One major place where these passions intersect is in the realm of environmental justice: "The confluence of social and environmental movements". As described by wikipedia, this movement "seeks to redress inequitable distributions of environmental burdens (pollution, industrial facilities, crime, etc.) and access to environmental goods (nutritious food, clean air & water, parks, recreation, health care, education, transportation, safe jobs, etc.) in a variety of situations."

I've learned about many exciting examples of how technology can play an important role addressing these inequities. My most recent encounter with this intersection was at the Stanford Digital Vision expo, where I met Netika Raval. Netika, who in conjunction with Ahimsa Center on Social Equity, a newly formed institute at Gandhi Ashram in India is fostering a multidisciplinary and networked approach to address social issues.  The first area they are focusing on is water.  They have developed a physical as well as computer game about water and are also training villagers to test water and send in quality reports using sms text messaging. Projects like this are fascinating to me as they perfectly marry my two passions.

Here at Sun, OpenEco provides an example of how technology can be used to help reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and encourage sustainable innovation. This global on-line community provides free, easy-to-use tools to help participants assess, track, and compare energy performance and share proven best practices.

Back to my seemingly, on the surface paradoxical passions: Balance is everything. There is no doubt in my mind that lacking connection to the natural world can have a negative impact on our individual and collective well-being. There is also no doubt that IT can play an important role in fostering that connection as well as conserving our resources. Again, balance is everything.

If you too are excited about specific projects that explore these intersections between environment and technology, please share below...