Tech Advice for Non-Profits: TechSoup

A great place for non-profits to look for articles and advice in the technology field is TechSoup. They have articles discussing all aspects of technology and tech support as well as other topcis. A recent article gave advice and how to best utilize volunteers. There is also a very good article on ensuring your mass emails are not classified as Spam.

TechSoup also runs TechSoupStock, a marketplace offering reduced price software. They have amazing deals on Microsoft software but be warned - you can only order Microsoft products once per year. Read the details. They also have software from Macromedia, Symantec and Intuit.

One of the best features of TechSoup is the Discussion Area. Check out the discussions on hardware, software, fundraising and a host of topics.

Aaron Price Fellows Start Internship

Three high school seniors who are Aaron Price Fellows have begun a 6 month internship at the San Diego Futures Foundation. The mission of the Aaron Price Fellows program is to enrich the lives of a diverse group of high school students so they become responsible, caring members of their community.

Annette, Andre and Monica will assist SDFF staff in all our programs and learn about both technology and non-profit organizations.

Welcome!!

National Engineering Week Planning

Futures Foundation Staff participated in a meeting sponsored by Qualcomm to promote activities during National Engineering Week, www.eweek.org. The San Diego region shares a nationwide crisis of too few students pursuing math, science and engineering college degrees. In a world-wide marketplace, the U.S. needs to stay competitive by producing for engineers and scientists. E-Week is part of a national effort to promote this beginning in elementary school and continuing through high school and into college.

Foster Families Receive 100+ Computers

We've partnered with San Diego County's Foster Family Licensing program this year to get refurbished computers to families raising foster children. This past week we gave out 101 computers. Our total for 2005 is 506 computers to Foster Families!

The parents are universally so thankful. And the children who came with them were pretty excited to be able to use the computers.

We owe a big thanks to Suzanne and Lamisse from the County. And an even bigger thanks to my volunteers: Mike, Julie and her two high school interns, Christine, Scott, Manny and a bunch of high school interns who helped clean and prepare the monitors and computers: Fong, Boun, Annette, Andre, Monica, Christian, Le, Sergio and Lupita.

Kearny High School Thank You to SDFF

We got a great thank-you note last week for a donation to Kearny High School. The teacher wrote:

As I sit amidst the quiet (students are on Thanksgiving Break) looking at our newly enhanced Student Center with 25 sleek black Dell computers I am grateful for the generosity of your Foundation. The 40 Dell computers and monitors we received last week from your organization have doubled the capacity of our Student Center, and given several teachers around the complex excellent dependable technology to enhance their instruction and improve their computer labs. Our Center was constantly in use prior to this, but I can only imagine when the students return how surprised and delighted they will be with so many more opportunities to find a computer that is actually available to them! Thanks again for making this happen for us. We are truly grateful in this season of Thanksgiving.

Intern receives BofA Neighborhood Initiative Award

Jelvin Forones, a former Futures Foundation intern and Hoover High School senior, has received the Bank of America San Diego Neighborhood Initiative Award. Jelvin is pictured above with SDFF Intern Manager, Steve Katnack.

Only five student leaders in San Diego County were chosen this year. The award is given to students who showed leadership in their communities.

Jelvin has been matched with a Bank of America mentor and will be working at the San Diego Futures Foundation this Summer in a full time internship paid for by Bank of America.

Congratulations to Jelvin!

New AOIT Interns from Hoover High School

A new group of Juniors from Hoover High School started today. They are enrolled in the Academy of Information Technology and will intern here for 24 hours. They help prepare computers for donation and learn software installation and security.

This group seems really engaged. We opened up computers and went over all the parts today.

Donations, Donations, Donations

The Futures Foundation is donating to many organizations this week:

• The Japan Society of San Diego and Tijuana
• The Clairemont Friendship Senior Center
• San Diego Foundation for Change
• Promoting Responsible Independence in Daily Endeavors

Plus last week we donated to couple more organizations:

• The Ballantyne Community Charter School
• New Haven Youth and Family Services

Lots of Pickups and Deliveries this week

Two organizations picked up computers today: The International Community Foundation which seeks to increase charitable giving and volunteerism across U.S. borders to benefit overseas communities and non-profit organizations and Kids in Touch Communications which is dedicated to military family communications. They both do great work!

Congratulations on being awarded computers.

Taste of Technology - A great success and fun time

What fun! We had a great crowd at our annual fundraiser. It took lots of work (especially by Maren - who is an organizational genius!). The crowd seemed to have a lot of fun especially at the casino tables and during the live auction. We had a couple bidding wars that got the crowd excited. The silent auction was a great success too. Many thanks to Dell Computer Corporation and the Sycuan Band of the Kumeyaay Nation - our major sponsors for the night. The event took place downtown in the new Hotel Solamar - a great place for an event.

The night was also the farewell event for our Executive Director, Becky Stawiski. Becky has guided the San Diego Futures Foundation since it's inception and deserves great praise for her dedication and hard work making it an important organization in bringing technology to San Diego County.

Boys & Girls Club of Chula Vista

The Boys and Girls Club of Chula Vista picked up 15 computers today. They are setting up a second computer lab in their main facility. It will primarily be used for an after school program. Sounds good. SDFF has been working with them for many years - they received computers in our first year.

Good luck to them!!

Gotta Love SKYPE!

Voice over IP for real! The new version of Skype seems an improvement. I love that we can call other SDFF staff in other offices, FREE!

The Hoover High interns thought it was pretty cool but not as cool as I thought. And you can call any "real" telephone number for 2 cents/minute if you buy the SkypeOut service.

www.skype.com

AASC Conference - Pangea Foundation

SDFF was invited to attend the opening breakfast at the Annual Conference of the American Association of Service Providers meeting here in San Diego. The Pangea Foundation, a frequent partner of SDFF, borrowed 32 computers from us to show off their project, www.aasconline.org, which is a web-based resident data management tool. Over a 1100 service coordinators were there! Service Coordinators serve families, the elderly, persons with disabilities and others who are involved in creating and maintaining service-enhanced housing environments.

The Futures Foundation was publically recognized by Pangea Foundation Executive Director, Kristen Berry, for our donation of equipment over the years. Pangea does great work. Their goal: to bring state-of-the-art technology to schools and community organizations. Sounds good!

Lots of new computer distributions....

We have 4 more non-profits getting computers: Boys and Girls Club of Chula Vista, New Haven Youth and Family Services, International Community Foundation, and Kids in Touch.

Yesterday, the Hoover High School Interns were busy the entire time cleaning and prepping mice, keyboards, and monitors. Next week - they discover Linux!!!!!

Taste of Technology

Join the San Diego Futures Foundation for, Taste of Technology – CASINO NIGHT, an exciting evening of entertainment, where guests will enjoy food, drink, their favorite casino games, and silent and live auctions to support the foundation’s programs and service offerings and to improve opportunities for San Diego’s residents to access technology. It takes place October 20 at Hotel Solamar.

More info: http://www.sdfutures.org/tasteoftechnology/index.htm

San Diego County Housing Self Sufficiency Computer Donation

Today is the second day of the computer distribution to families participating in San Diego County's Self Sufficiency Program. Their goal is help 150 families improve their economic situation through assisting them with job training, education, financial literacy and other means. We will be giving approximately 30 computer to families who do not have them now.

Everyone who has picked up their computers has been very thankful. Many have children who will now be able to use the computers for school work.

Welcome!

Welcome to the Blog for the San Diego Futures Foundation.

We will be writing about our activities and experiences by both our staff and interns. Periodically we'll also add some tech stuff.

Visit our web page to find out more about us: www.sdfutures.org

Thanks.