| A few weeks back I shared my list of birthday wishes. While a couple of the wishes involve you sharing Mighty Purpose with others, the remaining 32 wishes are all about you. I included with these wishes a drawing for 3 of you to receive a gift from me. |
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I was humbled and impressed by the submissions you sent, but there could only be 3 winners. Congrats to Stephanie Formo, Motivate (Beta) Fellow Carl Jefferson and Andrew Posselt for being our big winners. Like last time I gave gifts, I will share with all you what they received in a couple of weeks.
Today, I will tell you about the cool projects 2 of these winners shared with me as part of the birthday drawing.
Today, I will tell you about the cool projects 2 of these winners shared with me as part of the birthday drawing.
The Impact of Comprehensive Job Programs in Small Community Centers
In the world of workforce development, larger and better funded institutions (i.e. government agencies, larger non-profits, and technical colleges) have the capacity to envision, design and implement comprehensive employment programs but often have a hard time recruiting and connecting with the folks with economic challenges they are trying to serve. At the same time, small community centers are typically able to recruit participants from the neighborhoods they serve, but are often unable to provide the depth of programming needed to address the community's most pressing needs.
Community Leader, and Motivate (Beta) Fellow, Carl Jefferson is looking to close this gap by developing a "turn-key" job programming solution that community centers can implement with the resources they have available. This solution will provide the intensity of programming needed to help the chronically unemployed and under-employed find and keep meaningful work.
As a professional workforce and training specialist serving some of the larger workforce development organizations, and a former board-level President of a community center, Carl has truly matched his skills, experience and passions to a community need.
Carl expects to pilot his solution in partnership with the Lussier Community Education Center within the next few months. His behavior-based program also has a very cool outreach and promotion component, melding the best abilities of both larger and smaller organizations. He will target career-oriented jobs in industries of growing demand like direct-patient healthcare, retail management and banking/financial services.
I'll keep you all posted as Carl keeps me posted. If you want to help or learn more, you can find Carl on Facebook.
Recruiting 8 Strangers to Change the Way a Community School Educates Children With Special Needs
Technology has the potential to improve the outcomes and reduce the cost of educating children in our country. This is even more true for children with special needs. Of course, there are major obstacles to upgrading the technology in our local schools, including resource constraints, adoption resistance and training.
Freelance non-profit grant writer Stephanie Formo, and mother of a daughter with Down syndrome, is aware of all these obstacles and she has a solution for her daughter's school: a grant through Project Kite. Connecting Project Kite to her daughter's school would allow that school to receive a range of adaptive technology (think iPads with special apps to special pencil grips to virtual reality-like immersion educational computers), and the training to use these tools well.
In order to even submit an application she needed to recruit 3 teams consisting of a child with special educational needs, that child's parent, that child's primary teacher, and a service provider attached to that child. That meant she had to "put herself out there" to persuade and lead the parents, teachers and professionals she needed to form these teams. To make this even more difficult, she had just moved to the community (and state), and she didn't really know anyone there and she was not well known either. This was tough to navigate.
At last report, not only has Stephanie managed to recruit the allies and teams she needed but also the grant has been awarded. Now comes the hard work (and the revolution).
I'll update you all as Stephanie keeps me updated. If you want to learn more or help, you can find Stephanie on Elance.
Be well,
Sterling Lynk
P.S. - After 7:00am CST on Tuesday, February 19th, I will be sharing a new exhibit in the Museum of Purpose. This seemed like a "Holy Discontent" reaction by Seth Godin and I had to share it. My reaction was "Amen". I want to know what you think. Check it out and share your reaction. You need to see this.
In the world of workforce development, larger and better funded institutions (i.e. government agencies, larger non-profits, and technical colleges) have the capacity to envision, design and implement comprehensive employment programs but often have a hard time recruiting and connecting with the folks with economic challenges they are trying to serve. At the same time, small community centers are typically able to recruit participants from the neighborhoods they serve, but are often unable to provide the depth of programming needed to address the community's most pressing needs.
Community Leader, and Motivate (Beta) Fellow, Carl Jefferson is looking to close this gap by developing a "turn-key" job programming solution that community centers can implement with the resources they have available. This solution will provide the intensity of programming needed to help the chronically unemployed and under-employed find and keep meaningful work.
As a professional workforce and training specialist serving some of the larger workforce development organizations, and a former board-level President of a community center, Carl has truly matched his skills, experience and passions to a community need.
Carl expects to pilot his solution in partnership with the Lussier Community Education Center within the next few months. His behavior-based program also has a very cool outreach and promotion component, melding the best abilities of both larger and smaller organizations. He will target career-oriented jobs in industries of growing demand like direct-patient healthcare, retail management and banking/financial services.
I'll keep you all posted as Carl keeps me posted. If you want to help or learn more, you can find Carl on Facebook.
Recruiting 8 Strangers to Change the Way a Community School Educates Children With Special Needs
Technology has the potential to improve the outcomes and reduce the cost of educating children in our country. This is even more true for children with special needs. Of course, there are major obstacles to upgrading the technology in our local schools, including resource constraints, adoption resistance and training.
Freelance non-profit grant writer Stephanie Formo, and mother of a daughter with Down syndrome, is aware of all these obstacles and she has a solution for her daughter's school: a grant through Project Kite. Connecting Project Kite to her daughter's school would allow that school to receive a range of adaptive technology (think iPads with special apps to special pencil grips to virtual reality-like immersion educational computers), and the training to use these tools well.
In order to even submit an application she needed to recruit 3 teams consisting of a child with special educational needs, that child's parent, that child's primary teacher, and a service provider attached to that child. That meant she had to "put herself out there" to persuade and lead the parents, teachers and professionals she needed to form these teams. To make this even more difficult, she had just moved to the community (and state), and she didn't really know anyone there and she was not well known either. This was tough to navigate.
At last report, not only has Stephanie managed to recruit the allies and teams she needed but also the grant has been awarded. Now comes the hard work (and the revolution).
I'll update you all as Stephanie keeps me updated. If you want to learn more or help, you can find Stephanie on Elance.
Be well,
Sterling Lynk
P.S. - After 7:00am CST on Tuesday, February 19th, I will be sharing a new exhibit in the Museum of Purpose. This seemed like a "Holy Discontent" reaction by Seth Godin and I had to share it. My reaction was "Amen". I want to know what you think. Check it out and share your reaction. You need to see this.