Archive for the 'challenge' Category

Last Day of Voting for USAID Challenge

Published
by
Amy Sample Ward
on December 12, 2008
in challenge
. 0 Comments

Originally posted on the NetSquared blog.

It’s true: Today, Friday, is the last day to cast your vote for up to 5 favorite USAID project submissions.  Get out the vote, now!

The Word on the Street…

Project teams and others are telling their friends, families, colleagues and communities about the vote, hoping to make it to the next round where 15 projects will be presented to the USAID judges.  If you want to learn more about projects than what is provided in the Project Gallery, check out the Community Blog where projects are discussing their ideas and asking for your support.

Oliver Subasinghe recently told the devex community about the USAID Challenge and check out this testimonial from quazi on the community blog:

Learning about various projects through the USAID Development 2.0 Challenge

I am glad that I voted for 5 projets posted here on NetSquared. What I liked most is that I now will have access to ideas as I prepare to use social web technologies to advance our cause for leadership development in Bangladesh, especially for the youth.

Get out the Vote!

This is the last day to help select the 15 projects moving on in the Challenge. Cast your vote now!

The voting process is simple, interactive and fun. It’s our goal to be as inclusive as possible because it’s your job to pick the projects that best deserve the time, attention, and funding that this Challenge can offer.

How to vote:

  • You must Register and Login to the NetSquared site to participate in the Vote (please check your junk mail folder if you do not see a registration email confirmation)
  • Each registered user has one (1) ballot
  • You must vote for at least three (3) Projects and no more than five (5)
  • All votes are weighted equally (in other words, your first choice and fifth choice have equal value)
  • You can only vote for each Project once, yes that includes your own
  • You must review and cast your ballot for your vote to count (details below)

Share your feedback, ideas, or favorites on the Community Blog after you’ve voted!

One week to vote in USAID Challenge!

Published
by
Amy Sample Ward
on December 8, 2008
in challenge
. 0 Comments

Today, the voting opens to select the top 15 projects in the USAID Development 2.0 Challenge.  Voting only lasts this week so check it out now:  http://netsquared.org/usaid/vote

For more information about the Challenge, visit: http://netsquared.org/usaid

Why vote?

The voting process is simple, interactive and fun.  Plus, your voices together are better than ours alone and voting in the USAID Challenge Community Vote will help select the very best 15 projects to move on to the panel of judges.

Voting begins on Monday, December 8 and closes on Friday, December 12.  That’s just one week of voting, so we hope you’ll get the word out to friends and colleagues to help support the projects you care about. You don’t have to be part of a project team or even be a mobile tech expert to participate. 

Go Vote!

How to vote:

  • You must Register and Login to the NetSquared site to participate in the Vote (please check your junk mail folder if you do not see a registration email confirmation)
  • Each registered user has one (1) ballot
  • You must vote for at least three (3) Projects and no more than five (5)
  • All votes are weighted equally (in other words, your first choice and fifth choice have equal value)
  • You can only vote for each Project once, yes that includes your own

Contact us if you have any problems or questions - we want to make sure your vote counts!

For more information about voting, visit USAID Vote!

The top 15 selected projects will be announced Monday, December 15th and will be presented to USAID, where a panel of judges will select the final 3.  For more information about the Challenge, check out the USAID Development 2.0 Challenge page.

Five days left to submit to USAID

Published
by
Amy Sample Ward
on December 1, 2008
in challenge and mobile
. 1 Comment

Originally posted on the NetSquared blog.

This is your last week to submit ideas to the 2008 USAID Development 2.0 Challenge. Proposals are stacking up in the USAID Project Gallery already!  You can read proposals, star your favorites, leave comments and collaborate with project teams, or submit your own!  Check out the newest projects!

Submissions are due December 5th! Submit your idea today!

From the Project Gallery:

  • ROBO Calls for Health - a developing country proposal
    A Problem in many developing countries is that many people who require medical care for chronic illnesses (high pretension and diabetes) and child health (Pre and post natal) often forget their appointment or to maintain their home treatment plan.   Such situations result in HIV AIDS, loss of ability to work (resulting in economic stress and poverty) premature death including high infant mortality rates. Most of these individuals already have mobile phones through which they can be reached by health care system (village, district, national level).  Through phone calls and/or text messaging patients would be reminded of their appointments and/or home treatments.
  • BizWiz - The Business Helper
    BizWiz - the Business Helper- is a cell phone application that helps small and micro entrepreneurs keep track of their business expenses and sales more easily, streamline financial information, and analyze it on a more regular basis. BizWiz allows the creation of an immediate record of the transaction as it happens, ensuring that expenses and revenues are properly managed.
  • Cell by Cell Community Twitter
    I’ve been involved with community development in urban slums and small rural towns in Brazil for the past fifty years.  There is an assumption by “outsiders” that because of the density of the slums and the circumscribed boundaries of the small rural towns, communication circulates freely and rapidly.  I believe the opposite is true.  Residents of these communities tend to stay close to their residences, sources of food, access to transportation and community services such as schools and health clinics.  They tend to venture out to social gatherings such as church attendance in groups.  They would never think of just walking their dog outside the immediate confins of the street in front of their house or shanty.
  • Global PocketSchool Network (PSGN)
    PSGN is a global open network distributing mlearning-based edutainment solutions to places where there are no schools. This project is to help extremely underserved children develop literacy, numeracy, and life-skills to participate in global information, knowledge, and creative content economy. The philosophy for this is “everyone can learn and contribute to world peace and prosperity.”

Participate in 4 easy steps:

  • Register and/or Login
  • Click on Username
  • Click on “Submit a Project to the Project Gallery” under My Project Idea
  • Select “USAID” from the Prize Tag menu located below Additional Cause Area Tags on the Submission Form

Visit the USAID Development 2.0 Challenge Project Gallery to check out proposals, star your favorites, and comment and collaborate with the project teams or learn more about the Challenge.

Social Innovation Camp announces projects

Published
by
Amy Sample Ward
on November 21, 2008
in challenge and community
. 0 Comments

Social Innovation Camp just announced the projects who will attend the SICamp weekend 5 - 7 December to build on and out to turn their ideas into working projects.  115 ideas were submitted and the top choices include:

Going Postal

A tool to help people take control of junk mail: Going Postal aims both to stop junk reaching your letter box, as well as offering companies alternative ways to get their advertising out - which is good news for the trees that are used to produce the 550,000 tonnes of paper wasted on unsolicited mail in the UK each year.

Useful Visitors

What if travelers brought more than cash to the countries they visited? You could harness the skills, talent and knowledge of those visiting other countries - whether they’re on business, visiting relatives or simply tourists. Via the web, universities could find visiting professors, hospitals could find visiting nurses, feeding centres could meet five star chefs and Joe the plumber can fix the drains in an orphanage. It’s a new approach both to international volunteering, as well as tackling the brain drain many countries are suffering as they loose talent and skills to migration.

AccessCity

The rush hour’s bad enough for those who have only a bag and umbrella to carry around. But how do you negotiate a city’s transport system when you’re not able to keep up with the commuter scrum? AccessCity aims to develop a site to enable a user-generated view of London (in the first instance, but with the ability to be rolled out nationally and beyond) from an accessibility perspective: helping those who are less able to get around - due to physical disabilities or impairments, or if they need to take children with them - and highlighting what needs to be improved to make simple journeys less of a hassle.

Visualising Community Need

There’s been increasing emphasis on how you give users themselves greater control over the social care they receive in recent years - it’s a huge social and political issue. Visualising Community Need is a project to help people map their own care requirements and use this information to get care providers to better understand the needs of those they are supposed to be serving - turning the system of social care on its head.

Good Gym

People all over Britain run, jog and lift weights. The Good Gym aims to make it easy for people to channel this energy toward social good. The idea is to get fitness fanatics to incorporate visits to isolated older people or the delivery of useful items to dependent individuals into their exercise routines.

Vegsy

Etsy, but for vegetables. This idea uses an online market place to bring together people who grow food in their home, allotment, small holding or farm with people who want to buy locally produced, natural, wholesome foods - just like Etsy has done with handmade craft goods. So there’s less air miles in our food and we know exactly what we’re eating and where it’s coming from.

But there is even more! The judges couldn’t decide between four more ideas so you can help decide!  The voting ends at midnight Sunday night, so check them out and vote now!

Learn more about Social Innovation Camp and the weekend ‘conference’ on 5 - 7 December here.

What do you think about the ideas selected?  Do you have ways to help?

USAID Development 2.0 Challenge: Extended Deadline Dec. 5th!

Published
by
Amy Sample Ward
on November 19, 2008
in challenge
. 0 Comments

If you have an idea for mobile technologies for good and you haven’t submitted to the USAID Development 2.0 Challenge project gallery yet, it’s your lucky day!

The Challenge submission deadline is extended to December 5th!

To participate in the USAID Development Challenge please Register and Login and submit your idea. To view, comment on or star a project, visit the USAID Project Gallery.

About the Challenge

Mobile technology, including everything from inventive applications for smart phones to simple text messaging, is increasingly ubiquitous in the developing world. USAID challenges you to explore its potential through an innovation for maximum development impact in areas such as health, banking, education, agricultural trade, or other pressing development issues.

The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), the U.S. Government agency that delivers economic and humanitarian assistance worldwide on behalf of the American people, is sponsoring a challenge to find the best in mobile innovations for good. Through a NetSquared community vote, fifteen finalists will be chosen. A panel of judges, selected by USAID, will then select the winners. The first place winner will receive a grant of $10,000, the two runner-ups will receive grants of $5,000 each. All three winners will have the opportunity to present their ideas to senior USAID officials, experts, and the public in Washington D.C.

How It Works

Individuals and organizations working with mobile technologies to create change are invited to share their projects with the community through the USAID Development 2.0 Challenge submission form. Once you’ve hit submit for your challenge, it’s public. This provides you with an opportunity to get feedback from your community, the USAID community, the NetSquared community and other friendly collaborators.

Once the project submission process has closed, we will hold a community vote to select the top fifteen projects. Those projects will then go in front of a panel of USAID-selected judges who will determine the three winners.

Four Easy Steps to Participate:

  • Register and/or Login
  • Click on Username
  • Click on “Submit a Project to the Project Gallery” under My Project Idea
  • Select “USAID” from the Prize Tag menu located below Additional Cause Area Tags on the Submission Form

Learn more about the Challenge and enter your idea here.

29-Day Giving Challenge: Connecting online!

Published
by
Amy Sample Ward
on November 11, 2008
in challenge and community
. 1 Comment

It’s already day 13 of the 29-Day Giving Challenge!  I wanted to let you all know that I haven’t given up on the challenge; instead, I’m blogging about my participation and connecting with others online in the 29-Day Giving community set up on Ning.  It’s a great example of a community online supporting each other and sharing learning, ideas, and fun.

I invite you to join me on the 29-Day Giving Challenge Community!

Are you participating in the 29-Day Giving Challenge?  Let’s connect!

Learn more about the challenge and the online community.

29 Day Giving Challenge: Days 3-6

Published
by
Amy Sample Ward
on November 4, 2008
in challenge
. 3 Comments

It is already day 6 of my 29-Day Giving Challenge! The challenge is to give away something every day, for 29 days.  Thanks to Britt Bravo, I started at a time that leads up to Thanksgiving as a fitting way to celebrate the season.  Join me!

I wanted to take a minute to catch you up on my challenge progress.

Day 3 (Nov. 1)

Last week as a big one in our house (flat, actually).  I had a long list of items left on my to-do list and I expected, Friday night, to be working on them for a good chunk of Saturday.  As many of you have experienced yourselves, I’m sure, it can be pretty easy for people like us who are passionate about what they do, excited to get involved, and happy to help to get over-committed.  Or, at least, have too many items on the to-do list.  Since moving here in September, it has been a personal goal of mine to avoid establishing a pattern of work-aholicism, but I haven’t kept the goal front-and-center.  So, Saturday, I decided to give time and attention.

I gave up my whole day to whatever ELSE there was besides work.  I didn’t get online at all.  Instead, I spent time with my husband and our friend, ‘vegged out’ to some old episodes of The Office, and went to a play at the Hampstead Theatre.  It sounds very silly and selfish, but it felt great to push aside the laptop and give a full day to people and things that I love.

Day 4 (Nov. 2)

Sunday, I was browsing through my RSS feed, reading news and stories, not expecting to come upon a wonderful gift.  But I did!

Dining for Women is a nonprofit organization that I really like:

Dining for Women is a dinner giving circle. We “dine in” together once a month, each bringing a dish to share, and our “dining out” dollars are sent to international programs empowering women.

Through support of international grass-roots programs in education, healthcare, vocational training, micro-credit loans and economic development, and through our members’ combined donations, we encourage women to believe they can improve their living situations.

Education is an integral part of our mission. DFW believes that through education, our members become agents of change, capable of altering the face of world poverty.

As a new fundraising mechanism, DFW is offering beautiful charity boxes with the organization’s logo on them.  “This project was conceived and designed exclusively for DFW by the Ithaca chapter– for the nationwide DFW membership. It is a collaboration with The Zanger Company (Gloria Smith), importer of Polish Stoneware, and the women of the Ceramika Artystyczna Factory in Poland.”

I purchased a charity box for my mother - the person who first taught me about giving.  I can’t wait for it to arrive to her door!

Day 5 (Nov. 3)

Yesterday, I received an email from DonorsChoose.org wrapping up the Bloggers Challenge from last month.  I clicked through to my account and decided to check in on projects I had selected.  Many were fully-funded and the campaigns were thus closed.  The project I donated to during the challenge, was still in need, though.  So, I decided to give again.

Why?  The project is something very close to home for me - digital storytelling.  Right now, I’m in the middle of quite a few conversations, idea-sharing, and email exchanges discussing the use of video and storytelling for organizations, conferences, and more.  The power of a video, a message coming directly from those being served, is incredible.  And in this proposal from a teacher in South Carolina, we can help a classroom of elementary school students start telling stories digitally, too.  Check it out - and if you are able, help them out!

Day 6 (Nov. 4)

Today, Tuesday, November 4, 2008, is the US Election.  GO VOTE!

What did I give today?  I gave my voice, my political contribution, my commitment to the future.  Voting is the easiest, truest way to show patriotism.  Participating in the process is the best way to start engaging with your neighbors, your community, your country.

I actually already voted, because I had to mail the ballot a while ago to ensure it made it from London in time.  But today I am using all the powers I have to get out the vote.  Giving away my Facebook status to my time.

This is one of the most important elections you will probably ever participate in given the current issues facing our country and the timeline we require for answers and action.  I, obviously, would love to have the candidate I voted for take office in January.  But today, that isn’t what is most important to me: I just want you to vote.  Please.

Find your local polling place here.  Find out if there are any voting reports from your area or report with Twitter Vote Report here.

USAID Development 2.0 Challenge: Share your ideas!

Published
by
Amy Sample Ward
on November 3, 2008
in challenge
. 0 Comments

Originally posted on the NetSquared blog.

The 2008 USAID Development 2.0 Challenge is underway and proposals are stacking up in the USAID Project Gallery.  You can read proposals, star your favorites, leave comments and collaborate with project teams, or submit your own!  Here are some of the most recently submitted projects - check them out!

From the Project Gallery:

  • Mobile tools linking Teachers, Students and Parents to boost EducationEducation institutions often need to evaluate the academic performance of their students and teachers. Students also need to monitor their own progress. Parents/Guardians also need to monitor their student’s progress.

    Teachers frequently give tests or exams to their students during the term and this data is rarely used for analysis, apart from that given at the end of term/semester. The reason is that they do not have time to aggregate this data to a format suitable for easy analysis. These days, most academic institutions have atleast a computer which can be used for this kind of work. But there are cases where the number of computers is not enough for all teachers to enter student marks as often as analysis would be required. Also some teachers are part time employees and hence may not be at the school when their marks are needed.

  • Ushahidi v2 - Mobile.Crisis.ReportingWhy Mobile
    Mobile phones are the one ubiquitous technology found all over the globe -if the goal of Ushahidi is to let ordinary people submit reports during a crisis and know of incidents happening around them, then we must ensure that any phone can be used for this purpose.

    What
    The following features will be incorporated into Ushahidi’s mobile development:
    •    ability to send and receive SMS alerts;
    •    ability to set up a local or international alert number at short notice;
    •    ability work on different smartphones;
    •    ability to send MMS messages (images and video);
    •    ability to send GPS coordinates.

Participate in 4 easy steps:

  • Register and/or Login
  • Click on Username
  • Click on “Submit a Project to the Project Gallery” under My Project Idea
  • Select “USAID” from the Prize Tag menu located below Additional Cause Area Tags on the Submission Form

Visit the USAID Development 2.0 Challenge Project Gallery to check out proposals, vote on your favorites, and comment and collaborate with the project teams or learn more about the Challenge.

29-Day Giving Challenge: Here we go!

Published
by
Amy Sample Ward
on October 31, 2008
in challenge
. 0 Comments

I’m really excited to participate in the 29-Day Giving Challenge with Britt Bravo and many other changebloggers.  Britt is always a great insiprer for do-good-er-ness and I hope you’ll join me in 29 days of giving, leading up to the US Thanksgiving holiday!  I think this will be a great way to feel the giving spirit of Thanksgiving, as our new location in London, UK, isn’t naturally lending itself to celebrate this year.

DAY 1 (Oct. 30th)

The London Underground, or tube, has recently put up ads that ask when you last smiled at another passenger.  As a ‘foreigner’ I quickly noticed how many people here become quite steely on public transportation, there isn’t much conversation, let alone eye contact or smiles.  The ads suggest that you can change someone’s day by smiling at them on the tube.  So, I started doing it yesterday as my first day of giving: giving away smiles!

The results?  Well, as I’m sure you can imagine.  Some people were very confused, others just ignored it, but some smiled back and passed it on!  A smile can go a long way, start one today! :)

Day 2 (Oct. 31st)

Today, I guess I didn’t technically give anything away, but I put myself out there.  I joined School of Everything and created my teaching (and learning) profile.  This way, I can connect to people right here in Camden or around the world to share skills and knowledge that I have.  This is what the site says:

School of Everything connects people who want to learn with passionate teachers in their local area. The award-wining site is free to join for both people who want to learn and people who want to teach.

Teachers register online and create a personal page giving information on their lessons, the qualifications offered and the format in which they teach - for example workshops or one-to-one sessions. Potential pupils find a tutor who’s right for them simply searching by subject, learning category and location. They can then send them a message, arrange to meet and begin learning their new subject.

I met the co-founder, Andy Gibson earlier this week so School of Everything was on my list of things to investigate.  Once I visited the site, I just had to participate!  Try it out for yourself, or connect with me!  I’m looking forward to the connections, friendships, and all the shared learning to come!

Join in with the 29-Day Giving Challenge!

Final Push for a World Diabetes Day Doodle

Published
by
Amy Sample Ward
on October 27, 2008
in challenge and community
. 1 Comment

Manny Hernandez and the Tu Diabetes community needs your help! Their goal is 20,000 signatures in an appeal to Google to consider doing a World Diabetes Day doodle on Nov. 14th.  Right now, they are about half way there.  Tu Diabetes has partnered with other diabetes organization to help raise awareness and reach the 20,000 signatures goal.

You can sign the petition here!

Help get a World Diabetes Day Doodle