Dear Friends
Thank you to everyone involved with #GivingTuesday ! It's
the perfect motivator for me to write a fundraising appeal too. I am writing on
behalf of Digital Promise, a nonprofit in WA state. http://www.digital-promise.host56.com/
Lots of things are in transition at Digital Promise. That is
why this appeal is on my personal blog. Plus a nonprofit about to have
RantWoman as President needs help by definition! The donations link http://www.digital-promise.host56.com/DONATE.htm
goes straight to our Digital Promise
treasurer, a much better professional bookkeeper than RantWoman. Presenting a
more polished face to the world, including tidier-looking links is only one goal
as our board looks forward, but first some acknowledgments.
For close to two decades Digital Promise has been involved
in creating partnerships between building managers, community technology
resources, and residents of low income communities. At present Digital
Promise's most consistent activity has been in support of public computer labs
at two Seattle Housing Authority communities the STAR of Seattle and the Westwood
Heights Technology Center; this year we were also pleased to connect residents
of Pike Market housing communities with computer help provided by volunteers
from Microsoft through the Day of Caring. More about these community technology
centers in a moment.
First, we need to thank longtime Digital Promise board
President Joe Diehl. Joe's list of connections among people involved with
affordable housing is so long I hardly know where to begin. I have no idea how
he finds time to do all he has been doing. Even he realizes he cannot keep up with
everything and is more than ready to step down as President. I am writing in
transition, with deep gratitude for all I have learned and for many connections.
So give generously with heartfelt thanks to Joe and all the other Board
volunteers!
Next there is the story of people involved with the STAR
Center http://www.starofseattle.org/Pages/default.aspx
,
the community where I first met Joe and Digital Promise. The STAR Center
originally arose as a partnership between Seattle Housing Authority and
residents with a number of disabilities. These founders worked to create a
computer lab equipped with a number of different assistive technologies, both
to meet the accommodations needs of staff and to provide a place where people
might explore what technology and teamwork can enable them to do.
It's the technology that plays the video or reads the audio
book; sometimes it's the teamwork that helps someone with mobility difficulties
insert the CD or find broadcasts streamed in languages other than English. It’s
the high-contrast video that helps one customer who is also deaf with social
networking or all of the services one increasingly can only access online; it’s
the teamwork that provides staff able to direct this customer to the most
direct route to meet key needs. It’s the technology that helps blind people
read on the computer; it’s the teamwork that helps people who have lived their
whole life with challenges and people adjusting after life-changing medical events
learn from each other, about ordinary things like running and organization, and
about new horizons like online music or accessibility every time we try a new
tool.
The STAR Center has
provided a wide variety of classes for adults and has also run projects
partnering with Seattle Public schools to help youth with disabilities explore
the horizons of adulthood. That is one project I personally really hope to
continue! So give generously to help open doors for youth, to help people
adjusting after life-changing medical events, and for all the other people who
use our resources too.
Finally give generously so that we can explore new ways to
grow our efforts. We do not know quite what form this will take but the need is
clear: 30% of people in low-income housing also have disabilities. Digital Promise
hopes to continue to help create partnerships, whether through visits from Day
of Caring volunteers or new horizons of online learning, or helping communities
like Pike Market create places in their community where people can come together
and connect both in person and online.
Right now Digital Promise needs to work at some basic: some
financial reserves so that we can pay our staff on a reasonable schedule, some
services we might need on more precise timelines than our dedicated volunteers
can achieve, appropriate compensation for people who train and direct our many
volunteers, ways to refine our planning and budgeting based on experiences with
past projects, ways to share our unique experience with residents and other
kinds of housing communities.
$5000-$10,000 would be an excellent reserve and allow us to
cover some expense board members are now just personally absorbing.
$15,000-$25,000 would allow us to immediately resume our
program with Seattle Public Schools.
I would be humbled to meet these targets; if this appeal
generats more money than that figuring out what to do with the money would be
more of a good problem to have than I expect, but I love surprises!
With warmest wishes and grateful hope as Digital Promise
evolves in our rapidly changing technology environment.
Sincerely,
Dorene Cornwell
PS There is another Digital Promise. We like them and this
is our fundraising appeal. In fact as I contemplate the future of this digital
Promise, we may have to think about ways to reduce confusion. But here again is
the donation link for the Digital Promise I am writing about.
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