Introducing Our GiveCamp UK 2011 Charity Projects

Oct 13 2011 12:26 PM

When Paul and I decided that we wanted to bring the spirit of GiveCamp to the UK we had no idea how it might pan out. Would techies want to participate? Would charities be willing to get involved? How much would it all cost?!

I suppose it was much the same set of questions that Chris Koenig had when he first set about planning Dallas GiveCamp back in 2007.

I don’t think we need have worried, as thanks to all of our willing volunteers and charitable organisations, our first ever GiveCamp UK is set to be a great event.

In the lead up to the event I felt that we had not done enough to set expectations for our volunteers. After all, when you start a new project the first thing that you ask before committing to it is “What will I be doing?”

So what will you be working on?

Nathan Timothy Foundation

The Nathan Timothy Foundation is an interesting and unique organisation that focuses on using song writing and music as an engagement tool to address the emotional health and wellbeing of young people.

Their team has come to GiveCamp UK in order to work with our volunteers to develop a new web application with CMS. The charity will upload content produced from each workshop, provide a secure login to each group, and enable the young people involved in each workshop to login in and be free to download the song(s) that they created.

The Nathan Timothy Foundation would also like to be able to create a sub site for each workshop or production that will enable each group to give an identity to their creation for others to view. 

We’re looking for developers (and designers) with ASP.NET MVC skills for this project.

Charity Technology Trust

The Charity Technology Trust works in partnership with the charitable sector to raise awareness of the use of technology for “third sector” organisation. They focus on guiding charities and non-profits in the UK towards more effective methods of working and collaborating through the use of technology.

The team assigned to this project has a broad scope of tasks, since this organisation is looking for help with an online ASP.NET portal that will give their network of charity organisations access to case studies, videos, research papers, relevant statistical information and infographics that will encourage them to invest time in exploring technology solutions. CTT want to be able to provide a text based search so that visitors can look up information relevant to them, as well as putting in place any groundwork for an on-going project that will see the addition of a widget to enable charities working with CTT to include information on their own sites.

This project will require a team comfortable with ASP.NET development and design, as well as volunteers who have some database/back end expertise.

Scene and Heard

Scene and Heard are a mentoring organisation focused on helping 9 to 15 year olds develop a sense of personal success and increased self-esteem through writing and performing their own plays.

These folks need help in creating an online platform to help them with an online ticketing function and a CMS that will enable them to create ticket numbers.

If you have Linux or ASP.NET experience, this could be the project for you. We need web devs, designers and a bit of database expertise. 

The Prison Phoenix Trust

The Prison Phoenix Trust is a really interesting charity that works with prisoners throughout the UK and the Republic of Ireland to promote and encourage prisoners in the development of their spiritual welfare through yoga and meditation, using breath control and silence.

This project will centre around the creation of a internal intranet solution that will involve the transfer of legacy data to the new system.

The Phoenix Prison Trust solution will likely be developed in ASP.NET and will require the assistance of web devs, web designers and some aspects of database development.

Latin American Women’s Aid

Latin American Women’s Aid is an organisation that provides temporary accommodation, practical advice and support for Latin America women who are fleeing from violent domestic situations. Their aim is to promote female independence and autonomy and help women to strive for non-violent environments for themselves and their children.

Latin American Women’s Aid is looking for a team to help them design a new data structure to hold their highly confidential and sensitive information. At present the organisation are utilising Excel. Could this change? We’re looking for competent database professionals to focus on this project. Is that you?

Sussex Interpreting Services

Sussex Interpreting Services exists to provide those in our community whose language needs inhibit their access to information about health, education and overall quality of life.

The project for this charity centres around a new ASP.NET website with a CMS that will allow non-technical staff to easily update content and materials, but can also be extended by technical staff in the future. The majority of support for this team is needed in the form of web devs, but there is also a need for input from designers and database professionals.

Young Minds

Young Minds is a national charity committed to improving the mental-health and emotional wellbeing of children and young people.

Young Minds are looking for help to create a secure online community forum where it is safe to discuss mental illness in young people. The charity stakeholders involved in this project need web developers and are considering Linux-based tech for their solution.

The You Can Hub

The You Can Hub is a community interest group in Cambridge who focus on supplying support through training, coaching and mentoring to help disadvantaged entrepreneurs of all shapes and sizes realise their goals.

Using WordPress, The You Can Hub would like help to create a new web presence for their organisation. Their main focus is good design and user experience.

The wild card project…

Through our conversations with the charities that we have been working with, Paul and I came to discover that technology for charitable organisations is a lucrative business! When I spoke to Mel of The You Can Hub earlier this year, she pointed out research that showed the main areas for concern for charities and non-profits were fundraising and event management – two areas where effective management of data is pretty critical.

Following this conversation, Paul and I sanitised this this virtual brick wall with John Quinn of the Nathan Timothy Foundation. John directed us to a commercial application that required the financial investment of a five figure £ amount.

This seemed crazy to us both. No charity should have to pay that kind of money to do good work in the community.

Our wild card project is a GiveCamp first. We plan to put in place the groundwork for phase 1 of a charity agnostic, open source CRM application that can be used to manage tasks associated with member/donor management,  reporting, creating mailing lists and recording event activities and tasks.

This is a big project, but it is our hope that with phase one complete, we can upload this to an open source site and provide a legacy for the first GiveCamp UK event that can benefit from further development by open source contributions.

So there you have it. These are our projects.

The GiveCamp UK team are really excited to see what great work can be done for the charities that have stepped up for GiveCamp UK 2011. Come next Friday, we will be handing the responsibility over to you guys to see what you can deliver.

Are you excited yet? Smile

60 Comments

  • Mark Horgan said

    I find it a little strange that nearly all the projects require ASP.NET. I thought using open source technologies and Linux servers would be cheaper for charities. Does Microsoft have a direct relationship with GiveCamp?

  • James said

    Looking forward to it!

    I hope there's enough work for everyone to do, and I hope we're not short of any particular discipline. What if we end up with 100 db devs but only five designers, or 100 designers but only five db devs?

  • Rachel - Big Giver for GiveCamp UK said

    @Mark - GiveCamp is connected to Microsoft insofar as the founder of the program is enployed at Microsoft. Chris Koenig came up with the idea before he started with MS and when he got a job there they wanted to continue the idea and so their audience marketing team took it on. He is still involved and still runs the Dallas GiveCamp.

    Having said that, they have no say in what technologies the charities choose to request. Paul has worked with the charities and has used the knowledge of what skill sets all our volunteers have told us they have.

    @James - totally! Fortunately we gathered information on everyone's skill sets at registration. We're more likely to have an issue sharing the db guys than the web devs :)

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