Group items tagged

A website, www.protectyourtexasborder.com, launched March 3rd, which was originally intended to be a forum for farmers, ranchers, and other border dwellers to discuss border violence spawned by illegal immigrants and drug smugglers, has "turned into a political hot potato". It has spawned some senators to call for its removal because it "exaggerates the problem" faced on the borders. U.S. Rep. Silvestre Reyes, D-El Paso, has spearheaded the campaign for its removal, citing it as a waste of tax payer dollars as well as breeding hate speech and other such things.

Blended Learning, which combines online distance learning and traditional classroom education for K-12 discussed in this article, has potential, but needs help to reach its "full potential".  My favorite quote in the article is: " 'There is a significant risk that the existing education system will co-opt online learning as it blends it into its current flawed model-and just as is the case now, too few students will receive an excellent education,' the report states."

This is site that non-profits can join and access different technologies that would help the organization reach its goals. TechSoup is the name of the organization that runs this and it has many partners that donate these different forms of technology. This technology is availiable to all nonprofits that qualify. check it out.

This is a survey using information from 238 non profit organizations in seattle. I found it easy to read and interpret. It's a great snapshot of IT use and needs by non profits in a US city.

This site has at Top 10 list for paid social media monitoring services specifically designed for nonprofits. I found it to be very helpful because it had descriptions of each type of service along with costs, and what size nonprofit it would be most beneficial for. This could be useful for a nonprofit trying to organize contacts while also receiving feedback on how they are progressing through social media.

It is increasingly apparent that finding the perfect cloud platform is a lot like getting married. The perfect partner if hard to find. Yes there are 5 major players as of today that include Google, Oracle, Microsoft, Amazon but even they aren't identical in this field. A better bargain might be found with one of these baby clouds so it appears to be worth the look. All of the usual IT issues are what will last, what's next and how much did that cost? The clouds are coming no matter what though....

If a nonprofit dabbles in web design this is more specific to design choice for the web creator but it was worth the inquiry for myself. Drupal has been proven to better the better choice for a larger organization that wants more features. Wordpress has held an advantage for the smaller startups for ease of use. There is a convergence between the two that is occurring but Drupal still maintains a lead. The problem with the more complex applications in a site is that it will require more maintenance which a very small nonprofit or company would seek to avoid. I generally consider it very difficult to maintain a mobile web solution and keep a good selection of applications running without some expert support. The old standard of a simple website appears to be waning quickly. The choice now appears to be how much work you want to pay your website manager to do rather than determining if you need one.

This article covers donor database implementation for a non-profit. Giftworks was endorsed for ease of use. Administrators are happier with a more customized solution when its possible. Microsoft Access was criticized because it seems less directed toward the non-profit sector. It was interesting to note that the competition for donor dollars is increasing. A highly integrated database clearly outperforms segmented data. The online database with a trained rep might be the best choice of all.

Article about government review of potentially costly It projects and there chance for success.

This report indicates what trends dominate older users of social media. The main argument here is whether or not using social media to interact with NPO volunteeers and clients is worthwhile. The research indicates that it is a worthwhile endeavor. The important thing to bear in mind as far as older users are concerned, is making organizational web sites extremely accessible and user-friendly.

I think to a certain extent it is important to incorporate new social media into npo's its a easier way to reach out to volunteers and clients, its mostly about how you as a supervisor manage the usage from your employees.

I found it suprising and really neat that individuals at a specific level of government, like the state level would be recognized for their achievments in IT.

Article on government IT.

Describes how impossible it is to shutdown internet service. I'm actually quite unconvinced that it isn't possible but would the creator give up the switch?

This one was more out of curiosity

A staring point on setting up an email campaign in concert with a website. It is quickly apparent how many things are connected to and or dependent on a successful website in a successful nonprofit. Email marketing can be done without a website but it is going to have more value in conjunction with the website definitely.

This article discusses the changes being implemented into the nonprofit sector in the technology area. New technologies are being used to assist in accomplishing the organization's mission statement as well as using funding to its greatest potential and maximizing funding coming in. "In a release, Kristen Fulks, Blackbaud principal consultant and another co-author of the paper, said that 'We think it is very important to share fundraising technology trends with the nonprofit community, yet the fundamentals familiar to any fundraiser still apply,' she said. 'With the ever-demanding challenges of the economy and other influences, it is even more critical to get donors engaged faster, rather than just using technology for technology's sake.'"

This article talks about a recently legalized alternative business structure for nonprofits to consider. Establishing an L3C instead of a nonprofit seems a better title. This is similar to considering if you want to be LLC or corporation from the nonprofit standpoint. If you are allowed to make a little more profit it seems to be a good choice. The lack of a long track record could make it risky.

A nonprofit business structure you should know about

Wikipedia turns ten years old this month. Wikipedia is an online encyclopedia that is open to anyone with an internet connection to write on any topic that they see fit. IT is more of a starting place for research on things because of its open user format, but those dedicated to Wikipedia usually come in and remove any nonsense that a person, place, or event may accumulate. The founders of Wikipedia could have easily made a fortune, but in turn decided to make Wikipedia a non-profit, charitable business.

It would be great if non-profits could get on board with something like this--with products pertaining to their services. Also if a project like this was successful with products, it would be great for a system to be created dealing with service projects.

This web page luminates Ohio's initiative to offer virtual maitainence of healthcare and their efforts to make health IT more accessable and usable.