Tuesday, January 26, 2010

On Girls and ICTs

At the Technology Salon hosted by the UN Foundation's Technology Partnership with Vodafone Foundation on Jan 28, 2010, some folks from the DC area (and beyond) will gather to share experiences around girls and ICTs.  This conversation is an important one, given that gaps exist around discussion, practice and research.   Continue reading.....

Monday, January 18, 2010

Children in Emergencies: Applying What We Already Know to the Crisis in Haiti

In early 2005, following the Tsunami, I collaborated with a cross-section of people at the organization where I work to put together a summary of lessons learned and some short guidelines for working with children and communities in emergencies. Continue reading at Wait... What's new website....

Friday, January 15, 2010

Ushahidi in Haiti: What's Needed Now

My main experience with disasters comes from working at an international development organization in El Salvador and happening to be the only senior manager who wasn't on annual vacation when a huge earthquake struck almost exactly 9 years ago, on January 13, 2001.  The rush to act was immediate, and it was a lot of learning by doing.  I got handed the responsibility by fate I suppose and didn't do such a bad job of it, if I do say so.  At that time we were pretty unprepared; something that has certainly changed since then in the organization where I work.  We now have country level disaster plans at hand and support a lot of disaster risk reduction and preparedness work with local communities and governments.  Continue reading here at Wait... What's new home!



Monday, January 11, 2010

An Example of Youth-Led Community Change in Mali


For the past couple years, I’ve been supporting the Youth Empowerment through Arts and Media (YETAM)  project in 6 African countries. One of the best things about being involved in the project is the opportunity to work with some incredible people who are developing the program strategies and implementing YETAM on the ground.  Bedo, the child media program coordinator in Plan Mali, is one of those people I've been lucky enough to work with.  He's kind, gentle, thoughtful and soft spoken yet solid in his opinions and knowledge. His face totally lights up when he's working with the youth. He has clear vision and gets things done, writes excellent reports, and isn't afraid to clarify things if he's not sure he's understood correctly.  It's been a real pleasure working with him. On Friday, Bedo told me about some of the short-term positive results that the Mali team is seeing in the YETAM program there.... continue reading at Wait... What's new website!


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Thoughts on Avatar

Last week I read a post called “When Will White People Stop Making Movies like Avatar”. So I went into the movie this past Friday with some preconceptions.  Yesterday I read another post on this topic by David Brooks in the New York Times.  Continue reading ....