I. What's New
A. T4T Assistance Program
B. Call for Consultants
C. Job Opening
D. CTC Conference Growth through Collaboration

II. Resources
A. CTC Sustainability Toolkit
B. Don't Just Ask for Money
C. Seven Tips for Avoiding Spam
D. Software
1. Ewrapper
2. EdNet
3. Discountech Windows Server 2000
E. Volunteer Way
F. For Fun

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I. What's New
A. T4T Assistance Program
We are pleased to announce the

TEAMING FOR TECHNOLOGY Assistance Program

Now available to nonprofit organizations in the Philadelphia area.

Benefits:

A technology assessment
A strategic technology plan
Log-in name and password for our member's only website
Five hours of consulting time*
25% Discount on additional consulting hours*
An application to our Hardware Access Fund, which includes new IBM equipment and refurbished machines
Partner discounts on multiple IT services, including but not limited to database solutions, trainings, and Internet service
20% Discount on T4T trainings
Cost:

Annual dues for membership are determined on a sliding scale based on operating budget and start at just $50.
United Way member agencies receive a 20% discount on membership fees.
One site is included in membership; additional sites are $50 per site.
*We have qualified consultants for web design, network maintenance, database development, and more. All of our consultants have experience working with nonprofit organizations and most have worked in nonprofit organizations for years.

Contact us for more information or to sign up:
http://www.uwsepa.org/team4tech/
teamtech@uwsepa.org
215-665-2525
Fax: 215-665-2531
Seven Benjamin Franklin Parkway
Philadelphia, PA 19103

B. Call for Consultants
We have several opportunities for qualified technology related consultants who have experience working with nonprofit organizations. Please send resumes to
Stephen Rockwell
Teaming for Technology
United Way of Southeastern Pennsylvania
Seven Benjamin Franklin Parkway
Philadelphia, PA 19103
stephenr@uwsepa.org
215-665-2531 (fax)

C. Job Opening

UNITED WAY OF SOUTHEASTERN PENNSYLVANIA

Position Responsibilities

Position Title: Technological Development Project Coordinator

Position Summary: This position will coordinate projects for the Teaming for Technology initiative, building the capacity of this initiative to support the Community Impact Plan through providing tech development services and leveraging technology to help agencies achieve their mission.

Job Responsibilities:

· Responsible for developing and implementing circuit riding services, outlined in the T4T Business Plan
· Documents and evaluates Teaming for Technology Assistance Program.
· Will build a database of consultants available for projects.
· Assist in the re-development, administration, and maintenance of Philadelphia Teaming for Technology Web Site and Technology Service Directory
· Researches and pursues resources development opportunities to support our projects
· Attends meetings and maintains relationships with collaborative partners
· Track trends and best practice of local and national non-profit tech development industry
· Assist with the administration of QuickPlace for national and local collaborations
· Other related duties as assigned.

Desired Qualifications:

· Undergraduate degree or equivalent in business, non-profit management, social work or related field.
· At least one year of demonstrated nonprofit technological development experience.
· Demonstrated capacity for creative planning and implementation.
· Excellent verbal and written communication skills, including strong presentation and persuasive skills.
· Demonstrated project management ability.
· Time management and organizational skills.
· Ability and willingness for local travel.

D. CTC Conference Growth through Collaboration
When: September 20th, 2002
Where: Community College of Philadelphia
Northwest Regional Center
1300 W. Godfrey Avenue
Philadelphia, PA 19141

This conference will focus on "Growth through Collaboration". By presenting tools, collaborations and resources in our conference on September 20th, this will enable the next stage of growth for CTCs in our region. The conference will focus on Regional Resources, Tools of Collaboration, and Specific Successful Collaborations
http://www.ctcnet-philly.org
Email John Cureton at cureton@usa.net for more information

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II. Resources

A. [CTC] Sustainability Toolkit Now Available`

Developed with funds from an America Connects Consortium Field Innovation Grant, LTC and the Lowell Community Technology Consortium were able to develop the CTC Sustainability Toolkit to aid CTCs in assessing their sustainability. Please take some time to look at the toolkit by visiting:

http://www.americaconnects.net/research/LTC_ToolKit/index.shtml

Work on this resource is not fully complete. The last step in the process is to get additional input from our colleagues in the field. Many of you helped in refining the initial standards. I now ask you for assistance in identifying models of success that illustrate the various standards detailed in the toolkit's Standards of Excellence http://www.americaconnects.net/research/LTC_ToolKit/toolkit/index.shtml

If you have a process, tool, lesson learned, etc that you are particularly proud of and has worked for you, that is a model of success. Please take some time and share it with the field. Please fill out the Models of Success form (dowload at:
http://www.americaconnects.net/research/LTC_ToolKit/toolkit/index.shtml) and return to me at felicia@ltc.org. If you have questions, feel free to contact me. Thanks for you time and input.

"Building Community Through Technology"
Felicia M. Sullivan 978.458.5400 x 11 (voice)
Director of Interactive Media and Community Outreach 978.937.0361 (fax)
Lowell Telecommunications Corporation felicia@ltc.org (email)
246 Market Street http://www.ltc.org (LTC)
Lowell, MA 01852 USA http://www.lctc.org (LCTC)

B. Don't Just Ask for Money!

What happens when a person clicks on your organization's "Support Us" link? For too many groups, this link leads to information only on how to make a cash donation.

WildAid, a wildlife preservation and support nonprofit organization, has a terrific "How You Can Help" page [http://www.wildaid.org/help/index.htm] that offers a list of the many ways a person can support both the organization and the cause the group promotes. There is detailed information on volunteering, on advocacy activities a person can do anytime, and, of course, on donating to the organization. It's an excellent model for other nonprofits to follow.

For those who do fill out a form on your site to make a donation, do you also offer a field on the form for the person to give feedback about your organization's programs or activities? Don't just ask for information needed to process a donation; ask for information that can help donors feel more of a part of your organization and its mission.

Supporters of nonprofit organizations don't want to give just money and then only hear from the groups again when more money is needed; they want to feel a part of your organization, and feel like you value more than their cash.
This article was written by
Jayne Cravens
jcravens@coyotecommunications.com
TECH4IMPACT
Coyote Communications http://www.coyotecommunications.com and
United Nations Volunteers (UNV) [http://www.unvolunteers.org]

C. Seven Tips on Avoiding Spam

Have your email accounts been rendered unusable by a constant barrage of promotions about investment opportunities, weight loss schemes, online gambling, phallic enlargement, etc?

While you probably already know a few good ways to avoid spam, this tip sheet probably includes a few you might not be aware of.

This new technical tip sheet is available at the OC web site at:
http://www.organizenow.net/techtips/spamavoid.html

Comments are welcome!

D. Software
1.. eWrapper, OC's latest free software program, just released

What is eWrapper? It is a tool for cleaning up text to prepare it to be sent out via email. So if your email messages end up unreadable to many of the people you try to send them to, eWrapper will fix the problem. OC's intern Michael Suarez was the main developer of eWrapper; we delayed the release for a while to make it easy to install. Now that this is done, we would like you to try it!

Like our acclaimed Organizers' Database (ODB) software (www.organizersdb.org), eWrapper is completely free of charge. All we ask of users is that they consider making a tax-deductible donation to our program that harnesses the talents of college interns to develop free software for the activist community.

So, if the article you want to copy and send out on your email list looks like this...

********************************************************
Winners and losers on a day that took investors from
way down to even
and back down again.

July 22, 2002: 5:58 PM EDT

NEW YORK (CNN/Money) - Stock prices tumbled yet again Monday
as concerns about Citigroup's
Enron connections and poor quarterly
results from BellSouth added
to insecurity.

The Dow Jones industrial average tumbled 234.68 to 7,784.58; it was
down more than 300 points
earlier in the session.

The Nasdaq composite index lost 36.50 to 1,282.65. The Standard &
Poor's 500 index declined 27.90 to 819.85.
********************************************************
you can use this nifty tool (it takes about 5 seconds) to strip out the wierd formatting and make it look like this:

********************************************************
Winners and losers on a day that took investors from way down to even and back down again.

July 22, 2002: 5:58 PM EDT

NEW YORK (CNN/Money) - Stock prices tumbled yet again Monday as concerns about Citigroup's Enron connections and poor quarterly results from BellSouth added to insecurity.

The Dow Jones industrial average tumbled 234.68 to 7,784.58; it was down more than 300 points earlier in the session.

The Nasdaq composite index lost 36.50 to 1,282.65. The Standard & Poor's 500 index declined 27.90 to 819.85.
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OCtech is a low-volume e-newsletter on computers and social
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| our address and subscription information are included.
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2. Free Internet based training in many subjects: www.free-ed.net

3. Windows Server 2000 is now available on Discountech
http://www.discountech.org Software for nonprofits for a low administrative cost.

D. Here is a 10 page listing of grants for non-profit computer technology programs: http://www.lib.msu.edu/harris23/grants/2comptec.htm

E. VolunterWay.org - Virtual Volunteering
In September 2002, VolunteerWay and United Way Southeastern Pennsylvania will be launching our Virtual and Technology Volunteering initiative at http://www.VolunteerWay.org. VolunteerWay.org is our interactive, volunteer matching website that includes over 2,000 volunteer opportunities with over 1,000 agencies in the Delaware Valley region. It is a partnership of United Ways and Volunteer Centers in Southeastern Pennsylvania, Southern New Jersey and Delaware and provided free to volunteers and non-profit organizations.

We are encouraging professionals and students with computer/technology experience or those interested in other virtual volunteering opportunities to visit http://www.volunteerway.org in September to find an opportunity that fits your interests, time commitment and location. When you visit VolunteerWay, be sure to include the keywords "technology", "computer" and/or "virtual" in your search criteria.

Computer/Technology Volunteering could include projects like:
> Help with designing or updating website
> Help with designing or updating database systems
> Creating a power point presentation for clients or funders
> Advice for implementing computer network
> Advice for establishing internet connection and/or agency email.
> Network or software training for agency or clients served

Other Virtual Volunteering could include all opportunities that volunteers can accomplish from a remote location such as:
> Virtual mentoring/email pal-- email or phone
> Grant writing/editing and development
> Writing/editing website content
> Writing/editing marketing/informational materials
> Researcher

If you have any questions or would like your company or school to be involved in a technology volunteer project as a group, please email volunteerway@uwsepa.org or call us at 215-665-2474. If you know of an organization that may wish to post their volunteer opportunities, please direct them to visit http://www.VolunteerWay.org.

Thanks for participating and using VolunteerWay to find volunteer opportunities!
F. For Fun
When your computer isn't doing what you want and is frustrating to no end (as inevitably happens from time to time) sometimes a little humor can help. I recently received this forward and thought I would share it with you for those moments.

*(Read this to yourself _aloud_)

If a packet hits a pocket on a socket on a port, and the bus is interrupted at a very last resort, and the access of the memory makes your floppy disk abort, then the socket packet pocket has an error to report.

If your cursor finds a menu item followed by a dash, and the
double-clicking icon puts your window in the trash, and your data is corrupted cause the index doesn't hash, then your situation's hopeless and your system's gonna crash!

If the label on the cable on the table at your house, says the network is connected to the button on your mouse, but your packets want to tunnel to another protocol, that's repeatedly rejected by the printer down the hall, and your screen is all distorted by the side effects of gauss, so your icons in the window are as wavy as a souse; then you may as well reboot and go out with a bang, 'cuz sure as I'm a poet, the sucker's gonna hang!

When the copy of your floppy's getting sloppy in the disk, and the macro code instructions is causing unnecessary risk, then you'll have to flash the memory and you'll want to RAM your ROM, and then quickly turn off the computer and be sure to tell your Mom! *
* I don't know about you, but that certainly clears things up for ME! *