Getting settled in to YES
I am getting settled into my project site. I was lucky enough to be familiar with the site in advance. I'm learning my way around and have done some research on resources that I may be able to use which I found very helpful. I wish to say thanks to all of you who have sent me links on resources we may be able to use and links to volunteer services. They are coming in handy.
Things I will be working on this week are:
Researching the types of software we will need to make our computers accessible.
Researching which companies might be willing to either donate or reduce the cost of this software for non - profit organizations.
Organizing and scheduling committee meeting for new committee members.
Locating volunteers.
Setting up training on how to use the various features of MS Office/Small business. (I may have lost my volunteer for that and need to locate another)
Setting up a employee handbook on basic "computer 101" to cover how to perform updates, disk cleanup, defragmenting ect.
So far what has been accomplished in between research is:
Located and had donated the use of a conference room for our TechACCESS workshops.
Received a donation of refreshments for the trainings.
Learned how to use MS Excel to perform a mail merge (that was actually fun).
Sent out a bulk mailing to inform the community about our project and invite the community to the workshops about accessibility (way more stressfull than it should have been)
I found a software program that I am going to attempt to have donated to us called SuperNova. It is one software that is accessible for any person with any level of sight impairment. Obtaining this will mean we will not have to purchase several different programs.
Comment from Kevin Palmer on July 5, 2007 - 11:33am
Nice to see YES keeping you busy already. Rayna do you have a link to Supernova or be willing to post it to the Wiki? Also posting about some of the research you're doing this week to the Wiki would be really helpful. A lot of people are working on assistive technology and it's an entirely new area for the CTC VISTA Project so any/all information or tools you find would very useful. The Assistive Tech portion of the Wiki is http://www.ctcvista.org/access_inclusion. just log in and start adding.
Comment from Rayna Ramirez on July 5, 2007 - 11:46am
I will post them to the wiki. I have found a website as well that I will post that has a lot of links to useful information. It's undergoing some changes and updates but is still a useful tool.
Comment from Ben Sheldon on July 6, 2007 - 4:59pm
Looks like you have a full plate, but it's exciting to see you've made some good progress. How did you manage to get the food donations? When I used to work in-kinds, I found that often, all you have to do is ask. If only grant-writing worked that way :-)
That SuperNova program looks really neat. I just checked on Techsoup.com (the place for donated software) and they don't even have a Accessibility category. Good luck!
Comment from Rayna Ramirez on July 9, 2007 - 9:27am
It helped with the food donations that I had an inside connection with the owners of the store :) Not always that easy though. What I have done is made a master letter that can be changed to suit whatever we are asking to have donated. It explains who we are what we are doing and asks for what we need. The what we need part can be changed to cover what we want it to. I attach a business card and proof that we are non - profit along with an explanation of why we need the donation. I just used it successfully again to receive another donation for fund raising purposes. It is rough to get anything donated here as the town is so small so I often go to the larger cities or towns nearby. I will post it on the wiki for anyone who is interested.
Comment from danielle martin on July 11, 2007 - 5:12pm
I knew you + Pat would equal lots of YES productivity! Think you can get her on the site to blog a bit?
-Danielle
ps How's your son?
Comment from Rayna Ramirez on July 12, 2007 - 11:53am
My son is doing great. He's allergic to wheat. I mentioned to Pat about blogging but will tell her you want to see her on there.....never know might work lol.