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Coding For Cleveland Charities: GiveCamp 2013

Blog Date
Author(s)
Kevin F. Smith
Stuart O. Smith, Jr.
Tags
Cleveland
GiveCamp
Nonprofit
Volunteering

Featured Tweets

-- Amazing redesign -- Amazing​ experience -- Free tech work for nonprofits --
-- Saving nonprofits money - Announcing July 18-20, 2014 --

The tweets pictured above represent all that was great about Cleveland Give Camp 2013. Amazing work was done by over 200 volunteers providing tech solutions for nonprofits going into the future, and it will happen again next year -- July 18-20, 2014! Be sure to view all the tweets below that we have shared from the event. They give a great overview of Cleveland GiveCamp 2013.

The fourth Cleveland GiveCamp (ClevelandGiveCamp.org - @CleGiveCamp) which took place over the July 19-21, 2013, weekend was truly a remarkable event. This was Stuart's fourth year in attendance, and Kevin's first year. Kevin's brother, Mike, was not able to attend, but hopes to be be back on a tech team next year.

Kevin and Stuart Smith
Kevin and Stuart Smith

Stuart served again this year on the leadership team, and sat in with the Domestic Violence & Child Advocacy Center​ (DVCAC.org - @DVCAC​) team on Friday and part of Saturday. Stuart provided some Drupal administration training to the DVCAC staff, who will manage their site after GiveCamp. Kevin served on the Social Media team by updating the Cleveland GiveCamp Facebook page and tweeting about all the weekend's activities.

Volunteers & Charities

One of the reasons Stuart did not serve the full weekend on a tech team is because of the incredible turnout of talented volunteers this year. Alas, no war stories for 2013 of GiveCamp all-nighters, as Stuart and Mike have done in the past, or domain hosting registration at 1:00 a.m. on a Friday night. To Stuart, this being the fourth year of Cleveland GiveCamp, the whole operation felt like a well oiled machine. Approximately half of the attendees were returning veterans of the event, and so many great people signed up to volunteer that the leaders had to put people on a waiting list. It was also great to meet and hear of people from other states attending. The volunteers make this truly an amazing event.


Slide Show: GiveCamp Volunteers

In addition to the project managers and all the tech/design participants, there were several people volunteering as floaters. These floaters brought specific technical and leadership skills to assist where needed.

The social media team on which Kevin served helped to make #CleGC a trending term on Twitter, while the meal preparation ensured all were well fed!


Slide Show: ​GiveCamp FOOD!

The combined efforts of all in attendance led to a 100% success rate! All projects were completed!

Here are a list of the nonprofits which were served (note: as of this date, some of the website projects that were developed "offline" have not yet been moved online):

  1. Bike Cleveland
  2. Cleveland Eastside Ex-Offender Coalition
  3. Cleveland TimeBank, a project of the Stockyards, Clark-Fulton, and Brooklyn Centre Community Development Office
  4. Conservancy for Cuyahoga Valley National Park
  5. Domestic Violence and Child Advocacy Center
  6. Free Clinic
  7. Guardians Advocating Child Safety and Protection
  8. Heights Arts
  9. LAND Studio
  10. Leadership Lorain County
  11. Lorain County Safe Harbor
  12. Malachi House
  13. May Dugan Center
  14. Near West Family Network
  15. North Coast Community Homes
  16. Operation StandUP!
  17. The Hummingbird Project
  18. Westside Industrial Retention & Expansion Network (WIRE-Net)

Sponsors

Geeks Give
Geeks Give Shirt Design

A big thank-you goes out to all the Cleveland GiveCamp sponsors! They made it possible for the care and feeding of the 200 volunteers. Their donations' value was multiplied many times over through the ongoing nature of the tech projects. (Please see the PDF containing the sponsors' Facebook/Twitter links on sosAssociates.com weekly tech meeting announcements for the week of 7/15/13 - 7/22/13.)

2013 sponsors include:

GOLD SPONSORS

  1. Arras Keathley Agency
  2. Burke Lakefront Airport
  3. Explorys
  4. Hyland Software
  5. IEEE Cleveland Section
  6. JumpStart
  7. KeyBank
  8. LeanDog
  9. Rosetta

SILVER SPONSORS

  1. Coffee and Code
  2. Onshore Momentum

PATRON SPONSORS

  1. Bizdom
  2. BlueBridge Networks, LLC
  3. DXY
  4. Pantek

Slide Show: ​GiveCamp Sponsors

 

We also want to make special mention of the sponsors that host Cleveland GiveCamp each year. There is nothing like the environment created by working at Burke Lakefront Airport and on the Lean Dog (LeanDog.com - @LeanDog) boat. The airport, in addition to allowing us to have our GiveCamp group photo taken on the tarmac, also offers the opportunity to be surrounded by the interesting space and aeronautics displays of the International Women Air & Space Museum (iwasm.org - @WomenintheAir). The Lean Dog boat was fully renovated last year as part of an over-one-million-dollar project, and the volunteers this year were able to make great use of the space. Plus, it is a boat -- what better views of Lake Erie and Cleveland's Rock and Roll Hall of Fame!

This year, the attendees were treated to a special fireworks display from the Cleveland National Senior Games. Be sure to see the tweets below for more photos/video of our host locations and of the fireworks.


Slide Show: ​GiveCamp Great Location

Resources

GiveCamp Cleveland Care and Feeding of your WordPress Site
Care and Feeding of your WordPress Site
Cleveland GiveCamp 2013 presentation by Heidi Cool @hacool

Before and during Cleveland GiveCamp 2013, resources to assist in creating websites were shared via Twitter. They are listed in the tweets below, but we also wanted to provide direct links here:

What Others Are Saying

Stuart and Kevin recommend you read the following articles/blog posts, and view the photo galleries. This way, you can get a true flavor for Cleveland GiveCamp and why so many people support it. If we missed any articles, please contact Stuart via Twitter at @sos_jr, or leave a message in the comment section below.

We also recommend you watch for further updates on blogs/articles on the Cleveland GiveCamp "news" web page, follow @CleGiveCamp on Twitter, join the Google+ Group, and Like Cleveland GiveCamp's Facebook page.

Tweets/Retweets

Here are tweets and retweets that Kevin and Stuart did regarding Cleveland GiveCamp. Please view these, because they help convey the spirit of the weekend, plus include interesting photos/videos and useful links. Thank you to all those listed below who we retweeted/mentioned.

DIRECTIONS: Click on links and scroll down to view. 

  1. Stuart's tweets before and Friday.
  2. Kevin's Friday and Saturday tweets.
  3. Stuart's Saturday Tweets.
  4. Kevin's Sunday tweets.
  5. Stuart's tweets Sunday and after.

Mark your calendar for next year -- July 18-20, 2014! See you there!