Volunteering

After missing 2020 and going virtual in 2021 due to COVID-19 safety considerations, at the start of 2022, the Cleveland GiveCamp Steering Committee was open to new possibilities as to what form the free tech solutions would be provided to local nonprofits.

Cleveland GiveCamp 2022 stayed with the weekend format of nonprofit teams and standup progress meetings, but new this year was:

• the location -- Hyland
• the month -- August instead of the traditional third Saturday in July
• offering a hybrid option -- a combination of remote and in-person volunteers, which one nonprofit team utilized

In this blog post, I will:

• convey what happened before and during the August 12-14, 2022, Cleveland GiveCamp Weekend
• thank the volunteers and sponsors that made it possible
• share information about the nonprofits served

While the most important activity happens over Cleveland GiveCamp Weekend, when the tech solutions are actually developed for the Nonprofit Partners, Cleveland GiveCamp is a year-round organization plannings and preparing for the weekend of service.

I decided to create these three blog posts to remind me of the three days of fun I had over Father's Day Weekend. The text is the same at the beginning of all three, so I encourage you to read the tweets within the posts that tell the story of:

2 of 3: Fun Father's Day Weekend: Saturday -- Service Project & The Longest Day of Play

Read tweets below in this blog post to learn about:

• Northeast Ohio Orienteering Club (NEOOC) service project at Richfield Heritage Preserve
  Be sure to click on the links in the tweets to learn about both of these great organizations!
• Cleveland Metroparks  “The Longest Day of Play” at Euclid Beach
• Cleveland United Way 2-1-1 service
• Plastic Free Lake Erie
• Step Forward - Ohio's designated anti-poverty agency for Cuyahoga County with early childhood education programs, adult skills training, and other services
• Especially large waves on Lake Erie on this windy day. Be sure to view the videos of the waves.
• Cleveland Metroparks Euclid Beach concessions serving Honey Hut Ice Cream
• Drum circle and dancing
• Ohio Sea Grant

With Cleveland GiveCamp 2020 being canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic, it was known from the very beginning of planning for the eleventh Cleveland GiveCamp in 2021 that flexibility would be needed.

Two decisions were made early on to ensure a safe event in this time of a once-in-a-century pandemic:

• First, to move the Cleveland GiveCamp 2021 Weekend from the third weekend in July to the fall. This would allow extra time for volunteers to get the coronavirus vaccination and to have time to learn from others working in office settings what safety procedures would be needed.

• Second, to plan simultaneously both an in-person event and a virtual event, so as to be prepared for changes in the environment.

Cleveland GiveCamp 2021 Weekend took place September 10-12, 2021.

We were pleased when Fox 8 News Producer Rachel Inch approached us to use some of our Facebook photos for their 6:00 pm news story on #Masks4Community on Wednesday, July 8, 2020. Her request made us think about sharing the story of the great work done by the #Masks4Community leaders, partners, donors, and volunteers in one of our "Social Distancing Series" blog posts.

We first learned about #Masks4Community's good work because our @sos_jr twitter account follows (and retweets) @ShanelleLSmith. In addition to #Masks4Community's website -- Masks4Community.com, we also learned more about the program from Steven Litt's article.

In addition to giving out FREE masks, #Masks4Community distributes information about voting and the census in the kits. We are BIG believers in the importance of voting, and know how the census directly impacts the way services are provided in our community. Therefore, we were excited to learn that the #Masks4Community program also supports our belief in the importance of people fulfilling their civic duty!

We signed up to volunteer once a week, starting with the morning shift on Saturday, June 27th. We were not only impressed by the mission of the organization, but also how clearly they spelled out that they followed safety measures for those volunteering (everyone wears masks, washes hands, practices social distancing, and the number of volunteers is limited). We only volunteered because these safety measures are in place.

This morning, Sunday, July 19, 2020, for some reason I woke at 5:00 am -- I now assume that it is because my body is trained to wake up early on the third weekend of July. This is because, for the last ten years, the third weekend of July has been Cleveland GiveCamp Weekend. Little sleep and a lot of work on behalf of local nonprofits is the norm for the over 200 volunteers that provide FREE tech solutions annually at Cleveland GiveCamp.

Since I was awake, I decided to put together this blog post to honor those that give their talent every year, and to acknowledge and mourn the loss of normality in 2020 during this coronavirus crisis. I thank many people in this blog post, but please remember that they represent a much larger number of people who work on behalf of Cleveland GiveCamp to make it possible to serve our community's nonprofits with FREE tech! I created the video at the top of this blog post on Saturday, July 18th, to share on social media -- it helped me remember ten years of success at: "Cleveland GiveCamp – geeks in the home of rock and roll coding for charity."

10th Anniversary Cleveland GiveCamp!

The Mission of Cleveland GiveCamp is to pair creative and technology talent with nonprofits in need.

On July 19-21, 2019, Cleveland GiveCamp marked the tenth year of its tech volunteers serving nonprofits in the Cleveland and Akron areas. We (Stuart O. Smith, Jr., and Kevin F. Smith) want to share with you tweets, videos, photos, and information about Cleveland GiveCamp 2019.

Stuart has volunteered at Cleveland GiveCamp Weekend for all of its ten years, and this was Kevin Smith's sixth year working on the Cleveland GiveCamp social media team.

10 years! It is hard to believe that it has been ten years! It has been exciting to see Cleveland GiveCamp grow over the years and help so many nonprofits with free websites and other tech solutions.

The Mission of Cleveland GiveCamp is to pair creative and technology talent with nonprofits in need.

Stuart did not have time to write this blog post at the end of July, since he was preparing for a backpacking trip and writing blog posts about FRONT International, but we still wanted to share our experiences at Cleveland GiveCamp 2018.

On July 20-22, 2018, Cleveland GiveCamp Weekend marked the ninth year of serving nonprofits in the Cleveland and Akron areas. The Smiths (Stuart, Kevin, and Mike) want to share with you the following tweets, photos, and information about Cleveland GiveCamp 2018.

Stuart has attended Cleveland GiveCamp weekend for all of its nine years, and in 2018 served on the Cleveland GiveCamp Steering Committee for his eighth year. He continues to manage both the ClevelandGiveCamp.org website and the @CleGiveCamp Twitter feed year-round, and serves on the Social Media Team during Cleveland GiveCamp weekend. This was Kevin's fifth year working on the Cleveland GiveCamp social media team. Mike returned this year to work on a Wordpress project for Hope for Kids Geauga (HopeForKidsGeauga.org) at his seventh GiveCamp. Cleveland GiveCamp continues to be one of the largest GiveCamps in the nation.

I want to begin with a BIG thank-you to BVU Director of Communications and Technology Melanie Meyer for inviting me to attend the inaugural BVU Ohio Nonprofit Technology & Communications Summit on Friday, September 30, 2016, as their guest representing the good work of Cleveland GiveCamp.

The mission of BVU: The Center for Nonprofit Excellence "is to promote business volunteerism and foster excellence in nonprofit organizations." This has led Melanie and me to explore how Cleveland GiveCamp can reach out to the nonprofits served by BVU. As a provider of free tech solutions to Cleveland and Akron area nonprofits, it seemed logical that Cleveland GiveCamp be present at BVU's first tech summit. Cleveland GiveCamp has the largest number of tech volunteers of any of the nation's other GiveCamps. 

The Mission of Cleveland GiveCamp is to pair creative and technology talent with nonprofits in need.

Cleveland GiveCamp Weekend on July 29-31, 2016, marked the seventh year of serving nonprofits from the Cleveland and Akron areas. I am fortunate to to be part of Cleveland GiveCamp every year.

Cleveland continues to have many creative people volunteering (over 225 registered for 2016). It is believed that Cleveland has the largest GiveCamp in the nation. It is exciting that again this year there were so many volunteers that the tech volunteer tickets sold out, and a waiting list had to be started.