Coordinating a national census is no small task. Those who attended the recent ‘Hispanic Central Texas, Economic Opportunity and the 2020 Census’ panel presented by the Hispanic Impact Fund of the Austin Community Foundation gained insights into how this monumental endeavor is unfolding in the Austin area.
One key concern to Central Texas is that some populations historically have been, or are at risk of being, missed in the census at disproportionately higher rates. The latest estimates indicate approximately 25%, or nearly 7 million, of Texans, including a large proportion who are Hispanic, live in hard-to-count neighborhoods.
The panelists emphasized the importance of an accurate count. The distribution hundreds of billions of dollars in federal funds, and grants are based on census data. This money is spent on schools, hospitals, roads and other vital programs. An undercount of the Texas population of just 1% could translate to a loss of $300 million in federal funding for the state and for Texans.
Spread the word that Census Day 2020 is April 1st. For more information on actions you can take to support an accurate count in Central Texas visit: The United Way for Greater Austin’s Central Texas 2020 Census Resource page.
Panelists and supporters of the ‘Hispanic Central Texas, Economic Opportunity and the 2020 Census Panel’ on February 27th, 2020 presented by the Hispanic Impact Fund of the Austin Community Foundation including representatives from Bank of America, the Housing Authority of the City of Austin, the Austin Community Foundation, St. David’s Foundation, the United Way for Greater Austin, Todos Juntos Learning Center and the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.
Some say your life’s purpose something you’d do for free. If that were true, why do so many feel burned out by purpose-driven work? Plus consider that the front-lines of these professions (nonprofits, NGOs, social impact, human services, advocacy…) are highly populated by women. Let’s talk about this! A meet-up is bring proposed for SXSW 2020 to do just that.
The proposed meet-up is titled Women changemakers – let’s talk self-care. And we need you, the public, to show your support for this idea during the community voting period (Aug. 5 – Aug. 23, 2019). Please go to panelpicker.sxsw.com , log in and vote-up and comment on this proposal if you’d like to see it at the next SXSW. Here is a video about it:
Nonprofits are here to change the world. And SXSW® is here to inspire do-gooders in their work.
Whether you are headed to #SXSW2019 or keeping up with the conference on social media – keep an eye on this site for this “nonprofit geek’s” descriptions of top offerings from the SXSW Social & Global Impact track.
Brené Brown (March 8th at 11:00 a.m. – Austin Convention Center)
The strength of our beliefs can be the foundation for positive changes. Storyteller, Researcher and Author Brené Brown (Daring Greatly, Rising Strong…) will address top questions that change-makers face in an age of increased polarization. Is it possible to improve the world in a culture of shaming and blaming? Brown’s keynote will shed light on the effort it takes to show up and make a difference in our communities.
Stay tuned to this page for more Social & Global Impact SXSW® picks from Your Nonprofit Geek.
We hear about the good work that large nonprofits do. But it is less common that the stories of the foot-soldiers and smaller nonprofit organizations make it into public awareness.
Here is one of those stories; when one-on-one human connections were made. A mother needed help, someone listened, reached out to another – across borders. Requests were sent, generous people responded, and a life of a child was saved as a result.
I see it as the power of people who care – and the power of nonprofit organizations. Here are the words of the board chair of a small nonprofit organization, called Hearts Unite the Globe, doing a tremendous job spreading the word and also connecting the Congenital Heart Defect community. I’ll let her tell the story of this child’s lifesaving operation:
I am feeling so grateful right now. A few months ago a woman wrote to me from Africa. She had heard my radio show* and she wrote asking me for help. As a single mother in Africa, she had no way to pay for open-heart surgery for her son and the pediatric cardiologist said he would die without surgery soon.
I reached out to the two gentlemen I knew helping children in Africa and after many, many emails, many many prayers and much effort on the part of untold number of angels Elvis had his open-heart surgery TODAY! He’s recovering in the ICU and tomorrow I get to meet him and his mother! Such an amazing blessing! Please pray for Elvis and his mother Esther. They’ve been through so much, they are so very far away and they still have a long path to travel upon but I truly believe angels are watching over them.
Thank you to Ann Logan-Lubben, her husband Jack Lubben, Laura Schleicher, Laura Redfern, Frank Jaworski and all of the supporters of Hearts Unite the Globe. Because of the work we are doing with the radio show, we really are helping others.
I especially want to thank HeartGift, the nonprofit organization that flew Esther and Elvis here and have provided life-saving surgery at no cost to this family. I really need to recognize two angel dads who were so helpful in trying to get Elvis where he needed to be — thank you so much Peter Mbogo Kamau of the Take Heart Association Project and Fareed Matthews of Brave Little Hearts SA — both of these wonderful gentlemen continued correspondence with so many people in an effort to help little Elvis. Truly, this was a labor of love for so many people. I am very touched with how people came together to provide a miracle for Elvis.
– Anna Jaworski, Board Chair, Hearts Unite the Globe. January 21, 2016
*Heart to Heart with Anna (about Congenital Heart Defects on Blog Talk Radio) a service of the nonprofit organization Hearts Unite the Globe
I recently took a trip to visit family. They live in a large city. The trip was during the hottest time of the year. There is something about the lack of trees, the reflection of the sun on windows and concrete and riding hot public transportation with hundreds of equally sweaty people that can make me feel like I am being forced to listen to fingernails on a chalkboard.
Hot bus, summer in the city
In the middle of one of these hot afternoons, I found myself on a city bus on my way back to my family’s apartment. Trying to forget about my aching feet and beads of sweat that would not go away, I closed my eyes. However, my attempts at finding a moment of zen were harshly and frequently interrupted. Every few blocks when the bus driver would open the doors to let people on and off (and keep the doors open for some unknown reason), there was a seemingly-endless round of the following noises:
The “stop requested” bell – repeating itself at one-second intervals
A recorded female voice saying “please exit through the rear door” – repeating itself at two-second intervals
I expected the bus driver make a general announcement: “stop repeatedly pressing the stop requested button!” No announcement – the dings continued. I expected a bus rider to yell “stop repeatedly pressing the stop requested button!” No yelling – the dings continued.
I decided this out-of-towner needed to take matters into her own hands. I looked around the bus to see if I could send the “stop repeatedly pressing the button” message to someone. I determined the culprit. It was not what I expected. I expected that someone was knowingly bothering the bus or that a technical glitch was happening. What I discovered was neither.
A boy (about 13 years old) was holding one of the polls where the waist-level “stop requested” buttons was located. He was mindlessly and obliviously doing what I could only call the “belly bump” with the “stop requested button.” He was riding solo, so he was not trying to impress his friends with his “belly pressing” skills. I believe on this hot day he had found his own moment of zen in his mindless swaying and leaning. However in his zen state, his ears had become temporarily disconnected.
These discoveries happened in a matter of seconds for me, so for the next few seconds I tried to imagine the scenarios in which the annoying noises would stop. As I mentioned, no announcements or communications were being made to the boy. I was pretty far away from him, so I did not want to scar him for life by yelling across the bus “Hey kid, your belly is ringing the bell. Cut it out!” I did mumble to the guy next to me “that kid’s belly is ringing the bell” in hopes that my seat-mate would have less compunction about yelling something to the boy (he did not). I had an idea that people who live here should take action first, as opposed to an out-of-towner like me. I wanted to do something – but I felt pretty helpless…and irritated.*
The bystander effect
After I got off the bus, I got a flashback from freshman year psychology 101 class. We learned about the ‘bystander effect.’ This term describes a psychological phenomenon when individuals do not offer to help a victim when other people are present. And generally, the more bystanders, the less likely it is that any one of them will help. One explanation for this is that people feel the responsibility is diffused when others are around.
It was clear that no one (not even me) stepped forward to stop that boy from ringing the bell with his stomach. Maybe this was an example of the bystander effect (albeit there was no real harm being done, which is perhaps why none of us stopped the boy. Plus many of us may have thought that stopping the boy would cause harm through embarrassment to the boy. So this situation was ambiguous in those ways). Nevertheless, since I had this occasion to think about the bystander effect – I started applying it to my life as a nonprofit geek.
Kudos to you
It occurred to me that people who work for nonprofit organizations are not bystanders. Each one has jumped in to help; to right a societal wrong; to work on making the world a better place. You have made altruistic and activist choices – and I am giving a big nonprofit geek standing ovation to you for that. Hooray for you!
And there is something else that has earned you bigtime geek points from this nonprofit geek. Your activism has compelled you to learn ways to help even more! (You are reading this blog, aren’t you?) As Dacher Keltner, Ph.D. of the Greater Good Science Center says:
“… much of the bystander research suggests that one’s personality only determines so much. To offer the right kind of help, one also needs the relevant skills or knowledge demanded by a particular situation.”
So feel good! Feel good for helping (and not standing by) and for learning more ways to help. You are making the world a better place – with more bus rides of zen and less annoying ‘dings.’ Thank you for your work with nonprofit organizations.
*So what did I do? I pulled out my cell phone and recorded it so I could maybe smile about it later.
greater good geek 