Difference between revisions of "User:Holt"
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communities need sunlight, water and modern tools; a majestic forest | communities need sunlight, water and modern tools; a majestic forest | ||
will come. Organized Community Mentoring within OLPC Contributors | will come. Organized Community Mentoring within OLPC Contributors | ||
| − | Program (which I overhauled | + | Program (which I overhauled [in 2009] thanks to a dedicated |
team of volunteers) has proved instrumental to this end. | team of volunteers) has proved instrumental to this end. | ||
| Line 69: | Line 69: | ||
the coming decade, open to all meaningful partnerships, while always | the coming decade, open to all meaningful partnerships, while always | ||
protecting our organic grassroots. This will not be easy, but the | protecting our organic grassroots. This will not be easy, but the | ||
| − | lifelong friends I've made over the last | + | lifelong friends I've made over the last [3 years] in the OLPC/Sugar |
community will make this possible. Kids need healthy families to | community will make this possible. Kids need healthy families to | ||
explore their worlds, not tabloid divorces, to advocate for | explore their worlds, not tabloid divorces, to advocate for | ||
Revision as of 16:57, 16 September 2010
- Embrace Support as explicit strategy
More than an afterthought, more than usability hunches, and rather in the footsteps of Greg Smith and the 200+ support volunteers I decided to recruit starting in December 2007. Let's expand the mandate of Sugar Labs into the treacherous world of supportive support, and friendly documentation -- where Quality feeds on itself, when users and volunteers are all tired of being users -- and help each other get back to learning.
- Crack Open Volunteerism & Mentoring
Far beyond Sugar's existing developer constituency, eg: http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Contributors_program We must all Renew Our Message, and focus on people who are natural "connectors" building a Community Projects Platform that invites gradual engagement and commitment -- and avoid scaring away our most loyal & resourceful grandparents unfamiliar with irc! Participatory communities need sunlight, water and modern tools; a majestic forest will come. Organized Community Mentoring within OLPC Contributors Program (which I overhauled [in 2009] thanks to a dedicated team of volunteers) has proved instrumental to this end.
- Build Places for Teachers: Techie and Non-Techie
Vividly illustrating how learning with Sugar might make their jobs easier, building lifelong Bricolage dreams in their kids, eg: http://wiki.laptop.org/go/ClassActs/Resources I will work with the Red Hat-inspired http://teachingopensource.org initiative (join me for Toronto's Summit Oct 29-30) to match techie teachers with non-techie teachers to establish this critical social fabric. Building a movement around diverse Grassroots Innovation means learning from our failures. While I prefer the word Adoption to Deployment, XO/Sugar supporters spontaneously came together with me Sept 6-11 in Washington DC (with zero funding) to prove This Can Work!
- Bring Budgetary Authority to Sugar Labs from OLPC, and Others
Our business is kids but our management must be adult if scalability is to be realized. Credibility does not come overnight, and is even harder to establish in the funding battles of the non-profit world-- but the time is now...
- Build Relationships around our Human Mission
Nurtured by the expressivity of the telephone and the facetime of local groups, when digital immigrants need months to learn wiki/irc culture. Community leadership means reducing "male" conflict, and increasing "female" active listening -- greatly deepening our culture of free speech and critique. Not a testosterone culture of "free screech" scaring away earnest contributors. But a genuinely Free and Open tolerance, marching forward into globalization every day, driven by more quiet consciences than will ever send us email.
- Cross-fertilize Sugar/OLPC Local Labs
Gratuitous travel exhausts our earth's vanishing resources. But I paid for several trips around North America and Europe over the past 2 years for a reason -- to lay these seeds. Now we can move our community-building beyond cultivating hobbyists into a learning organization, willing to both negotiate large contracts and decentralize delegated empowerment, accept other learning cultures with different curricular construction kits. Washington DC is a perfect example: building Sugar/XO synergies with deployment expertise, physical XO libraries, a grassroots repair shop, monthly talks and a sophisticated network of nearby computer clubhouses. Similarly, I will be working hard with Mike Lee to seed a multitalented Sugar/OLPC group this fall in NY City, starting mid-November if you can hopefully join! EG. The volunteer repair centers I coordinate worldwide for OLPC can now grow into a much stronger network with proper Care And Feeding.
- Now is the time to build a Broad-Based 21st Century Learning Movement
I will substantially widen the spectrum of communications between Sugars Labs and OLPC to help pave the way for Sustainability over the coming decade, open to all meaningful partnerships, while always protecting our organic grassroots. This will not be easy, but the lifelong friends I've made over the last [3 years] in the OLPC/Sugar community will make this possible. Kids need healthy families to explore their worlds, not tabloid divorces, to advocate for 1 billion small-but-growing brains on this planet. Sugar Labs and OLPC owe it to the world's children to similarly mature into responsible, playful, lifelong parents! Even if not always loved :)