How Are You Giving Back This Season?

Reader Kate Corcoran, an Account Supervisor at Articulate Communications sent in a note about the "One Laptop Per Child" project. The project is facing some challenges, but we still think it is a worthy cause. What are you doing on your own or with your company to give back this season? At Horn Group, we've been supporting City Harvest and their food rescue program, among other good causes. Continue reading for Kate's letter to us about OLPC, and send info on your own non-profit work to prnewser at mediabistro.com When we heard about the "One Laptop Per Child" (OLPC) we knew we had to get involved. In short, OLPC is a non-profit organization whose mission is to empower children in developing countries to learn by providing one Internet-connected laptop to every school-aged child. The "give one and get one" concept is simple: a donation of $399 buys two laptop computers - one for us and one that will be given to a child. As a tech PR firm, this initiative seemed a like a great way for us to give back, while supporting our company goals. As PR professionals, we spend our days "getting the word out" about technology that make businesses run more efficiently and how to give employers the tools to make employees' jobs easier and more productive. We knew if successful, these computers would essentially do this for these children; make learning easier, more productive and not to mention, fun. OLPC is providing a more simple way for the nearly two billion children in developing countries to learn, express themselves and explore the world. These are children who have no formal education and little opportunity to advance in our competitive, global society. These computers will help arm the children with go-forward skills for the future and most importantly, allow them to see what's out there - and make their dreams of education a reality. Yesterday, PC World posted an in-depth story regarding OLPC which discussed the many issues that it will need to solve, in order to succeed in its mission. Like most start-up tech ventures, it's going take a whole lot of time, money and as PC World stated, "several transitions of management and leadership, as any commercial organization does." So, what about all the folks like Articulate who have donated holiday funds to help support OLPC? Well, I'd say it's a lot like VC's granting Series A Funding, you believe in the ultimate mission of the company, you take a chance and hope that it pays off in the end. In the case of OPLC, as PC World highlighted, there are a lot of kinks that need to be worked out. But, as tech people at heart, we can't help but hope that this mission will be successful. After all, look at what's at stake. Billions of children's futures. Because in its root we embrace OLPC's mission to help educate children, we've decided to support this cause, kinks or no kinks. We plan to donate both of our computers to children who need them much more than we do. If you'd like to learn more about OLPC please visit their Web site at www.laptopgiving.org

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How Are You Giving Back This Season?

Joe Ciarallo

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