Notes Sept 16, 2008

Thanks to those of you that came to the meeting tonight. Here's a recap of what we talked about.

Officer Positions Available

• Fundraising board will consist of 2 (?) members to rise money for activities during the year
• So far Chelsea Germano is one of these members

Publicity

• Venues for publicity this semester can include the Dec and the Cav Daily
• Saana will send out the Guluwalk information and logo so we can start to flyer and chalk soon

Sources of Money

• Appropriations for UNICEF
• OAA and AAS (academic organizations that give money to groups)

Guluwalk

• Saturday October 25th 2pm
• Tabling October 20th - 24th
• This is during family weekend so we will have to compete with the family activities, but it could help us in donations

Water Droplets

• Tabling October 27th - November 1st

Draft Letters

• Ashi will send out a draft letter sometime this week to take to businesses asking for money/goods for Guluwalk
• Elizabeth Tilton (Saana will contact her) can donate food
• Go to any businesses at home if you happen to be home one weekend
• 5 areas: Corner (Molly and Chelsea), Barracks (Rashmita and Mehak), Downtown (Ashi and Kim), Target/Whole Foods (Rachel), our own homes
• Remember it's tax-deductible!

Guluwalk

• We still need to find speakers - ask Invisible Children and Building for Tomorrow
• We're also looking for music groups to perform
• The Invisible Children might be coming through this area soon with the Lost Boys

Next Week's General Body Meeting

• Tuesday September 23rd 8pm Minor 130
• This will be an educational meeting
• We'll talk about Guluwalk, publicity for this semester, and the Nicaraguan Orphan Fund

Service Festival

• We're continuing to brainstorm ideas for a booth, but let us know if you have any

First General Body Meeting Notes

Tshirts

• Shirts will be $10
• The new design will be royal blue on white shirts

Slideshow of the history of UNICEF

• UNICEF UVA is sponsored by the US Fund for UNICEF
• The Campus Initiative provides us with supplies and funding for projects
• Our goals are to education, advocate, and fundraise
• We wants to hear your ideas and goals!

Officers

• There are not currently any spots open as officers but it you would like to come to the meetings we can give you a position
• Officer meetings are every other Tuesday at 8 pm in the Student Activities Center (the bottom floor of Newcomb)

Ideas for the semester

• Documentary or film series
• Door-to-door fundraising

Publicity

• The publicity committee needs as much help as it can get! We need people to help chalk and flyer to spread the word for events
• We will also (hopefully) solicit help from Greek organizations

Nicaragaun Orphan Fund

• If you are interested in going to Nicaragua during spring break to work with orphans then look for more information from NOF coming soon

Blog

• The website for the blog is unicefuva.blogspot.com
• It will contain relates new stories, minutes from the meetings, and general announcements

Guluwalk

• Guluwalk will take place on Saturday, October 25th
• Join the facebook event and invite all of your friends!

First General Body Meeting

Don't miss our first meeting tonight!!

Tuesday, 8:30 PM

Minor 125

We'll be giving an overview of what UNICEF is all about and what UVA-UNICEF does.

We will also be discussing our plans for the year including a few big events coming up.

Learn how you can get involved, have fun, and meet lots of new people!

Don't forget to bring $10 for a T-shirt if you're interested.

www.giveadrop.com for cleaner, safer drinking water!

Hey UNICEF-UVAers! I hope you all are having a fantastic summer. As I was sitting here at 1 am studying for my LSAT, I was surfing Perezhilton.com and found a great link that is incredibly relevant to our theme of world hunger/clean drinking water for next year, so I thought I'd give you all a heads up to learn more or donate.

www.giveadrop.com

Project Clean Water is being run by Virgin and the singer Jewel to provide clean drinking water for people around the world who are in desperate need of a safe water source. They're involved in education, sanitation of water supplies, and research in sustainability.

Here are some statistics from their page:
"...some 40 billion working hours are lose each year in Agrica to time spent carrying water."
"443 million school days are lost each year due to water-related diseases"
"$15 can purchase a small scale water filter for a family"
"$2500 can provide an entire village with a fully equipped water well"

Check the site out!

Apr 21 Meeting-Last of the Year!

Hey UNICEF-UVA members!

Here are the notes from Monday's meeting if you missed it.

Announcements:
-T-shirts for next year! The design is all set, the t-shirts will be between $10-12
-Dues for next semester will be $5

Goals:
-increase membership
-increase club unity
-plan events early and efficiently

Gulu Walk
-Music: a band from CNU expressed interest to come
-Speakers--authors of "Three Cups of Tea"--Greg Mortenson and David Relin
-Food--later date--last year we had TONS of donations
-Location--amphitheater, rain site Mem Gym
-Time: afternoon or evening--2-7 ish (not the whole time, 2-5 or 4-7)

Theme:
-we decided not to focus on one country, but more on a theme that affects several, if not all, countries to some degree: WORLD HUNGER AND CLEAN WATER
-incorporating issues in Latin America, Asia, and Africa

5k
-theme will be poverty, clean water, or both in accordance with our overall group theme for the year
-Selam and Kelsey (Me!) will be planning the run and contacting Ragged Mountain for help
-this is for SPRING semester, since we have the Gulu Walk in the fall

Membership
-computer sign up for Activities Fair
-promotional movie with photos from last year
-wearing GULUWalk shirts since ours won't be ready
-blue and white balloons

Recommendations for Next Year
-planning events early
-relying less on cosponsorship--plan event and then look for friendly groups
-attendance at meetings
-ICE CREAM SOCIAL/COOKOUT for first meeting
-utilize facebook group better

Alrighty guys! We got a lot done, and we're all excited to get some good stuff done together next year! I hope you all do well on finals and enjoy your summer!

Meeting--ELECCIONES!

Hola amigos!

Today at our UNICEF-UVA general body meeting, we held elections for our major positions. With tight races all around, we welcome our upcoming executive body:

Madame President - Ashi (cue "Hail to the Chief")
Vice-President - Kim
Secretary - Rachel
Treasurer - Biruh
Publicity - Saana
Publicity Committee - Megan, Tiffany, Bianka, Whitney
Outreach - Rashmita
Events Coordinator - Selam
Historian - Kelsey
Webmaster -Mehak

I, as historian, will be your faithful blogger, along with fellow dedicated gal Samantha, who will be joining me on this site.

Together, we will be blogging about recent news events, upcoming related social events here on campus and nearby locales, and fun factual information in order for our readers to become more aware of what is going on in the world as it relates to UNICEF.

Thanks for reading, and I look forward to blogging for you!

U.N. Teams With Google Earth To Track Refugees, Educate Public

By Mike Musgrove

Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, April 12, 2008; Page D02

Can Google Earth save the world?

The U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees announced a new partnership with the search engine this week. The goal: To use Google's globe-mapping software to illustrate the plight of parts of the planet's population.

Google Earth, a free, virtual-globe program from the search engine company, lets users zoom in on locations around the planet. Users can also use special programs known as layers, which organizations can build to incorporate video, text or other interactive features.

Under an outreach program, Google has been populating its virtual globe with socially minded projects from such organizations as Greenpeace, the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum and UNICEF. Six such layers have been launched in the past two weeks.

Click on the United Nations' "visit a camp" button in Google Earth, for example, and an online depiction of the globe spins and zeroes in on a satellite view of a refugee camp in Chad. There, visitors learn about the refugees who have fled to that country from western Sudan's Darfur region. Click on a button and users can find out how much money it costs to install, say, a new water source at the camp. Click again and users can donate that amount.

"The great thing about Google Earth is it gives you that ability to be there," said Tim Irwin, a spokesman for the U.N. refugee organization. "We're hoping to take something that might be a little abstract for some people and make it very real."

Rebecca Moore, manager of Google Earth Outreach, said she is hoping the software can be used by organizations on a larger scale. "This sort of immersive experience can lead to greater understanding, greater compassion and a desire to help," she said.

The U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum launched "World is Witness," a layer that traces a recent trip to Rwanda to learn about the 1994 genocide there.

Last year, the museum was the first nonprofit organization to launch a Google Earth layer. The museum credited the program for increasing traffic to its "How can I help" page from 2,500 visitors a month to more than 50,000.

"It has been hugely helpful in terms of our outreach efforts," said John Heffernan, director of the museum's Genocide Prevention Initiative.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/04/11/AR2008041103566.html?hpid=topnews