I applied to college in 2001. Back then my friends thought I was crazy for doing all of my applications online. I thought they were crazy for trusting the USPS with something that important. I don’t even know if you can still apply to college on dead trees, but apparently most admissions offices haven’t embraced technology as much as they should. Matchbox is a Boston, MA based startup that took inspiration from the iPad and built a platform to make the selection process much better. This has little to do with how people apply to college, and everything to do with how admissions offices make decisions. Organization is essential, and it’s a heck of a lot easier to stay organized when every piece of information you need is on an iPad and you have software that allows you to interact with that information in a user-friendly way.
Are You a Match?
I have an iPad. There are some good things it’s good for (consuming content), and there are some things it’s not so good for (producing content). Where the device really shines is somewhere in-between. That’s right where Matchbox sits–the admissions process is all about interacting with the content applicants create. Reading it, rating it, and organizing the results. Take a look at Matchbox’s Product Tour. The software looks stunningly beautiful, and you can tell right off the bat that admissions is a process made for the iPad. If you’re as impressed as I am, go take a look at Matchbox’s Internships page. Right now they’re looking for a Development Intern (Engineering). I know you thought that you were done with the college admissions process forever, but give Matchbox a look. There’s also an “I just want to work here” link, so try that if you aren’t a Developer.
Links to Help You Begin Your Research
What have you heard about Matchbox?
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I’ve read plenty of articles about how technology is making kids dumber. Video games, Facebook, and text messaging are usually the culprits. I’m more interested in how technology is making kids smarter. My expectations for kids who are currently in elementary school are through the roof because of the tools they and their teachers have access to. Wireless Generation is a Brooklyn, NY based company that is at the forefront of education technology. The company was founded by two Rhodes Scholars who “shared a passion for technology and an interest in what it could do for K-12 teachers.” Within ten years they built this passion into a company that was sold for $360 million. That’s what’s cool about the education market–you can feel like you’re doing good and still play in a market with big money.
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Walking around a museum and looking at stuff is usually boring for me. It’s just too passive. I like museums that are hands-on and offer experiential learning opportunities. I’ve never been there, but The Exploratorium in San Francisco, CA looks like my kind of museum. It’s focused on art, science, and human perception and based on the premise that “following your curiosity and asking questions can lead to amazing moments of discovery, learning, and awareness, and can increase confidence in your ability to understand how the world works.” The Exploratorium looks like a truly amazing place to visit, and they even offer all kinds of in-depth web content for those who can’t visit.
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There’s a homeless guy who lives in the park near my apartment. I’m convinced that he’s actually a superhero in disguise. There’s something different about him from the others who hang in the park. He combs his hair with a mirror, he works on his tan, and he uses his bags of stuff to do bicep curls. If you’re exercising, you have to some sort of positive outlook. That’s why I love what Back On My Feet is doing. They’re a Philadelphia, PA based non-profit that “promotes the self-sufficiency of people experiencing homelessness by engaging them in running as a means to build confidence, strength and self-esteem.” No food. No shelter. Just running at first. (There are some programs for those who have had success with the running.) We’ve seen plenty of athletic programs used to promote achievement in youth–why not try it with adults?
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Ever since I was a kid, I’ve wanted to spend as much time as possible enjoying nature. Along the way I’ve learned a lot of stuff without realizing it. For instance, I can tell you about the the entire lifecycle of mayflies or the spawning behavior of salmon. Yes, I’ve read about those things to supplement my knowledge, but you can’t really understand how it all works until you see it in action. That’s the premise that NatureBridge is based on. They’re a San Francisco, CA based non-profit that has spent the last 40 years introducing “1 million young people to the wonder and science of nature in the world’s best classrooms—our national parks.”
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It’s easy to think of the developing world as having completely different problems from the ones we have in the U.S. But when you look more closely, you start to realize that the link between poverty and a lack of good education is consistent across the world–our inner cities and the developing world have similar problems that require similar solutions. buildOn is a non-profit organization based in Stamford, CT that aims to break “the cycle of poverty, illiteracy, and low expectations through service and education” by “putting youth in service and building schools in developing countries.” Most non-profits either focus on education abroad or domestically, buildOn is unique in that they believe that they can better solve both problems by working on them at the same time.
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What have you done in the past week to make yourself a better candidate for the jobs that you’ll apply for after you graduate? E-mail me at willy@onedayonejob.com and tell me. Seriously. Developing new skills isn’t just about being better qualified for a job or internship–it’s also about showing employers that you’re constantly trying to better yourself and willing to invest time and money to do so. Companies love people who show a desire to grow into new roles. Luckily, there are more and more companies that offer online education with the purpose of actually teaching you applicable skills, not giving you a worthless piece of paper. One of these companies is Treehouse, which is based in Orlando, FL. Their “goal is to teach Web Design, Web Development and iOS, to everyone in the World who wants to learn.”
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I absolutely love playing sports and participating in other outdoor activities. Physical activities are great because they provide nearly immediate feedback. You have a great idea of how you’re performing and how hard you can push yourself. That’s why the National Ability Center in Park City, UT uses activities like “alpine and cross-country skiing, snowboarding, swimming, cycling, waterskiing, horseback riding, rafting,” and more to aid the “the development of lifetime skills for people of all ages and abilities.” By using specially designed equipment and well-trained instructors (many of whom are individuals with disabilities), The National Ability Center is able to bring these wonderful activities to people who may otherwise never have a chance to participate.
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Yesterday I almost got highlighted. I was in a boat, on a river, fishing with my Dad and a guide. A thunderstorm came up behind us, and we decided to tuck the boat in a cove under a bunch of trees and take cover. It wasn’t the best spot, but there wasn’t anywhere else for us to go. When it started hailing, I got a little nervous. And then BANG! A bolt of lightning hit the water about three feet to my right. You and I are both lucky that you’re reading this today. This story has nothing to do with today’s company except for the fact that yesterday’s near death experience made me want to regress back to being a little kid–the kind that reads Highlights. If you’re not familiar, Highlights is a Columbus, OH company that develops products for children with a common theme: “Fun with a Purpose.” It’s all about “wholesome fun” that “is dedicated to helping children grow in basic skills and knowledge, in creativeness, in ability to think and reason, in sensitivity to others, in high ideals and worthy ways of living.”
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When you’re a kid, you think that teachers have an easy job. They have good hours, lots of vacation with summers off, and they get to stand in front of a room and tell you what to do. As you get older, you start to realize that teaching also includes grading papers, planning lessons, communicating with parents, writing comments for report cards, and a whole lot more. A grade book just isn’t a good hub for managing all of this. Teachers need something industrial-strength, and that’s what Instructure provides with their Canvas Learning Management System. The Sandy, UT based company offers a suite of tools that enable teachers to spend way less time on administrative stuff, and more time teaching and working directly with students. They serve educators at all levels–from Kindergarten to some of the world’s top universities, which shows you just how flexible the Canvas platform is.
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Earth Day is a contrived holiday. It was designed as a day of teach-ins across the country to educate students about environmental evils. April 22 was chosen as the date because it fit perfectly between spring break and final exams. If you want to maximize on-campus student activity, this is the time of year to do it. It’s worked. Earth Day now has more than 40 years of history behind it, and it continues to be a great way to rally people for environmental causes. Earth Day Network is a Washington, DC based non-profit organization that organizes Earth Day activities across the world while also focusing on environmental causes year round. In the past they’ve “executed successful environmental campaigns on issues ranging from climate change and drinking water to voter registration and saving the whale.”
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You’re not going to like this. You’ve paid a lot of money for a fancy education, and now some of the best universities in the world are giving it away for free. You still have to pay to get the piece of paper, but if you’re just looking for the knowledge, then you need to check out Coursera. They’re a Mountain View, CA based startup that is “partnering with the top universities in the world to offer courses online for anyone to take, for free.” So far they’re working with Princeton, Stanford, Berkeley, Michigan, and UPenn. It doesn’t get much better than that. What makes Coursera unique from things like MIT’s OpenCourseWare is that these classes are specifically created to be consumed online.
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100 years ago today the Titanic sank. It wasn’t the world’s first transportation disaster, nor was it the last, but it’s the one that continues to captivate people. As a kid I was absolutely fascinated by the story of the Titanic–the unsinkable ship that sank. I had a few books on the topic that I read over and over again. I learned about Alvin, the deep sea submersible, and Jason Jr., the underwater robot, and how they were used to explore the Titanic once it was discovered in 1985 (by essentially dragging video cameras just above the ocean floor). The discovery and expeditions were partially done by teams from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, which is a Woods Hole, MA based “non-profit research and higher education facility dedicated to the study of all aspects of marine science and engineering and to the education of marine researchers.” If it has to do with ocean science and exploration, there’s an extremely good chance that the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution is on top of it.
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Today’s kids better be smarter and taller than our generation. Why? iPads. They’re amazing educational tools, and now they’re replacing textbooks. That means that today’s students not only should learn more quickly, but they can carry around a single device that weighs less than a pound and a half instead of a 40+ pound backpack filled with textbooks (and finally get back to standing upright). Inkling is a company that is making this beautiful future happen more quickly. They’re based in San Francisco, CA, and they’re building “a better textbook: one that [is] interactive and engaging, one that [takes] advantage of the opportunities afforded by new media like iPad.” They’re tearing away the assumptions that people make about books and moving in many different directions–literally. Even though Inkling calls what they do “interactive textbooks” to take advantage of familiar language, they really are building something completely new.
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I was really lucky in that my parents sent me to a top notch private school for 6th through 12th grade. I have no doubt that it had a significantly positive effect on my education. Why? Because it was a truly great school. Private schools obviously aren’t the only great schools (and plenty of private schools aren’t all that great), but there’s no doubt that many of our country’s public schools are underperforming. 50CAN is a New York, NY based non-profit organization that is pushing for education reform because they believe that “Great Schools Can Change Everything.” They don’t just mean test scores and individual outcomes. They mean our economy, our democracy, our dreams, our competitiveness, our health, our communities, and pretty much everything else. 50CAN is different from many of the education focused non-profits that you’re likely familiar with in that 50CAN is focused squarely on advocacy.
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Think back to your favorite 90s sitcom. Odds are that there was an episode where your favorite main character was bored to death by some teacher trying to teach him or her about the Constitution. Your favorite character was completely unengaged until some major life event (usually artificially created by the brilliant teacher) came up that made the Constitution super relevant. I can already picture the specific Boy Meets World and Saved by the Bell episodes. Since those tv shows don’t actually teach much about the Constitution, we need our kids to have similar real life experiences. That’s what Constitutional Rights Foundation provides. They’re a Los Angeles, CA based non-profit that aims “to instill in our nation’s youth a deeper understanding of citizenship through values expressed in our Constitution and its Bill of Rights and to educate young people to become active and responsible participants in our society.” This is really important stuff–we can’t just expect future generations to learn it from watching reruns on tv.
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I played beach volleyball yesterday. On St. Patrick’s Day! And I was hot! No, I didn’t go on vacation. Chicago is having an amazing stretch of unseasonably warm weather. The best thing about it is that it gets people out doing what they love because they know that it still could snow again. For me it’s volleyball (or fishing if I can escape the city), but for others it may be running, playing with their dog, or riding a bike. Since I saw a ton of bikes yesterday, I thought it would be a good day to take a look at Bike New York. They’re a New York, NY based non-profit organization that aims to “promote and encourage bicycling and bicycle safety through education, public events, and collaboration with community and government organizations.” Biking is good for cities and good for people, so Bike New York isn’t just about biking for biking’s sake.
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I’m not big on St. Patrick’s Day, but judging from the number of people that I’ve seen dressed in green today, I’m about the only one who isn’t. It gets pretty ridiculous here in Chicago, and I’m sure it does in quite a few other cities. It makes me wonder what people from Ireland think of the way Americans celebrate the holiday. I’m sure some of the people who have been helped by the Irish International Immigrant Center in Boston, MA have an opinion. It’s a non-profit organization that “has supported Irish immigrants since 1989 and has grown into a multiservice center for people from 120 countries helping them find their place in our multicultural society.” While most of us think about Irish immigrants coming to America in the 1800s, there are certainly still people immigrating. That’s why the Irish International Immigrant Center exists.
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My last foreign language learning experience came in tenth grade French class. I found it mind numbingly boring even though we used French in Action, which was supposed to be a wonderful method for learning the language. If you can’t keep a student engaged, he or she will never learn the language. That’s why Voxy might be worth checking out for those of you who have had trouble learning languages through other methods. They’re based in New York, NY, and they offer “an exciting, award-winning way to learn a language from life.” How do they do this? They use web and mobile technologies to teach you a language while you’re doing things that you’d normally do–reading articles, playing games, or walking around your city. Not only does this make learning more fun, but it also makes it more useful. What you learn is based on the context of your life, so you’ll actually know why what you’re learning is useful.
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I’ve mentioned before that my middle and high school sent its classes on annual trips to promote bonding and discourage cliquiness. In 6th grade it was a Whale Watch, in 7th grade it was Camp Hi-Rock, and in 8th grade it was supposed to be Chewonki. We had been hearing about Chewonki from the older kids for years, but for some reason they changed it to Camp Sloane for our class. That ended up being a 1-year experiment after 20 members of my 8th grade class (including me) got lost in the woods overnight with one teacher. I thought it was fun, but some others (and their parents) weren’t so amused. Anyway, when I was looking for a non-profit to feature today, I came across the Chewonki Foundation in Wiscasset, ME. The name is obviously familiar, even if I never got to go. The simplest way to describe Chewonki might be as a camp, but that doesn’t really do justice to the wide range of programs that they offer.
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Amy and I are going to the International Kennel Club of Chicago Dog Show today. We’re not thinking about getting a dog yet, but we’re thinking about thinking about it. Since dogs are on my mind today, I figured I’d look for an animal friendly non-profit. You’d be hard pressed to find an organization more animal friendly than The Humane Society of the United States. They are “the nation’s largest and most effective animal protection organization” with support from more than 11 million people in the U.S. Their national headquarters is based in Washington, DC, but you’re probably familiar with local humane societies. While the local societies are not directly connected with The Humane Society of the United States, they do get support from it.
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The word “results” is extremely common in the business world, but you don’t hear it as much in the non-profit world. That is changing, but I still hear a lot of my friends griping about how ineffective the non-profits they’ve worked in have been. My guess (and hope) is that that’s not a problem at Results for Development Institute in Washington, DC considering that they have “results” in their name. They’re a non-profit organization that “delivers policy analysis, critical information, decision-making tools, and policy advice for governments, civil society organizations, and external funders to use to reduce poverty and accelerate social and economic progress in low and middle income countries.” It’s all about finding the levers that will deliver the highest impact and then finding the right way to pull them.
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My parents are big gardeners, so when I go home in the summer there’s always something fresh to eat. I never appreciated this as a kid (except for the wild berries in the backyard), but now I think it’s pretty awesome. Gardening is not only a great source of healthy food, but it can also be an extraordinary education tool. That’s why Urban Sprouts, which is based in San Francisco, CA, is using gardening to grow “healthy schools and communities.” It started as “a doctoral thesis project conducted at Luther Burbank Middle School during the 2003-04 school year,” but it was so successful that the school begged them to continue and expand the program.
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I’m lucky to live smack dab between two parks. Though they’re both small but very lively–filled with dog walkers in the winter and everybody else when it gets a little bit nicer out. Park space really makes cities better, which is why managing and maintaing parks is an extremely important job. That’s exactly what the Madison Square Park Conservancy in New York, NY. Madison Square Park is owned by the city, but is managed by a partnership of the Department of Parks & Recreation and the Conservancy. It wasn’t all that long ago that the park “was neglected and crime-ridden.” After $6 million and a lot of work from caring people through the Campaign for the New Madison Square Park, it is now a place that people want to visit again with “lush and brilliant horticulture” and a variety of cultural programs.
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There are some industries where company histories gets really confusing. Mergers, acquisitions, bankruptcies, name changes, and all kinds of other events make it hard to truly understand what parts of the story are meaningful. I’ve found this especially prevalent with financial institutions, advertising agencies, and publishers. We’re going to talk about the latter today. Macmillan is the New York, NY based face of a “group of publishing companies in the United States held by Verlagsgruppe Georg von Holtzbrinck” (a German company). As I read through their history, I got a bit overwhelmed. It starts in 1843 with two Scottish brothers, and includes the story about a completely different publisher named Macmillan. While understanding Macmillan’s history is important, it’s far more important to understand their future, which might include you.
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On Tuesday I mentioned that I saw Mrs. Doubtfire for the first time in many years. One of the fun things about watching movies and tv shows from your childhood is picking up on all of the things that went over your head when you were a kid. I love it when writers are able to please both the young and the old at the same time. However, it feels like entertainment is getting less and less subtle, which means that it keeps getting harder for parents to monitor what kids are watching. That’s why Common Sense Media, which is based in San Francisco, CA, exists. They’re a non-profit organization that “is dedicated to improving the lives of kids and families by providing the trustworthy information, education, and independent voice they need to thrive in a world of media and technology.”
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Despite my outdoorsiness, I was never a boy scout. I’ll admit that I was a little jealous of the other kids when they came into school with their uniforms covered in patches, but I’m sure I earned plenty of patches as a kid–even if I never actually got patches (now I can buy them from Best Made Company). Still, I have a ton of respect for Boy Scouts of America. They’re an organization that has lasted more than a century by staying focused on a core set of values. They believe “that helping youth is a key to building a more conscientious, responsible, and productive society,” and they’ve continuously adapted the way that they’ve helped you to keep current. Boy Scouts of America is headquartered in Irving, TX, but they operate (and have job opportunities) all across the country.
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Hopefully your class schedule hasn’t started a daytime tv habit, but if it has, at least you know who Dr. Oz is. If you don’t know, he’s a heart surgeon who was made famous by his appearances on The Oprah Winfrey Show. He now has his own show, but he also started a non-profit with his wife called HealthCorps. It’s based in New York, NY, and it’s aimed at “fighting the obesity and mental resilience crisis by getting American students and communities across the country to take charge of their health.” The organization was founded in 2003 and already has its peer mentoring programs in 54 high schools across 13 states. By the end of the year they expect to impact more than 100,000 students, and by 2015 they want to be in 100 high schools across all 50 states.
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Last weekend we took a look at Outward Bound and their amazing outdoor programming. Today we’re going to look at an organization with a similar approach, but a much tighter focus. It’s called CampInteractive, and they introduce “the creative power of technology and the inspiration of the outdoors to underprivileged inner-city youth.” They’re based in New York, NY, but they often venture well outside of the city limits. The combination of nature and technology seems like a bit of an odd one, but CampInteractive is making it work. They realize that inner-city youth often lack both technical and leadership skills, so they’ve built programs to address both, albeit in different ways.
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I’ve been a devoted Apple fanboy since 1990, yet I didn’t watch the liveblogs for their Education Event yesterday. It’s hard to get excited about digital textbooks when you never intend to read a textbook again, but I have to say that I’m looking forward to seeing how much technology will change the ways that future generations learn. Apple pushed a lot of people forward yesterday, but there’s a lot more to education than the content. Communication between teachers and students is essential, and technology can play an amazing role in this relationship. Coursekit is a New York, NY based company that offers “instructors and students amazingly designed tools to manage their courses – calendaring, file management” while making “it unbelievably easy to interact with one another.” It may kill a lot of your excuses for why you didn’t do your homework, but I think that the benefits are pretty obvious.
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