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The Central Texas FIRST LEGO League Championship Tournament was held in Leander on Saturday, January 10th. A national nonprofit, FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) pairs adult mentors such as National Instruments engineers with teams of students as they participate in an international robotics competition. Students, ages 9-14 are given a themed challenge and have 10 weeks to work as a team to research and develop an engineering solution, all while demonstrating core values such as teamwork, friendly sportsmanship, what is discovered is more important than winning, having fun, and “gracious professionalism”.Listen, as Ray Almgren, National Instruments’ Vice President of Marketing and Academic Relations, explains FIRST LEGO League goals and benefits. The tournament and the entire 2008-2009 Central Texas FLL Season are made possible through generous support of fellow United Way corporate partners, National Instruments, and Silicon Labs. National Instruments, by supporting employees taking work time to mentor students through FLL, is making a strategic impact on the educational success of Central Texas students. Research indicates that students who receive consistent, personal guidance from an adult mentor are significantly more likely to finish school, improve grades, and have more positive relationships. This is a key reason why United Way has evolved its work to focus on middle school students and launch its “Youth Education” initiative. With efforts targeted at middle school, where it is critical to ensure that all students are prepared for the transition to high school, United Way is making a long lasting impact at […]

Nell Edgington is President of Social Velocity, and has been involved in the nonprofit world for most of her career. Her organization is devoted to providing thought leadership and accelerating social innovation around system-changing ideas that solve existing public challenges. The following Q&A we had with her, one that we think you’ll find interesting and provocative, appears in our upcoming e-newsletter, Community Matters. To subscribe to our e-newsletter, click here. Your bio says you’ve been in the social sector for over 13 years. Tell us what things were like for you when you first got involved with the non-profit world. How were they different from today’s imperative to develop entrepreneurial models in the nonprofit sector? I don’t know that things were fundamentally all that different when I got started. Nonprofits have always been entrepreneurial, if you think about it. They are created because someone sees a disequilibrium, or “market opportunity” (inadequate schools, poor housing, lack of cultural arts) so they create an organization, with great risk and few resources, to fix that disequilibrium. This is not so different from a business entrepreneur, aside from the social motive versus profit motive. I think what has changed over the past decade or so is a convergence among the public, private and nonprofit sectors. A decade or so ago the three sectors remained relatively separate. A nonprofit might receive corporate philanthropic dollars or federal dollars, or government might contract with a nonprofit to provide public services, but the three sectors stayed separate and […]

Thanks to College Forward for sharing with us their photos from their 2009 MLK Day of Service project, the Copperfield Nature Trails cleanup. You can click here to check out the slideshow of their project. They write: Thanks to the United Way for sponsoring Saturday’s MLK Day of Service! We had great success here at Copperfield Nature Trails. With all the College Forward volunteer help, we planted trees, extended trails, and moved a ton of trash out of the greenbelt.

Let the City of Austin know how you think an estimated $69 million in federal housing and community development funds should be spent over the next five years. The City of Austin is seeking input on its Five Year Consolidated Plan for FY 2009-2014. Share your input at public hearings and through an on-line survey. Visit the City’s Neighborhood Housing and Community Development website for more information.

State Representative Dawnna Dukes, one of the speakers at our 2009 MLK Day of Service kickoff event, talks about the history of the annual MLK Boulevard Cleanup, and why it was started. This is the 10th anniversary year of the annual cleanup. Representative Dukes also shares with us her thoughts on why community service is so important, and what this historic week means to her.

A big thank you to Dr. Leonard Moore, Vice-President, UT Diversity & Community Engagement, for his keynote address: “The Dream Realized”, at our 2009 MLK Day of Service, and for this inspiring interview about what giving back means to him.

January 21 – 25 Pledge 5 hours of service in 2009 and get a free cup of Starbucks Coffee. Hands On Central Texas is proud to partner with Starbucks and their national “I’m In!” campaign urging everyone to pledge a minimum of 5 hours of service during 2009. For more info, click here.

What a wonderful day it was! We sent the call out to Central Texans & y’all answered it! We hosted the Austin’s biggest MLK Day of Service with over 700 volunteers honoring the legacy of Dr. King. I was amazed by the number of kids & families that came to the Reflecting on the Dream Breakfast. I think we had 3 bus loads of kids (thanks to our community partner College Forward!) march right into the Huston-Tillotson University campus to get their MLK on! Of course, we couldn’t of done it without our community partners & sponsors including the Austin Area Heritage Council, City of Austin Neighborhood Housing & Community Development, Huston-Tillotson University & Office of State Representative Dawnna Dukes. A big thank you goes out to Dr. Leonard Moore, VP of Diversity & Community Engagment at UT. Talk about an amazing speaker! His message about pursing your passion & being “real” & focused truly connected with the kids & everyone in the room. Everyone was so inspired; they wanted more & his message embodied the dream of Dr. King! Check out the pics from our MLK event. The community truly came together to LIVE UNITED! Well, as you can tell we had a great time! What did you enjoy the most about this MLK Day of Service? Tell us your MLK experience! MandoDirector, Hands On Central Texas

Foundation Communities, partnering with United Way Capital Area”s 2-1-1, expects to return $26 million in tax refunds to Central Texans this year by preparing free tax returns. How?Individuals who make up to $25,000 and households making up to $50,000 call 2-1-1 Texas/United Way for information about this service and nearby locations. Volunteers like you can call 2-1-1 to volunteer as tax mobile casino preparers or visit our Hands On Central Texas website. What the Community Tax Centers Offer• Paper and electronic tax filing• Bilingual and sign-language interpreters• Prior-year tax return preparation• Applications for Individual Taxpayer Identification Numbers A map of the Community Tax Centers