Time For the World – Funding update, BuildFTW, Builders’ Workshops, the Build A Better World Game

Hello!

Things are moving fast in Time For the World land.

First, we have received some key seed funding! A generous anonymous donor has pledged $10,000. This will unlock an additional $10,000 from a challenge grant pledged last year. Thanks to our donors!

This funding enables us to move forward with improvements to http://BuildFTW.org, start building out the other pieces (TeachFTW, ShareFTW, BankFTW), conduct more in-person outreach to Build sites, and create and share a robust Builders’ Workshops work-and-learn series.

We still have $5000 left on that challenge grant and it expires in August – so now it’s your turn to pitch in and help out. Help us reach $5000 before the end of summer and we double the money! Let’s aim for the end of June rather than the end of summer, we have lots of work to do.

Click this link to donate: https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=EWZUKAJNYUKS2

Projects are being logged at http://BuildFTW.org – slowly, slowly. That’s fine for now because we’re still constructing and improving and creating how-to materials and processes. But for those of you who are ready to start please go post your projects! The more actively we share stuff the more valuable it becomes. There’s a sustainable forestry project in Kenya, an Artist Bailout in LA, Health care coops in Pennsylvania, restorative justice projects in Madison and more. Help make it as cool as it can be!

And last but not least, our Builders’ Workshops are off to a great start. Workshop #2 is next Thursday May 17 – Building Blocks and Bridging Barriers
See the whole series calendar at: http://assets.danecountytimebank.org/Builders_workshop_calendar.pdf

We’re especially excited for the June 21 session where we’ll roll out our brand new Build A Better World Game. You’re invited to play it wherever you are! It starts as a board game but can grow into the Build A Better World Real-Life Adventure and beyond. Details to come…

As always, thanks for your interest and participation.

–Stephanie

First Builders’ Workshop was great! Plus… time to start posting projects on BuildFTW!!!

Builders’ Workshop #1 TOMORROW!

Hello!

We’re excited for tomorrow’s Builders’ Workshop, the first in our new monthly series. We’ll focus on how timebanking can help you accomplish your mission, whether you’re with an organization or want to simply partner with others in your community to achieve a common goal. Then we’ll have a lovely meal prepared by our Wellness Project organizers.

See the full calendar here.

If you were hoping to join us from afar you need to let me know asap so I can be sure we have the proper tools. Email steph@stephanierearick.com or call 608 443-8229.

And check out Build! Add your project/s if you’re ready. It’s under construction and your early feedback is really useful to us. We’ve spelled out some of the coming features too, on the landing page and in the Q&A and blogs.

We look forward to working with you on all of this!

Gearing up…. It’s about time to Build For the World

Hello!

Here’s what’s going on with us:
1. Soft launching BuildFTW online platform over the next couple weeks
2. Starting Builders’ Workshops Work and Learn Series in April
3. Launching Builders’ TimeBank to support all this work
4. Build Camp June 1 and 2 – connecting developers and projects to make cool stuff
—

1. Today is a big day for us. It’s time for a (very) soft launch of our Build For the World platform. This is just for our good friends and active timebanking projects (this may mean you!) for now – we’re beginning to ask you to post your projects at the site. It’s still under construction and will be for a long time – and that’s a good thing. This gives us a chance to be responsive to your input about how easy it is to use, what will make it most useful to you, etc.

We aim to link well with other efforts in order to make it easy to log in, add information, find what you need, etc. Contact us if you’d like to get started at the very beginning!

2. While we’re beginning to populate the BuildFTW site we’re also developing a monthly work and learn series, called Builders’ Workshops, in order to build leadership skills of people participating while creating video and written materials to share with the rest of the world.

We’ll start with a few broad sessions on what our economy is and has been over human history, what it could be and various tools and models being used to get it to a better place. Then we’ll go into project initiation and facilitation training, after which we’ll start focusing in on specific issues. Topics we will cover include: Wellness, Food Security, Transportation, Energy, Housing, Poverty, Arts, Healthy Community Economy (where we’ll begin our work to join our timebank with other models like price-based mutual credit, local currency, community-directed lending). Everything we do is made to share. And we hope to collaborate with lots of people far and wide – so let us know if you want to help by contributing content, time or talents.

Here’s the calendar.

We’ll be working to find good ways for people to join us virtually if you can’t be in Madison. If you know of a great tool for doing this (we have ideas if noone suggests something better) let us know.
As you’ll see from the calendar, after October we’re flexible about how we schedule the various issue topics and will base that on when guest presenters and project participants are most available. We hope you’ll want to join us in creating and/or participating in these!

3. We’re also launching the Builders’ TimeBank and you can sign up now at http://builders.timebanks.org
We’re using that to find and exchange resources that can directly contribute to the Build platform and learning support. We’re also using it to exchange resources among Build projects. That means if your project is signed up on BuildFTW you’ll be encouraged to use the Builders’ TimeBank to find things you need to make your projects successful.

Our reciprocity model: We ask you to honor the past and invest in the future, and ask for all the help you need in making your present project successful. You can interpret that how you like, and we encourage you to use your imagination. You might honor the past by helping out an earlier initiative, giving some money, timebank hours or other resources in exchange for using their materials… You might invest in the future by creating or adapting some materials, training new people, translating, innovating and sharing. We thought it would be fun to play more with the concept of time as the medium and like how every effort can qualify as someone else’s ‘past’ or ‘future’ investment.

Later we’ll also have BankFTW where we can exchange resources that aren’t time-based and we’ll keep using the same past/present/future reciprocity model there if it’s working. All of this is in service to trying things out to find out what works best.

4. Last and definitely not least, we’ll be co-hosting Build Camp here on June 1 and 2. This is geared toward bringing software developers and other technical minds together with people working on projects with a goal of creating and improving some tools during the event. Stay tuned for more info as that develops….

Well that’s quite enough for now! Thanks for playing.

We’ve been quiet lately – Here’s why. And other news

Hi

Oh, we know we’ve been woefully out of touch on this blog. But not because we’re not doing stuff!

I’m writing a massive proposal for funding for Build For the World. Marc’s working on pulling together an early March event where we involve programmers in making exciting new tools for our projects and others. Preston’s about to spend a couple months in Boston but will be around for our events here. Leander’s in South America and we’re really hoping to be able to bring him back to Madison in Spring and Summer, to stay awhile and work with us on all this cool stuff.

Before he left in December, Leander finished up a lot of fine work (building on what Marc started earlier and continues to work on) on a Drupal 7 platform for Build For the World. It’s looking great so far but we have a few pieces left to add, which Marc is working on now when he’s not working on tons of stuff for the UW and beyond. This Build platform will be where community-problem-solving projects will tell the world what they’re doing, their goals and outcomes, share their tools and protocols and communicate with each other so we can learn from each other more. As soon as we add these couple pieces, which will include a survey that helps create some standard simple measures for evaluation and a repository where we can upload documents to share, I’ll populate it with all Dane County TimeBank’s great projects to see how it is to use. Then we’ll start inviting the world at large to join in, likely beginning with the timebanking community we’re already in touch with but working to branch out to include projects using other kinds of cooperative economic tools.

There are some other efforts out there we hope and plan to join up/cooperate with and we’ll keep you posted as those developments occur.

So – if you want to help, be in touch. We need projects’ stewards to sign up their projects and share resources; programmers; money; in-kind donations; introductions to people you know who are doing things that will work well with this; introductions to people/organizations who might want to fund us; offers to share relevant knowledge and ideas.

We plan to create a Builders’ timebank for those offers that don’t fit with our exact needs at the moment but can be shared among Build projects. We also will create Bank For the World as soon as we can get to it – this will catalog all the contributions of all kinds to the project so we can work toward finding new ways to exchange resources to meet a variety of needs.

Hope you’ll play with us!

Final installment, Up The Wall Tour: Update #4 – Detroit to home

In Detroit…
We stayed with Kim Hodge (in Lathrup Village), organizer extraordinaire and founder of the Michigan Alliance of TimeBanks, who hosted and co-facilitated the two days of trainings we did.

The trainings were in a great church in Detroit, the Lighthouse Community Church on Wyoming St., thanks to Joan and her son the pastor.

First day we focused on identifying and engaging stakeholders – the organizations, groups and individuals who can help each timebank meet its goals.

We went through how to identify your vision, mission and objectives and base your activities around those things. Once you’re clear on what your real vision and goals are it’s much easier to determine who needs to be involved to make those things happen and what messages might appeal to them.

We also discussed how to approach organizations with one need that timebank members could fill and one asset the organization can provide in return, in order to make it very clear and simple how timebank involvement can be mutually beneficial. And how to know whether an organization has someone internal or with a strong active connection who will be willing to do the work to make timebank participation flow well. I always advise that this is essential to success with each organization, or at least has been for us at the Dane County TimeBank.

In the afternoon we were joined by a few additional people, including some stakeholders that organizers are working to get involved. During this time we went through some nuts and bolts issues about liability, insurance, resources available for these things, policy decisions and more (TimeBanks USA, Michigan Alliance of TimeBanks, Dane County TimeBank among others).

Then we did a visioning exercise focused on how we could use timebanking to facilitate successful and healthy reintegration into the community for returning soldiers. We first determined who would need to be involved in order to create a robust circuit of assets and needs. Then we mapped how a variety of community members could participate, based on each ones’ own assets and needs, and create a web of resources that can support the returning soldier and everyone else in the neighborhood. This seemed to help participants to see how they could create similar networks in their own communities, tailored to meet their own goals.

We had some practice rounds and a lovely close led by Kim and contributed to by everyone.

Next day was on funding and sustainability. Again, we focused on how to use your mission, vision and objectives to identify what resources you’ll need, best adapted to meeting your goals. We also did a lot of need and asset mapping and identification of non-monetary resources that can be brought in, then went through sources for monetary resources and what they tend to be necessary for. Sources identified were member fees, organizational member fees, contracts, grants, services provided, and various fundraising strategies. We explored some of these options in greater depth and then did individual need and asset mapping to begin picturing what sustainability would mean for each project. And I learned that Edge from Lansing will be making a documentary on timebanking and will be creating some pieces of what we’ve been looking for from a video production intern, and we’ll be looking to work together a bit. Very exciting!

After the session and a potluck, we got a little rest before I went to play at an art reception at Mercado art gallery in Mexicantown, Southwest Detroit. The gallery was beautiful! Big glass walls, boxy white rooms with a great art show inside. I found my new favorite artist, Susan Aaron Taylor (or at least from the three pieces she had there). Spaceband played first and were great as always. I really enjoy playing in a boxy echoey space with good sound and lighting so I had a great time. Read the rest of this entry »

Up The Wall Tour update #3 – Ohio – Montreal

After spending the night of 10/18 with my parents we drove 7 ½ hours from Ohio to New York City, where I met up with my friend Sabrina and her husband Lewis and had a grand time starting to catch up. I never get to see Sabrina and she’s just wonderful so this was a happy time. They have a cute and really funny 2-year-old, Augie who I started to get to know pretty quickly.

October 20 was the Contact conference at a very cool building in the lower east side, called Angel Oresanz. Lent itself to the kind of creativity the organizers were hoping to catalyze. I led a teach-in on timebanking applied to community problem solving and made some good new connections, especially with Community Tools and Guillaume from Bernal Bucks in San Francisco. I hope we can collaborate in the future to help timebanking connect with other human-scaled systems to make a better economy.

A few projects were selected to move forward from the Contact conference. One is about making connections for better local food production and distribution. I attended the session on next steps and proposed timebanking as a tool for cataloging assets and needs and facilitating tracking and increased collaboration. I’ll continue to participate in that discussion online. Check it out here.

Next day began the Metacurrency Collabathon. Unfortunately, the beginning session coincided with my show at Sidewalk Cafe so I couldn’t attend. I had a show to play! Which was really fun, by the way, even though a small portion of the crowd was noisy enough to make up for all the other people who were quiet and attentive. I love the Sidewalk Cafe.

Leander gave rave reviews of the Friday evening gathering and Saturday and Sunday were very rewarding. Lots of great people with great insights, values and motivation were gathered in a brilliantly facilitated open space format and came up with wonderful ideas that will be followed up on. This is a motivated group with great track records of thinking up cool ideas and moving them forward. My favorite topic (just reflecting my personal bias) of the weekend: starting a travel and culture exchange that works toward creating an economy where people can make a living by being creative and following their passion. We’ll make it happen!

a scene from Stations Lost

We had to leave the collabathon early on Sunday to get to New Hampshire for a gathering of leaders of the new timebank in Durham. The drive was a little longer than we’d thought but lovely with fall leaves.

We arrived at 8pm and had a really nice meal with about eight timebank organizers. They were a great group with lots of insights. All women, several of whom are involved in peace and culture exchange organizations, one who’s studying public health and looking for documentation of timebanking/public health outcomes. Delicious food, good conversation.

Robin offered us a place to stay in her lovely home in a beautiful wooded neighborhood by the bay. She also gave me a trumpet! Her son played it in 4th grade and didn’t continue. This gift seemed too good to be true – I love my trumpet, which was my Dad’s when he was a kid. But it’s completely deteriorating (its second owner never took good care of it :( ) so I’m thrilled to have one in better shape so Dad’s can retire peacefully.

Next day we walked with Noel by the bay, then on a gorgeous mountain just across the Maine border. Finished up our conversation that we’d started the night before, then hit the road for Maine.

Next stop was in Augusta Maine at Stacey Jacobsohn’s house, timebank organizer extraordinaire. She fed us and we prepared for our gathering in Madison, Maine where the goal was to plant seeds for more development of the mid-Maine TimeBank in Madison, new territory for them.

We got to Madison Maine and were introduced to the sweet, tiny union hall where the gathering would be held, and to Pete, a Vet for Peace in his 60′s, a classic Mainer with a great accent and very winning personality! He gave me a gift I really treasure – a little box he’d run across that day while picking up supplies for the event. It says “Somewhere someone is looking for exactly what you have to offer.” He felt that running across it then was serendipitous and I agree.

This gathering was one of my favorites of the whole trip. There were about 10 people there, more men than women, more older than not. Stacey gave me one of the most moving and sweet introductions I’ve ever gotten and then the whole group engaged in a really fascinating conversation about our economy, how it got the way it is, how it can be different, and how they’ll go about getting timebanking going to meet their goals of boosting people’s economic standing and reweaving their community to better include everyone. It was really cool.

Afterward we went to Carol Dyar-Eaton’s house for a bonfire and more great discussion. Carol has really cool ideas about involving young people and homecomers in building beautiful, artful solar chargers for laptops and cell phones. The plan involves a really thorough process, facilitated with timebanking, of community members providing education to the youth and the homecomers about electricity, woodworking, glass-working, sustainability and teamwork. Non-violent communication training and principles will be threaded throughout and homecomers will mentor the youth. They’ll learn a lot, build skills, connections and teamwork while creating beautiful and useful products. She’s already been gathering partners and making prototypes and they truly are lovely works of art. Very exciting project!

Next to Montreal where I played a great show with some fantastic musicians – Elgin Skye McLaren, Open Arms Fast Hands and Athena Holmes. A very attentive and respectful audience and just a fantastic time. My old friend from Madison, Ivan Klipstein, connected me with these folks and put us up. That was just great. Got to see some of his fantastic artwork he was working on and he gave us a disc of a recent radio appearance to listen to also (your cover’s blown, Ghosty!) which was hilarious.

Today we drove all day to Detroit where I’m finishing writing this so I can go to bed and get up early for our 2-day workshops with area timebankers, and shows on Sat. and Sunday. The home stretch!

On the road and other exciting news

I’m in Jackson Mississippi between my first two stops on the Up The Wall tour (Up The Wall is the name of the CD I’m touring with) and exciting new opportunities keep arising. Played in St. Louis last night and met with timebanking pioneers Renee Betty Marver and Linda Hogan, and more recent timebank organizers Terry, Johanna and Ruffina. Wonderful people and great conversation with lots of potential for future cool developments. Tomorrow I play New Orleans, Monday we meet with potential new timebankers there. Watch for an updated schedule in the next days.

Leander will join on the west coast just a few stops into the tour, helping with trainings, documenting what we learn and what is created, and helping to design systems to support this kind of decentralized work with lots of contributors. Preston and Marc will stay in Madison and help get those systems built.

Part of what we’ll do is talk with the many timebankers and organizers we’ll be meeting about doing Build For the World projects, where people in varying locations use timebanking or related methods to solve community problems – actively sharing their tools, methods, and learning with each other in order to support each other. Read more about it in our new and improved proposal.

And we now have a way for you to donate support this effort. No amount is too small or too big! This will go toward paying our travel expenses, keeping all four of the project partners fed, clothed and housed, and building tools to support this work – including teaching materials, code for project facilitation tools, communication tools like video and other media, and related.
Donate through Paypal

Every dollar you donate up to $15,000 will be matched dollar for dollar with a challenge grant. Even more exciting, we just received word of a $15,000 donation that will free the first $15K of the same challenge grant. Thanks so much to our generous donors, we’re enormously grateful and excited about the work you’re empowering us to do.

And thanks to all of you for paying attention! We look forward to working with you more.

–Stephanie