Our Impact
I am so happy with the outcome of our project, even if it was different from how we first thought it would be. We were able to raise over $1400 for our cause (way over our goal) with the combination of funds from our EdBacker and wristband sales. At first we thought that the funds would go directly to buying dispensers for our school, which cost around $200-$300 each. But, we were able to raise awareness of our issue at the local level, Austin High School and Austin ISD, allowing our school to see that there was a need for these dispensers. We appreciate that the school administration took initiative and bought three feminine hygiene dispensers for our school, which allowed us to have extra funds to support our project. But, we still had a lot of issues with our project. We didn't know who was going to be in charge of ordering, stocking, and supplying the machines (because the custodians couldn't do it), and we didn't know where the profits from the machines would go. Thankfully, an advisor told us that the Life Skills class at our school was looking for job opportunities, which gave us the idea that would solve our problem.
We figured out that it would benefit both our project and the class if we partnered up to run the dispensers. Because we are seniors and will not be here next year, we decided that they would be taking over our project for the years to come. The class will now be gaining experience through ordering supplies, stocking the dispensers, and managing the money. They will also benefit from this because they will be allowed to keep the profits, creating a constant source of extra funding. Our project made the most impact at the local level because the girls at Austin High School will now have access to the products that they need. This will allow them to receive a better education because they will no longer have to worry if they forgot to bring the right products and now can focus more on their schoolwork. We didn't make much of an impact at the regional or global level due to the specificity of our project, but we hope that if other schools have the same issue, they will be able to look to what we did for ideas. |
My Individual Impact:
My greatest impact to our project would be through reaching out to a countless number of community groups who helped to donate and support our cause. But, I also sold wristbands during lunch for two weeks, spread the word at our school, made posters, and communicated with administration about the logistics of our project. But, I couldn't have even gotten close to the impact that we made without my great group members, who were so passionate about our issue and making a difference, or without the community members who helped support us. |
Role of Communication
Efficient communication was a necessity in our project due to the vast variety of people we needed contact. In order to get the amount of money that we needed to make our project feasible, we needed to get many people to donate, but because our project had a very specific target audience and was tailored to appeal to certain people, we needed to spread to Facebook groups who had a particular interest in our project. Probably the most helpful group was "Austin Women Activists," because they were extremely passionate about our project and many shared it on their own pages. These communication initiatives allowed us to raise the right amount of money, therefore helping us to buy what we needed to. Also, communication with the school district and administration helped them to realize that our issue was important and caused them to buy three dispensers. This communication changed the course of our project, and like mentioned above, helped us to transfer the funds that we were allotted for buying the dispensers to buying supplies for the maintaining of the dispensers.
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Final Reflections and Looking Back
Working on this project has taught me so much about teamwork, planning, and networking. Not only did I have to work together with my group members, but I also had work with the school administrators, teachers, staff, and other community members to coordinate everything and make sure that we were on the right track. I also learned that planning is everything. I can't just expect anything to get done if I wait until the last minute. I think the biggest thing that I learned from this project is that it is extremely important to advocate for your issue, because no one is just going to stumble on it. When we started our EdBacker, we weren't sure how to get the word out to people, but after realizing that we could use social networking to our advantage, we were able to show people what we wanted to do. This allowed us to receive the vast majority of our donations and awareness about our issue. I can use all of these skills later on in life because I will still need to work in teams probably throughout my whole life (college, work, family, etc). Also, I have had trouble with planning and procrastination in the past, but now I am able to see the importance of looking ahead and getting work done in a timely manner. Lastly, I will also be able to use networking throughout my whole life because it is always important to get to know people in an area that you are interested in or identify stakeholders in different situations.
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Looking back on our project, I would probably try to figure out how people who can't afford the dispensers would be able to get products, which was our original idea for a project. I would have invested more time into spreading the word more so that we could afford products to buy for those who can't afford them. Or I would have tried to figure out a way to have quarters available for those that need them so that they can take advantage of the dispensers as well. I think if we had done this, we could have helped a lot more people at Austin High School who might not have access to these products at home.
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