ScriptEd students and volunteers are some of the most remarkable, dedicated and passionate people I've ever met. I am so lucky to have a job that gives me to the opportunity to work with these kinds of people every day. They motivate me to work harder and be better.
Going forward, I hope to showcase their amazingness from time to time.
Going forward, I hope to showcase their amazingness from time to time.
Today, I'm sharing (with his permission) an email I received from one of our hackathon volunteers. Enjoy!
So, I need to be honest. I really didn't want to go on Saturday. Suzanne had badgered me a few months back and I of course was in because, ya' know, volunteering and it was a while away. But this past week was super hectic and stressful and all I wanted to do on Saturday was lay in Central Park with my dog. Spending 12 hours working my butt off teaching kids to code was very much *not* the same thing. And I'd met some of these kids before, they were cool, but... it was going to be tough. They didn't listen. They weren't focused. Too rambunctious.
I could not have been more wrong about the kids. I could not have been more wrong about the best way to spend my Saturday afternoon. I've had a smile plastered on my face since I left Saturday! I have never seen kids work so hard, stay so focused and keep each other going as much as the MIHS team did on Saturday. And while I didn't see every group, it seemed pretty universal. I've participated in a bunch of hackathons. Most of the time the engineers (professional engineers!) do half the work that those kids do. And they moan and whine and require tons of swag and expensive coffee and mountain dew.
Those kids are amazing. I knew you all were "doing good" by building ScriptEd. But, I truly never realized that the kids were actually so invested. The fact is, when I've worked in situations like this with kids before (I taught "digital photograph and web design" at summer camps for years during college), the kids were horribly "privileged" and refused to do hard work. Not the MIHS kids. They seriously got that the harder they worked, the better their opportunities in the future would be. You're not just "doing good" — you are helping these kids actually create better lives for themselves. And this isn't an intangible — the effects are incredibly obvious and present.
I haven't done anything in the past few years that has made me so proud as watching those kids work, and then celebrate, on Saturday. Thank you so much for the opportunity. Thank you so much for creating an amazing organization. Please don't hesitate to ask for any help I can provide. I will definitely be involved as much as possible.
Thank you again!
This was such an uplifting read. My son is involved in hackathons and I never really knew much about them. I had my suspicions and questions and I did not know it it was a good thing or even legal. Now I can tell him that I am so proud of him and everything that he creates during the event.
ReplyDeleteLucius Cambell @ Skild