[sf-lug] Meeting Monday evening 15 November

[Christian Einfeldt]

hi,

Bobbie, thanks for mentioning the Partimus.org fundraiser !

On Tue, Nov 16, 2010 at 9:15 AM, jim <jim at systemateka.com> wrote:

>
>   Christian's December 15 event is a fund-raiser
> for the Partimus effort to get Linux into more
> schools. I hope he posts details.
>

Thanks for asking, Jim.  I did post this summary on 11/5/10:

http://linuxmafia.com/pipermail/sf-lug/2010q4/008184.html

A number of volunteers have been working very hard for free for 6.5 years
now in various public schools around the Bay Area to place GNU-Linux
machines in public schools.  We have established a good foundation, and we
now want to build on that foundation.  The teachers appreciate Linux, are
not afraid of it, and use it heavily for a wide variety of functions,
including some mission-critical functions such as reporting grades and so
forth, at least in some schools.  In some of the schools, Linux is the only
platform to which the kids have access for reaching the Internet.

All of this is a marvelous accomplishment, and we want to extend that
achievement. But to do so, we are going to need to bring in funds.  We have
been running entirely on volunteer fumes.  If we are going to expand, we
will need to establish a financial foundation to build on the foundation of
goodwill we have achieved and technical prowess that we have demonstrated.


Toward that end, we are holding an initial fundraiser to build a fundraising
committee on December 15, 2010, at 5 pm at 1601 Turk Street, at the Creative
Arts Charter School, in the Board Room.  The purpose of this meeting is to
create a group of dedicated volunteers who will focus on fundraising for our
Linux-schools efforts.  We will be providing modest refreshments, and we
will be asking for a suggested donation of $25.00 at the time of the
12/15/10 meeting to kick off our fundraising drive.

Free open source software has created a lot of jobs and wealth, and now is a
great time for us to expand our efforts to bring the considerable benefits
of free software to those who really need it most, namely, public schools
whose budgets have been mercilessly slashed for more than a decade.
 Supporting education fits very well with the FOSS culture of expanding
knowledge, transparency, and democracy.  Attending this fundraiser would be
a great way for the members of this list to make a commitment to supporting
our proven and very successful efforts to get FOSS ideals into the broader
society.

We will not be asking for too much of your time.  We will only be asking you
to share your contacts will us, and help us do outreach to get your friends
and neighbors to make small but meaningful financial contributions to our
efforts.

One of the specific goals of the 12/15/10 fundraiser will be to prepare for
a larger fundraiser to be held in the spring at the Creative Arts Charter
School.  That fundraiser will be a large installfest and FOSS festival.  We
are planning to have booths for Bay Area FOSS-related groups, such as local
LUGs and local FOSS-related businesses, both large and small.  We will have
barbeques and games for kids.  It will be a fun, family-oriented event that
will have the dual purpose of raising money and soliciting hardware
donations, which will be triaged on the spot and we will install GNU-Linux
on machines that are brought in, so that we can turn those machine right
around and install them in the 6 Bay Area Schools where we have a FOSS
presence.

Also for the 12/15/10 event, we are asking people to bring working laptops,
printers, monitors, keyboards, and optical mice towers to donate.  Our
minimum spec for donation is 512 MB of RAM and at least 1.8 Ghz chips or the
AMD equivalent.
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