Transatlantic Crew DIDI TSL Project

The US teens will start meeting Monday, August 31, 2009. There are about 8 new students joining the venture!  We are still open to other teens interested in helping out - just contact us here.

Soon we will be updating you on the activities we are planning, so check back again.

It’s been a while since I have blogged but I have been working hard to recruit new members for the next academic year.  I have now found eight interested students in the UK and am endeavouring to make contact with Baldric Commons (in world) to facilitate registration for my students.  Dudley is also making progress in trying to recruit new members from the States.  We will keep you posted.

The Transatlantic Crew is beginning to recruit more teens to help with their ongoing environmental education and fund-raising projects.

Each school, in the USA and the UK, are initiating recruitment drives to get more students interested and active in these environmental efforts.  The start-up team has done their work in laying out the general plan and goals. More help is needed to make each event an educational effort as well as spreading the word about what they are doing — both in Teen Second Life (TSL) and live in real life (RL).

The is always a need for interested, creative, concerned and motivated friends to continue the work toward awareness and action to improve our environment. 

Hey! If you are interested in learning more about this OR if you would want to join our team, please let us know! It is a world-wide concern, and our Transatlantic Crew would be happy to have your help, too.

The Transatlantic Team was awarded a start-up grant for their venture!

Now the team begins their plans for recruiting new members, planning their first event, and making a place in TSL ready for their first concert.  With environment the overall theme, the team will have Carbon Footprint as the focus of their first event.  Other themes will follow for other in-world and real world events. The start-up grant provides $US and $L for costs.

Raising awareness is their primary goal along with raising money for environmental charities. 

More information will be disseminated as the team progresses - and we will keep you informed here, too.

Congratulations, Transatlantic DIDI Team!

The Transatlantic Team received feedback from the panel presentation and it was very positive. We only need to clarify our budget!

Before the end of the week (in three days), the team will provide more specific information about costs for the venture using more research into Teen Second Life and other expenses. Then they will consider the income possibilities and estimate what that could be based on their plans and activities.

With the start-up costs supported by the grant from Youth Venture and Global Kids, the team can start planning, recruiting, researching more environmental information and get this growing more and more.

The next steps are to plan the actual events, starting with a concert and information on carbon footprints, promotion and advertising, and all the excitement to share in Teen Second Life AND RL.

Good job, Transatlantic Team!

The day was suddenly upon us and it was time to present the crew’s venture plan to a panel of adults.  Kitcat and Taggart were in-world very promptly - even before me **smiles.  But as you would expect with this team, things didn’t go smoothly!!  Ade was nowhere to be found and had to be searched for.  Where was she?  In lessons of course!!  No matter she was excused from class and the team were ready to present!! 

Sitting in the background I could see everything and the Crew really did us teachers proud.  They had to answer some really tough questions which they seemed to handle with ease - well done Transatlantic Crew - you did so well!!

The presentation seemed to fly by and the teens really worked hard to get across their viewpoints.  They convinced Vikky and Wall, but did they convince the Panel?  Tomorrow the teens will find out if they were successful and if any conditions, if any, will be put in place.  Watch this space for the verdict!

The teens have been asked to meet offline as a matter of urgency in order to get their action plan ready for Panel on Monday 23rd February.  It was agreed that Kitcat and Ade would meet on Thursday 12th February and all three teens would meet on Monday the 16th and Tuesday the 17th February at 9pm GMT, 4pm Western.  Finalising times to meet did take a long time but this is to be expected because of the time difference involved. 

The Panel will take place on Monday 23rd February at 3:15 GMT and the teens were reminded that this was their last meeting together on tsl before it takes place.  The teens are expected to give a ten minute presentation to a panel of adults (not their teachers). 

The teens then went outside to chat amongst themselves.  They discussed what was remaining to complete.  Kitcat and Tag now need to work hard on the action cards and pass these to Ade.  It seems that action card 3 needs to be completed and 5 needs to be started.  Everything must be sent to Meghan on Friday!!  Good luck everyone…

With the setbacks from illness and weather closing schools, the Transatlantic DIDI team had to revise their original schedule for launching their venture.

The team is learning more about budgets and recruiting before they finish their workshops with the Youth Venture and DIDI moderators.

Now, the team will present their proposal February 23, 2009. Then after any revisions they make based on feedback from the panel, they will launch into their venture, continue planning, preparing, recruiting, and get their events going.

There are several environmental issues and events they are considering, and they will start making specific plans soon after their launch. We’ll keep you informed!

The team was slowed by illness keeping some from the meeting; however, discussion and planning for not only starting the venture, but how to sustain it.

We generated ideas about how and why we do things over a long period of time.  Then we thought about how to use those ideas, that energy and momentum, in the project the team is planning.

Ade Fhang was not ill, and kept us on track. Thanks, Ade!

Time is getting short between now and when the team will present their proposal.  The team will have to get even more creative and push for times to discuss their ideas outside of the scheduled workshops, but our teens are good — they will figure it out!

The crew met on Monday 19th January eventhough it was "Martin Luther King Day" for the Americans who were on a day’s holiday.  The teens carried on discussing their project ideas and agreed that they would meet out of world using MSN.

Unfortunately, the UK teens were not able to attend on Tuesday the 20th and so the meeting had to be abandoned after some general discussions.

The aim now is to complete cards 1, 2 and 3 before next week’s workshop.  Meghan GKid distributed the following schedule showing deadlines etc.,

Mon, Jan 26
- Day 7 - DIDI Workship: Sustainability & Budget

Tues, Jan 27
- Day 8 - DIDI Workship:Budget

Mon, Feb 2
- Day 9 - DIDI Workship: Preparing for Panel

Tues, Feb 3
- Day 10 - Panel rehersal? 

Tues, Feb 10
- Day 11 - Team goes to panel !!

Mon, Feb 9
- Day 12 - Conditions presented and explained to group

Mon, Feb 16
- Day 13 - Group responds to conditions and lauches!!

The team were also asked to think about SMART goals:

Specific: 
Is the goal detailed enough that someone who isn’t part of the team would know what needs to be done and how?

Measurable:
Is there a clear way to measure success? How will you know when you’ve reached your goal?

Actionable: 
Is there a clear series of steps to take to accomplish your goal?

Realistic: 
Is it possible to reach this goal considering the resources available to your team?

Timely:
When will the goal be accomplished?

Well, that’s all from me today.  As can be seen, there is much to do!!  Please do comment on this blog, we would really appreciate your feeback.