One hundred and two technical volunteers gathered together March 19-21 at Schaeffer Hall, St. Mary’s College of Maryland for Southern Maryland Give Camp. Software Developers, website designers and database administrators donated their time to help 19 non-profit organizations prepare new websites, improve existing websites and internal software.
The program was run locally by chapter founder, Jim Pendarvis. Give Camp originated in Dallas in 2007. On Friday, the non-profit organizations introduced themselves and gathered with their teams of approximately 3 people to plan their strategy. Graphic designers helped several groups. Each team worked creatively to come up with new ideas, some even working through the night.
By Sunday, each group enthusiastically shared their projects with each other, showing off their improvements and having lots of fun doing it. (Pictured) The groups of volunteers corrected imperfect web links, corrected logos, added a photo gallery link and links for in-house personnel. The projects were given to each non-profit to maintain on their own after the weekend event.
The local non-profit organizations that benefited from the Southern Maryland Give Camp included St. Mary’s County Public Schools Citizens Advisory Committee for Special Education, Southern Maryland Child Resource Center, The Learning Disabilities Association of St. Mary’s County, Autism Spectrum Support Group of SoMD, Concerned Black Women of Calvert County, Inc., Calvert County Nursing Center, HELP Association Inc., Calvert Well Pet Clinic by Patuxent Animal Welfare Society, Inc., ECHO House, St. John Vianney Church, Patuxent Riverkeeper, Community Foundation of Charles County, Tri-County Council for Southern Maryland, Spring Dell Center, Inc., St. Paul’s Lazarus Ministry, St Mary’s County Resource Parent Association, Discover U Children’s Museum, SPCA, and Boys & Girls Clubs of Southern Maryland.
Sponsors for the weekend camp included St. Mary’s College of Maryland, Microsoft, Telerik, O’Reilly, Discount Asp.net, Intertech User Group Support, Charles County Technology Council, LL Photography, Elite Beatz Entertainment, Computer Management Inc. and Papa John’s Pizza. For more information view the website at http://www.somdgc.org/ , Facebook or reach them by email at contact@somdgc.org. Jim Pendarvis and Andrew Duthie also promised to shave their hair if they got 100 volunteers. And they did! Watch the YouTube video.
