Meeting for the Week of May 18th, 2015
This Meeting's Highlights
Speaker: Jon Kaufman
Program: H2OpenDoors So Fa
rMeeting for the week of May 18th to 24th, 2015
Greetings
Welcome
You've found the meeting for this week of the Rotary eClub of Silicon Valley - welcome!If I were to mention Charon, Hydra, Nix, Styx, and Kerberos, would you know what I'm talking about?If you knew that the 2nd and 3rd items in that set were discovered ten years ago this month, would that help?If I mentioned that the New Horizons space probe will be serious news this July related to the above, would that help?I mention this, in part, because of the tenth anniversary of the discovery of Hydra and Nix, which are (drumroll…) two of the five known moons of Pluto. I also mention this because we are only about eight weeks from the New Horizons probe doing a fly-by of the Pluto family, and by mentioning this at a party, you'll win astronomy kudos.Additionally, it's a chance to talk about exploration in general, which we are doing with our young eclub. Rotary has been around for 110 years, but eclubs are a more recent phenomenon (obviously), having launched as a pilot program in Rotary in 2004, and made a regular part of the organization by Rotary's Council on Legislation in 2010.Our focus is to make visiting our eclub as varied, informative, and inspiring an experience as one would find in the very best brick-and-mortar (i.e., non-eclub) clubs. We welcome the ideas of members and guests alike on how to get there!Guests, we ask that you consider contributing the cost of a meal to the service projects our club is putting in motion. Feel free to use our donation system for Happy Dollars, or you can mail a check made out to the Rotary eClub of Silicon Valley to our treasurer: ℅ Allen Thompson, 13500 Cascade Ct., Bakersfield CA 93314.
Think Like the Wind
Don't you like a video that makes you think?
The Power of Images
Keith has an image for us this week that got published in The Rotarian magazine some time ago."Here is my photo of the Milky Way over Mt Lassen that was published in the Rotarian Magazine in April 2014. This is a great location to photograph and see the Milky Way because there is very little light pollution from major cities. I made this image from two separate exposures. The first was taken just after sunset for a good exposure on the foreground. The second was taken several hours later as the Milky Way rose above the horizon."Beautiful stuff, Keith!
Happenings
What We Do
Stories of Service
Thank you, everyone, for taking part in judging the Service via Video 2015 contest! We will share the winners with everyone in next week's meeting. If you missed it, and are curious to see what students can do to support charitable efforts in their communities, you can find all eight finalists at this link.
Helping Nepal
As was mentioned in the last meeting, Rotary International President Gary C.K. Huang has encouraged Rotarians to help with the relief efforts in Nepal by supporting the ShelterBox effort to get its durable shelters to areas in need right away. At the eclub's monthly board meeting last week, it was voted unanimously that we identify $250 to send to ShelterBox and to ask our members to individually pledge more, with the goal that as a club and as individuals, we can raise at least $500, thereby covering the cost of half of one shelter. You can learn more about ShelterBox at: http://www.shelterbox.org/Please contribute in the Happy Dollars section below, or by sending an email to Treasurer Allen (treasurer@siliconvalleyrotary.com) with a pledge, and he will be in touch with you on ways you can pay that.Many of us live in an area where the potential of a powerful earthquake is very real, so thank you for taking time to help those in need.
Gooooooooooooooooooooal!
The next shindig is a gathering for the San Jose Earthquakes soccer match this Sunday (the 24th). If that's of interest to you, send an email to Stephen Zhou (szhou@financialguide.com). The match will be played at Levi's Stadium (home of the 49ers), so we will likely meet at President Rushton's home and carpool from there.
Raising Awareness and Funds
PR Chair Chris Cochrane has done some polishing of the two 12-second videos to raise awareness of our club and funds for our efforts, and asks that we use these links going forward:1. http://vimeo.com/cochrane/sv12. http://vimeo.com/cochrane/sv2Please share these with those you know! Hopefully they can take less than a minute to watch them both and share them with others.
The World of Rotary
This week's quick message about Rotary is a preview of what you'll learn much more about in the program.https://vimeo.com/45999981You might also take time to look at the winners from Rotary's annual photo contest. Among the honorable mentions is a great one from Cuba by our own Keith Marsh. Kudos, Keith!
Service Time
Have you helped make your community a little (or a lot) better recently? If so, let us know!
Sharings
Birthdays
Two members have a birthday this week, and it's time to celebrate them! Big happy birthdays to Manju Ramachandran (May 20th) and Shags Shagrin (May 24th). The raucous singing in your honor is heard all over the internet. Rotarians bellow, children cover ears, and dogs howl.
The Tidbit
from member Yvonne Kwan:Up for saving a step in your searches? Yvonne has a great tip for those using the Chrome browser.
A Little Humor
This little gem from rd.com is for all who love math.A farmer counted 196 cows in the field. But when he rounded them up, he had 200.
Happy Dollars
Anything happy to share with the group? We'd love to hear about it!
from member Rushton Hurley ($25):Let's help the people in Nepal![donations for Nepal as of Sunday (5/24) at 8p: $285]
from guest Lisa Bickford ($20):Great program for this week! Libraries need to evolve in order to remain relevant in today's society!
Fill out my online form.
Selected Comments from Last Week
Each week we ask our members and guests to let us know what they think of the program and the meeting. Here are some of the comments from last week, when Ron Starker and Doug Tindall presented a program on the future of libraries.
from member Yvonne Kwan (California, USA)
This is amazing information! Too often I hear that libraries are outdated and have no function in the digital age; Ron and Doug, you’ve just proved all of those nay-sayers wrong. I loved seeing your concept for libraries and how everything is laid out at the Singapore American School. It’s an awesome mix of preserving the values of the classic library while stepping forward with technological changes. Truly inspiring and totally cool!
And as luck would have it, I actually have a copy of Ready Player One sitting on my desk already! 8D
from member Martin Fox (Utah, USA)
Ron and Doug – your session just blew my mind. So many game changing ideas. Can’t wait to share this with others.
from guest Paul Mosso (California, USA)
Thank you Ron & Doug for sharing your experience at the Singapore American School. I enjoyed the idea of presenting books to students and having the books “pay for themselves.” While I spent my time in the educational system at the beginning of the tech explosion. I found books were not checked out of the library for years and even decades prior to me reaching for the book on the shelf. Which I now realize is even sadder since libraries are more than just a place of accessing information but also creating information. Great job on engaging students to access information and creating information in many different ways. I would’ve really enjoyed attending a school like yours.
President Rushton: great meeting, like always!
from member Chris Cochrane (Ontario, Canada)
Mitty…you saved created so much space in my head. I had 500 passwords to remember. Now just one!!! I love Last Pass! It’s heaven sent. THANK YOU!
from guest François Tessier (Quebec, Canada)
What an amazing and fun library concept. I wish I could become a kid again to have the chance to attend a school with such a library. Congratulations for this great concept. I will introduce it to my friends that live in Singapore!
from member Gene Tognetti (California, USA)
Ron and Doug’s preso was VERY thought provoking – I’m going to show this to my school’s librarian tomorrow! Lots of stuff to chew on and super informative – thanks! Maybe I missed it, but if there is an actual ‘starter kit’ to reimagine a library, I’d love to see it, as well.
from member Allen Thompson (California, USA)
The Singapore American School library looks like a librarian’s dream come true! What a marvelous facility! My brother Bob and his (then) wife Suzy were administrator and teacher at an American school in Singapore during the 80’s (possibly this one).
Keith, as ever, thanks for the beautiful photo.
Sorry to have missed the shindig at Drake’s. Looks like a fun time was had.
And my grandson Kelly is still cuter than yours!!
This Week’s Program
Jon Kaufman has not been a Rotarian long, but he has certainly made the most of the time he has been a member! Today he will talk about a project he has put his time and seemingly limitless energy behind.
Jon owns a Silicon Valley marketing company, and is a member of the Peninsula Sunrise Rotary Club of Redwood City. Jon joined Rotary three and a half years ago, and soon after, started a service project focused on water.
The H2OpenDoors project began with a fundraiser in San Carlos that raised over $100,000, funding the purchase and installation of solar-powered water purification systems for a large village and a school in northern Thailand. This was followed with a similar effort to Tacloban in the Philippines with the support of District 5170, followed by Central Mexico, Guatemala and Haiti.
Jon started the project to be a model that could be followed by other clubs around the nation. Watch the presentation “H2OpenDoors So Far” to hear what they’ve learned and how the water crisis can be solved….with a little technology and a whole lot of soul.
You can review the slides from this presentation at this link.
This program was recorded before the terrible earthquake in Nepal, and I received this note from Jon on May 8th:
“We are shipping one SunSpring to Nepal NEXT WEEK! Our Golf tournament registration fees and donations have provided us with the opportunity to take advantage of our Rapid-Response partner. We worked with them for the Philippines transport, if you recall. They are on the ground with a Harvard medical team, and say that the situation with water is critical, and electricity is out almost everywhere. They’ve identified a hospital, and the shipment will not cost us anything. Jack Barker will go out to Nepal once the SunSpring arrives and handle the installation. He’ll be scoping it out for our return in August with two or more systems, when I will fly there.”
Follow what Jon and the H2OpenDoors team is doing via their website and their Facebook page.
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Meeting for the Week of May 11th, 2015Meeting for the Week of May 25th, 2015
Great work, Jon, getting a sustainable, larger-scale system in place for clean water where it is needed. Yvonne, that’s a wonderful tidbit, too – well done. And a big Way-to-go! to Keith for the honor with the photo contest!
Thanks so much for the opportunity, Rushton. As we ramp up for a couple SunSprings for Nepal for an early August expedition, perhaps our clubs can work together.
Deepali
Thanks for a great tidbit – Yvonne.
Great to learn how Rotary is helping in Global Water crisis through this wonderful H2OpenDoors program. Good to learn that India has been chosen as a recipient for SunSpring in 2015 as many kids in India die every year due to water contamination. It will good to see Rotary Clubs replicate this program in that region.
Thank you Deepali. Yes, this Rotary project is one that many clubs can join in. We are rampling up for our August expedition to Nepal. Let’s get your club involved!
Catherine Liu
Clean water will be a bigger and bigger problem. It is great to know the creative programs targeting solving the problem
Keith Marsh
Thanks, Jon for the great presentation. I have been following this project since it was presented to the Rotary eClub of the Southwest USA and attended one of the H2Open Door fund raisers a few years ago. Please let us know how we can get more involved. Rushton, can we make this a focus of our International Service? Maybe join with another club to raise funds to buy a water system for an area in need. Organize a trip with students. Lots of possibilities here. Let me know how I can help.
Martin Fox
Thanks Jon. I remember when Jack Barker told me years ago that he was starting to work with you. Great to see your work progressing
Martin Fox
I liked your comments about using local Rotary clubs to smooth the cultural aspects of installing the Sun Springs. We learned the cultural issues the hard way with Sun Spring water projects in Peru’s Sacred Valley. While village entrepreneurs and village leaders were ready to implement, there was an upswell from community members who just wanted everything installed for them – no partnerships – no work on their end – no water testing – no paying for water. They said German NGOs had done it that way four decades earlier and that’s the way they wanted it this time. Perhaps local Rotary clubs could have smoothed out the issues so we wouldn’t have had to pull the plug on the projects. Pulling out broke our hearts and it changed the way I’ve worked with villages since.
Great observations, Martin. So important to have firm understandings going in.
Any chance of partnering with ShelterBox, an organization that bring instant shelter to disaster areas? It’s an initiative created and run by a member of a Rotary Club in the UK, and it’s recognized by Rotary International
Shelter Box has shown no interest in working with our project. Jim Carriere doesn’t seem to think there is a fit. Oh well.
This presentation was just awesome! I am totally wowed! I have been to a community where 50% of their health problems is access to clean water (in Sri Lanka). This technology is just amazing. It is funny how miniaturize a technology can enlarge its impact… I look forward visiting your website and following your project.
Please feel free to query me as you begin to learn about this solution. I think your club can help us launch a serious response for our August expedition to Nepal.
ShagsCA
That’s an amazing invention! Thanks for bringing it to our attention. Wonder if it can be scaled down ever more for a smaller-population use… Questions about Chris’ videos: Will viewing the videos on Vimeo.com still add to the count on YouTube? And will the YouTube links previously published still count? I posted it all over my social media sites. Yvonne – great tech tip! (Mine is that I use a video download helper (www.downloadhelper.net) to capture the weekly program video on my desktop to avoid the occasional “pausing” that happens during streaming views. It also enables me to speed up the playback using Windows Media Player and cut down the time it takes to view without losing the quality of the message.) And Rushton: is it possible can to use a larger font size for the weekly meeting text so I don’t have to manually enlarge the page, as that impacts the video sizes, which require manually reducing the page to view them. And can it be black instead of gray on white, which is low contrast. Old eyes!!!
Hey @ShagsCA:disqus! I’ll start with the font color change beginning for next week’s meeting; it’ll be a dark slate or black, to help improve readability.
As for font size, I will take that request into consideration and do some experiments to see what would be best.
Shags, any viideo plays on Vimeo will count towards the overall total, It’s the total plays that count. WE’ll add the YouTube, Vimeo and other plays together for fund-raising purposes.
Andrew Taw
Great presentation of a wonderful invention. I’ll definitely be showing the short video on H2open Doors to my students next week.
Andrew, let me know what the students think. We’re taking 12 high school students on our Mexico expedition in July. What is the age of your kids?
Andrew Taw
My students are high school students as well. I’ll let you know what they think!
Here’s another video, about 10 minutes. It is of the Mexico expedition from September with 10 High School students from Woodside and Redwood High schools. We installed a system and then spent three days with former Mexican President Fox in a private training academy at Centro Fox. We’re going again in July. Perhaps we can do a trip with your kids…we have a few lining up next year. https://vimeo.com/106944679
Because I come from a business perspective, I’m a bit obsessed about metrics and maximization of value. Shelter Boxes are essential elements for disaster relief, no question. But here is a challenging line of thought, meant to annoy and engage each of your members. One Shelter Box costs $1000 and serves about 5 people for about 5 months. That is a cost per beneficiary of about $200 per person for less than half a year. Now, let’s compare one SunSpring at $20,000. It serves about 5,000 people with daily drinking water for at least 10 years. Granted, this is not comparing apples and oranges. But given that we all have limited funds, time and energy, shouldn’t we try to help the most number of people who are suffering for the lowest possible cost per person? Some might be offended at this question. Others might find it stimulating. What say you?
An interesting and undoubtedly dangerous way to engage the audience, to say the least. As you alluded to in your comment regarding oranges and apples — I don’t see how you could reasonably compare emergency disaster shelter with clean water. Don’t get me wrong — I like clean water projects, and think the work you are doing is fabulous. I want to support new clean water projects and organizations I find, but I also am going to continue supporting emergency shelter and disaster relief organizations like ShelterBox. I am definitely not with you though with the marketing strategy/tactic you just employed in your comment targeting ShelterBox. But that’s my personal opinion.
Thank you for your presentation and the work you do.
I actually share your POV, Mitty. I paid for 3 boxes for Philippines and was in Tacloban to see them in use while I was installing two SunSprings. I bring the topic up to irritate the oyster and hopefully create a pearl. I joined Rotary specifically to do international projects a few years ago, and have since been to 3 international meetings. When I walk up and down the House of Friendship aisles, a sense of immense pride washes over me as I see the astounding array of work that Rotarians do all over the world. At the exact time that I feel proud of all that we do, I simultaneously want us to do better, have greater impact and alleviate the suffering of more people on a sustainable level. It’s not water vs. shelter. It’s water AND shelter. The more important work is in the long term. Are we getting the greatest impact out of our charitable dollar in everything we do? Do we even ask that question, ever? Here’s another dangerous question… is it inappropriate or heretical to even wonder if millions of Rotary dollars and focus should still be flowing to Polio? Are you a bad Rotarian to question this stuff?
Yvonne Kwan
Wonderful presentation and project, Jon. It’s great to see that the SunSpring not only gives clean water to areas that need it but also gives an opportunity for growing their local communities as well — and throwing in an education aspect as well with bringing high school students on trips.
I do have to say that I think comparing ShelterBox and SunSprings is a bit of an unfair comparison since they address different needs. ShelterBox doesn’t fulfill the need for clean water while SunSprings do, and SunSprings don’t fulfill the need for emergency shelter after disasters while ShelterBox does. The difference in cost there isn’t a matter of numbers to me; it’s a matter of supplying aid in different ways to those who need it most. Supporting both clean water and emergency relief organizations such as H2OpenDoors and ShelterBox are no-brainers for me; the means are different, but the end-goal is the same.
Couldn’t agree more, Yvonne. I support both and more. Disasters are one thing. The grinding poverty that affects millions for generations is another thing. The common denominator is suffering. As Rotarians we are devoted to service above self. I appreciate members like you who keep their eye on the prize.
Meg Taylor
What an outstanding program, and sustainable project. And it does my heart good that you’re helping in Nepal, Jon. My little nonprofit, Lending Promise, gives microcredit to women in Nepal (and India). The needs — of all kinds — are so great there. Kudos.
As we ramp up for our late July/Early August expedition to Nepal, lets connect. I’d love to see the women you are helping get involved in a water sales business that can deliver significant revenue for themselves and their children!
john lozano
Jon, thanks for the presentation. I appreciate your passion to provide clean water for others. I had heard of your program while in Lake Atitlan, Guatemala doing volunteer work. Keep up the great work.
Yvonne, thanks for the tech tip, I was able to show my students this cool tip during the week….they loved it.
John, come with us in January back to Guatemala! The Santa Cruz club is in the lead on it, and we’d love it if folks from your club experienced an H2OpenDoors project.
Paul Mosso
Thank you John for this amazing presentation. I completely agree that helping the most amount of people for the least amount of money can really help change the world, and thus be able to help even more people. The Sun Spring system is really “teaching people how to fish” rather than just “giving a fish” to that community.
One question, since these communities are setting up social businesses for the water, is part of the revenue model generating funds to replace the system after its lifecycle?
Brilliant question, Paul. The two components that will need replacement after 10 years are the batteries and the membranes, at a total cost of around $5500, These can be replaced in the field. The local Rotary club is tasked with mentoring the village in running a social business, and included in that is financial management for the short and long term expenses. The club also can provide microfinance loans. Pretty exciting, eh?
Lisa Highfill
I love good ideas- this is brilliant. Clean water is something I have always been very interested in and always included it in my classroom curriculum regardless of whether it is a “standard” that needs to be covered. I am very interested in this program and hope to share it with the high school teachers in my district (Pleasanton Unified). Thank you for sharing!
Lisa, we are bringing 13 Redwood City High School students and 3 teachers to central Mexico on an installation expedition in July, followed by a leadership academy with former President of Mexico Vicente Fox. This is our second year, and we’ll continue it. So how about you contact Pleasanton Rotarians and we try to engage your schools in the same way. We can bring those kids and you next year?
Richard Knaggs
How clever is this! The meetings every week get more and more interesting. This can definitely be used in our informal settlements in South Africa. Is the Salination level of the water an issue?
The SunSpring isn’t designed to handle desalination which is a VERY expensive process. The bigger challenge in Africa is finding clusters of populations large enough to take advantage of the SunSpring’s robust capacity. We need 1000-5000 people who are suffering from contaminated sources. Africa has tens of thousands of clusters of populations much smaller, using single boreholes. Let’s chat more about the potential to help South Africa!
Andrew Knaack
Thank you to Jon for your program! I appreciate the text update.
Rotary’s commitment to water has been a great movement. I hope to see the large impact on clean water access Rotary has been proven to have with polio.
Yes, Andrew. I hope you can help me spread the word about this new kind of project.
Allen Thompson
Jon, Thank You for a very interesting program. Indeed, potable water is the next best fight as polio begins to succumb.
Last night, the Kern Astronomical Society members set up some powerful telescopes and, for a while, we saw closeup views of the moon. We also took in Saturn and one of its moons and Jupiter, with four of its moons. An interesting fact is that, while Earth has its one moon, Jupiter and Saturn each have 50 moons (that we know of!) https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/planets/profile.cfm?Display=Moons
Cloud cover moved in pretty soon after the telescopes were set up but then the clouds were blown away by a wind that also moved the telescopes too much. So they packed up early promising to come back next month. They host a Star Party every month for the residents of Kern County and for that, we thank them for their service. http://www.kernastro.org/
Informative and ground breaking–the cost per person was amazing and I hope rotary can help this technology can become
even more more widespreadManju Ramachandran
Thank you for the program! I loved hearing about the cost per program. Is this something that can be sent to India where water is usually from the Bor well and very heavy in sulfides?
Manju, don’t get me started about India. There is so much incredible wealth on the one hand, and mind-numbing poverty on the other. How about you and I work on trying to wake up the India Rotary districts. I don’t think they know that this model of project even exists! I’ll have an exhibit in the House of Friendship in Sao Paulo next week, and I’ll especially seek out Rotarians from India. Any contacts you might have, let’s get them to be activists for the people. It is criminal how most people have to live there!
About us
Rotary eClub of Silicon Valley is a non-profit 501(c)4 organization dedicated towards bettering humanity through service and fellowship.
Delivering innovation, entrepreneurship, and education since January 2015.
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