World Savvy

World Savvy is an inspiring organization - the World Affairs Challenge is an annual day for an amazing group of kids, educators and community members to come together and demonstrate the importance of being a global citizen. Technology should allow for that collaborative, learning atmosphere to take place 365 days a year, which is why winning the Overnight Website Challenge would be a huge boon to this dynamic, vibrant organization. Educations are challenged every day by limited resources. World Savvy has those curriculum resources. This could bring them together!

I have been a volunteer judge for the World Affairs Challenge. I am a professional program evaluator and in that capacity see lots of education and non-profit programs. I have been deeply impressed by how well World Savvy is organized, the clarity of its mission, its results-orientation, the way it collaborates with schools and other partners, its extensive volunteer network, its outreach and communications to youth and teachers, and the competence and passion of staff. The program takes evaluation seriously and gathers data for both program improvement and accountability, which is unusual. Having been a judge for the World Affairs Challenge I saw firsthand the impact of the program on young people, increasing their global knowledge, awareness, and engagement -- key outcomes for American youth in our increasingly global village.

World Savvy is an organization that has incredible relevance to our global society. Participating in the World Affairs Challenge allowed me to examine important issues and learn more about world affairs. World Savvy is helping students connect with the rest of the world in ways that will have a dynamite impact on our society's future.

The services that World Savvy provides are extremely important in our ever-changing world. Practically speaking, today's young people need to be knowledgeable about global issues if they want to compete successfully for jobs in a global community. From a humanitarian aspect, if our society wants to solve issues such as Global Warming, disease, poverty, and war, issues that are not confined by national and international borders, then we need to produce young people that are able to not only see these problems from a global perspective, but also work successfully with people from around the world. In addition, as a teacher I have always appreciated how World Savvy values and supports educators. It is an amazing organization, and I am grateful for all the work they do.

I've been to a bunch of World Savvy events and showcases of kids' work. Man, those kids are inspired - and smart. World Savvy is going great work.

Talk about creative, clever, organized, wide-reaching global education for students from all walks of life...and you're talking about World Savvy. As a volunteer at the World Affairs Challenge (and other events), I was blown away by the impact the program has on young people. I saw well-informed middle and high school students solve some of the world's greatest global issues with all sorts of ideas, presented in all sorts of creative genres. I wish our government officials would attend a World Affairs Challenge, take the test the students (and volunteers) take about knowledge of global affairs, and follow World Savvy's lead on engaging the youth of America in global issues.

World Savvy staff jumped at the opportunity to write a curriculum for a Geography course for middle school students that was instructional, informative about current events, and interesting. They did a tremendous amount of work for us that allowed us to offer a course to our students that we would otherwise have been unable to offer. Our students enjoyed the content and learned so much.

World Savvy has an incredible team which can put into local action the global outlook of their mission. The youth and youth worker capacity building is a gift that keeps on giving for the San Francisco community. The curriculum they have helped us create is a valuable resource that has already been used by multiple youth workers from other organizations. I am glad to work with a team that is focused on production capacity as well as production.

As a volunteer judge for the World Affairs Challenge, I saw the enthusiasm it generated in all the young people involved. The World Affairs Challenge was just the spark that ignited the flame. The challenge of a new website would be to keep that flame alive, to keep young people tuned into global issues. Please accept this challenge!

I have worked with World Savvy since it was two graduate students with a grand idea. As World Savvy has grown, the Directors and staff have always maintained perspective about how to best serve students through connecting with teachers and schools. They understand that just "providing" a resource doesn't mean that it will be used. They have developed systems and strategies to engage teachers and whole schools (for that matter, whole Districts in some cases) to help students learn and become involved in the study of global affairs. As school districts all over the country write new mission statements that include the goal of educating global citizens, World Savvy's work is more important now than ever. Please support this great organization!

As a participant artist with World Savvy, I can attest to their dedication and drive to bring a global perspective to their students across the country, and also to their unique talent for bringing relevant and timely information to the fore for instructors and students to use easily. Knowledge is power! As a producer, it is equally apparent to me that a socially active website can be essential to a socially active organization, and believe World Savvy and their constituents would utilize this gift broadly and adroitly. Win Win Win!

As a director of a non-profit arts organization, I am very familiar with the work, energy and talent it takes to run a successful and inspiring organization like World Savvy. At each of their events, I am blown away with the quality and value of the work they are doing with students and teachers. The curriculum guides are an invaluable resource and a website that would make these guides and the other work they are doing more accessible and visible is so necessary. I couldn't recommend them more highly.

My son participates in World Savvy programs at school. The global issues curriculum he follows has enriched his understanding of the world he is part of. As I learn more about the work of this amazing organization, I see there are many, diverse opportunities to connect to World Savvy content and engage with a broader community of globally aware citizens. Much of this critical outreach communication happens via their website--which has some unrealized potential. A web upgrade would bump World Savvy to the next level, where excellent content, educational tools and peer networks are leveraged fully. This will benefit a limitless number of teachers and students!

This is my first year with World Savvy, and as an art teacher, I find it refreshing and exciting to have an organization willing, ready, able, and enthusiastic about supporting the arts. We tend to be isolated in our classrooms, and don't often get the chance to have someone who understands what we do and can integrate it cross-curricularly, with a global perspective. Their enthusiasm and commitment is infectious, and I only wish more people knew about it and would become involved. Maybe this is a terrific opportunity to become more visually accessible to the world out there!

World Savvy is filling a great need in public education. With the ever-increasing budget cuts, art programs are the first to go at most schools. World Savvy provides an outlet for students, an avenue to truly provide a well-rounded education to students, and the support that teachers want and need in order to create meaningful experiences for their students in the classroom. It ensures that students are receiving an exposure to global issues - real world issues - and building necessary critical thinking skills for the 21st century. It would be amazing to have World Savvy and its existing programs available to all schools & all students.

Education only really works when students can see connections to their world. World Savvy provided so many resources to help me make my math lessons more meaningful, more relevant to my students.

World Savvy is an innovative organization that has a magnetic ability to engage communities and young people around their vision for increased global knowledge. By providing teachers and schools a global affairs curriculum that they may not otherwise have, World Savvy opens the door for many young people to take leadership in their own education about global issues. This will undoubtedly affect their perspective of the world into adulthood and help insure that the next generation will envision their future in a global context, be aware of the global impact of their actions, and thus be more responsible global citizens.

We are now living in a global society and it is critical to have an awareness of global affairs. World Savvy provides the tools teachers need to help stimulate the interest of their students in the international community. This provides students with the opportunity to play a greater role in the world and to develop as global citizens.

World Savvy could be flashier.
Their Executive Director could drive a nicer car.
The program managers could use someone to make their copies or get them some coffee.
And their offices, well, they would love a make-over,

But the dedicated team at World Savvy has made their priorities clear:
To educate and engage the young people in our world.
To communicate global affairs in an accessible way.
To motivate our youth to act and to make a difference in their own lives and in the lives of others.

They have always put these priorities first, pouring everything they have into their programs and their participants. Always making sure that funds are allocated for students to attend the world affairs challenge or for teachers to have the resources they need.

So, yes, World Savvy could be flashier and their website could certainly be sleeker, but their vision and motives and process couldn't be smarter, more transparent or better allocated. As a team, they are selfless and forward-thinking, invested and passionate. As an organization they are diverse and inclusive, always evolving, thoughtful, and far-reaching, yet with lots of room to grow.

They are without a doubt deserving of a spot in the Nerdery Challenge; and I know that if selected, they will commit themselves fully to the project, as they do with all their work. The World Savvy team will be innovative in their approach to design. They will be present throughout the process and constant, collaborative members of the Nerdery team. Once designed, World Savvy will integrate their website fully into their operations, using it as an interactive platform and an essential part of their efforts with young people. A website of the caliber your experts can design will truly support this organization in fulfilling their mission of connecting teachers and students with each other...and with the world.

All of these great testimonials clearly demonstrate the real and meaningful relationships that World Savvy has already built locally and globally, but a new, more thoughtful, and more creative website will make the organization truly unstoppable. World Savvy has proven time and time again that people who firmly believe in something bigger than themselves can truly change the world. I hope that the selection committee realizes the awesome potential that this organization possesses, not to mention the personal and professional opportunity that the Nerdery team would experience by working on this project with World Savvy.

For all of these reasons and many more, World Savvy comes with my full recommendation for the Nerdery Overnight Website Challenge. On a personal note, I want to thank you for identifying incredible non-profits and for supporting them in their social pursuits to change our world. I can only hope that World Savvy will be among those selected.

I have been involved with World Savvy for the past four years, working primarily for the Global Media and Arts Program as an artist mentor. I have been able to witness firsthand the tremendous impact World Savvy's programs have had on (primarily at-risk) youth, and the inspiration the staff provides to teachers, artists and students through actively engaging all particapants. Not only do they empower youth to connect with and understand other students and cultures in their local and global communities, but World Savvy plays a vital role in linking other nonprofit art organizations, youth organizations and community members through their programs.

World Savvy's staff has been genuinely invested and passionate about empowering youth and bringing international awareness into the schools. I continue to be amazed by what a relatively small organization can produce. I have seen volunteers and staff put in time and energy not too dissimilar from those 24 hours that The Website Challenge volunteers dedicate to its cause. World Savvy will, without a doubt, be able utilize your efforts to their utmost. It is with pleasure that I recommend World Savvy be selected for the Overnight Website Challenge.

I have been watching World Savvy since its inception 7 years ago. It has grown from a grassroots organization into an amazing and highly beneficial organization that is extremely passionate about assisting the nation's students become more cognizant about the everchanging global affairs. Its curriculum is maintained in fresh and knowledgeable courses and programs. World Savvy reaches out to not only students but also the educators of our county, which is something we all need to cultivate much more. I can only hope that World Savvy is around to help my two year old son become more globally aware in the future. World Savvy is a unique program that I believe will greatly benefit from a more interactive and sophisticated website. I highly recommend World Savvy as one of the organizations to be selected.

World Savvy is to motivation for middle and high school students what President Obama is to health care: the catalyst! I've volunteered at 9 World Affairs Challenge events (WAC) and kids behave in the same way that they would at a high school athletic event - they are really into it! The "it" is involves spending months gathering, assessing and analyzing and drawing conclusions about difficult issues facing the world around us. Kids become more serious students (data from teachers, administrators and feedback all verify this) and are committed citizens following their World Savvy experiences.

WAC is one of 3 programs WS operates in MN and on each coast. In terms of broad and far-reaching impact, World Savvy deserves your attention.

Whatever your decision, great idea for kicking off 2010!

Over the past 3 years, World Savvy has helped me plan and implement engaging and relevant curriculum for my students. Last year, my World Savvy project was t-shirt making around the issues of immigration and stereotypes. The unit ended up being one of the most popular and thought-provoking amongst my students. The group of people running this organization are so earnest and passionate in their desire to bring world-awareness to our students, and I hope they will succeed as they work with more and more school districts around the country to incorporate international current events in an empathetic, unbiased, and exciting way. A new website would help them do this!

World Savvy is one of the few organizations out there working with kids to help them develop a more critical understanding of the global village within which we live. It is more important now than ever for our youth to understand the global context within which we exist. World Savvy's ultimate impact is seen in the faces and actions of kids who understand the interconnectedness of different cultures, ethnicities and religions and can then choose from a new perspective how they want to walk through this world.

And what better way to support World Savvy than to reboot and revitalize their website? Help us spread the word about the amazing work they are doing!

I've been a volunteer and donor to the organization for World Savvy since their first year, having worked as a volunteer at both the World Affairs Challenge and the Media and Arts Program. World Savvy generates so much enthusiasm and glee from students who are part of the core programs. I have yet to see middle and high school children as proud of their work and engaged in learning than I have during these annual events.

The staff at World Savvy are absolutely dedicated, taking on multiple duties and functions, and having enormous pride in their work.

Given the challenges American students face in the current educational environment, the need to build a global-centric foundation at an early age is paramount. Opening up the young mind to the world is never an easy task, but World Savvy does it extraordinarily well.

I have seen the impact Dana and her team have on youth, and I can not be more emphatic about them winning this contest. Please help us spread the word by their win (and a new website)!

World Savvy is a remarkable, inspired organization that introduces, explores, and nurtures new pathways to learning for youth as well as for educators. By engaging today's youth through creative educational programs, World Savvy not only incites students to think "beyond their borders," but ultimately empowers them with spirit, knowledge, and a global vision - all of which contribute to a more interconnected generation of future leaders.

We absolutely NEED World Savvy!!!!!!!!!!!!

I first started volunteering with World Savvy in 2005 as a coach for inner city youth preparing them for an academic challenge in world affairs. I was completely inspired by these youth and their thirst to know more about the world. I have no doubt that World Savvy impacted these middle school students in a significant way and that they will never be able to look at the world the same. World Savvy is helping to shape our future leaders, ensuring that they are aware of the world around them. World Savvy provides the tools for youth to become informed, active, responsible citizens. It teaches them to think critically, ask questions and try to come up with solutions to many of today's global challenges.

World Savvy is at the cutting edge of education in the 21st Century. They need a website that can enhance their outreach and impact by creating a forum for communication and to engage kids, teachers and parents. World Savvy introduces kids to the intricacies and connections of a global community, an innovative website is a fundamental tool for this important work.

I volunteered for World Savvy early in the organization's development and have seen it grow by leaps and bounds. World Savvy's success owes both to the incredible dedication, skill and innovation of its leadership/staff and to the timeliness and effectiveness of its programs. Donors and volunteers alike love World Savvy because they know that the time and resources they give to the organization are put to efficient and effective use. If World Savvy is selected as the winner of this contest, as I believe they should be, one can be sure that the effort going in to creating their new website will be well-spent.

As a volunteer and donor for World Savvy since its inception, I have been inspired by the dedication and exceptional service that the staff has consistently provided to teachers and students, and the enthusiastic participation of students in the World Affairs Challenge and the Media & Arts programs. World Savvy's website is key to extending their audience and soliciting support to sustain and expand their efforts to give teachers and students the tools to develop their understanding of complex international issues and their role in the global community. I highly recommend World Savvy to be selected for the Nerdery Challenge.

As a volunteer judge at last year's World Affairs Challenge in St. Paul, I heard junior high and high school students give presentations on the topic of human migration. I was amazed to see so many young people so passionate about world affairs and so creatively sharing what they had researched. I became more informed as a volunteer--evidence of the domino effect of World Savvy's work on both youth and adults. Having an interactive web site for discussion of global issues would be fantastic! Imagine kids having a forum for sharing their ideas about global warming, water shortages, human rights, or hunger. These are the discussions I want our future leaders to be having! This improved web capacity seems essential to World Savvy's efforts to encourage dialogue and sharing of information to help youth and educators understand, and change, the world.

What World Savy offers is definitely not the usual professional development which usually is of little value. My conversations with Linda Chang were interesting, insightful. They invigorated my lesson planning. She put me in touch with contemporary playwrights of outstanding quality, playwrights whose work was the exactly the kind of material I was having difficulty finding, material which fit perfectly my pedegogical interests and the international focus of our school. This is thoughtful, individually tailored curriculum support!
Robert Kowollik International Studies Academy

World Savvy delivers a critical message in teaching today’s youth to be proactive about universal problems that need cooperative solutions. As a parent of two young children, I see the vital need for the sharp focus World Savvy brings to global issues like poverty and sustainable development. A new website would help to deliver World Savvy’s message to a broader audience and provide much needed resources for educators facing strict budget constraints in this tough economy. World Savvy is a deserving and important organization that would benefit greatly from the website challenge.

World Savvy challenged me to see beyond foggy San Francisco. As a participant of the World Affairs Challenge in the past three year I have become a youth that is politically aware and excited about world affairs. World Savvy definitely deserves winning this website challenge as they continue providing opportunities to youth like me!

I've volunteered at many World Savvy events over the years and am always amazed at the energy. There's overwhelming energy on the part of the staff and the volunteers. And then there's even more energy on the part of the kids and teachers. And everyone's energized because they want to learn (and teach) about things that aren't being taught in the current curriculum. It is so important that we develop students who know about the world, and I think we're really fortunate to have such a capable, talented and responsible organization like World Savvy leading the charge.

The staff at World Savvy has always been extremely supportive of our staff and teachers, advice, the lending library, partnership, and teacher training through workshops. World Savvy is relentless in keeping up to date global issues relevant and accessible to our students. For example, I'll never forget World Savvy's resources for my class that included 3 sets of readings at different reading levels! If only teachers had this support all of the time.

World Savvy's commitment to youth education and world affairs is one of a kind. It's programing is innovative and dynamic and prepares the next generation to be global citizens, to participate in the dialogue of the future with a keen awareness self and the world around them.

Joey Piziali, volunteer

World Savvy is an amazing organization of professionals that bring together students from all around the bay area to focus on issues around the globe. For the past three years I have seen young minds grasp complicated issues and own them. I have been witness to the magic of struggling student as they make amazing discoveries. When one-sixth grader joined WAC he could not spell Pakistan let alone find it on a map. The following fall he stopped me in the hallway to recount all the things he had followed in the news about Pakistan that summer. His enthusiasm, curiosity and thirst for the truth has not waned. I have seen this happen again and again. Students learn that once you discover the truth you can not ignore it, where you are born does matter, and it is up to all of us to seek solutions together.

World Savy combines professional development for teachers with an awareness of how adolescents learn. Their workshops are unique and incorporate elements of the curriculum that are often neglected in schools today. Their on-going support for teachers with materials and written guides, ending in a celebration offer an entire school an opportunity to learn.

For several years I was lucky enough to have World Savvy and its amazing staff behind me every day as I stood up in front of my students at a public high school in San Francisco. These students, who are the focus of the current debate on failing schools and educational reform, threw themselves -frequently quite a bit over their heads- into everything from debates on comprehensive United Nations reform to water shortage impacts and solutions in the developing world. They worked harder than they had ever done in school and when I asked them why, they responded, "Because we talk about the real world in this class- things we care about and things we should care about." If World Savvy is able to work to its full potential, the gains for student and educator alike will be remarkable.

World Savvy provides some of the highest-quality professional development for educators in the Bay Area. Because of their outstanding work in the community, the students they reach are well-educated in global affairs and other important issues that are often missing from regular school instruction. And students become more confident with each showcase of their artwork, which World Savvy regularly organizes. I know of no other organization that deserves this opportunity more than World Savvy - their budget is small but their hearts are huge. Each member of the staff is completely selfless, and it's clear that they are in this business to create positive social change.

Kristin Farr, friend from the Arts Education Community

World Challenge Day is a great way for all interested students to expand their knowledge of world issues and experience creatively presenting what they know. Students are in a unique position to decide for themselves how they want to show others what they have learned. My students enjoy the challenge and enjoy the actual day. This is what real learning is all about

As a teacher who works with World Savvy I can honestly say this is one of the better non-profits in the country. The team is extremely dedicated to their work and this in turn makes for unique learning experiences for students and teachers alike. Participating in the World Affairs Challenge Day is the highlight of the year for me as a teacher.

World Savvy’s leadership and programs are unique, creative, and of the highest caliber in every way I have experienced them, from a teacher’s workshop at the Museum of Modern Art to a panel of experts at Columbia University considering American and Iranian relations.

Their mission serves a vital purpose in today’s world: increasing global literacy among our public school teachers and students, especially in underserved communities. They carry it out in an inspired way that achieves measurable results. Many more people should benefit from their services, and this would be made possible with a refined and expanded website.

I had the good fortune to work with Katina Papson of World Savvy in a collaboration between World Savvy and Horizons Unlimited where I was leading the art program with my Latino youth group. She was a lovely asset to our program and my students enjoyed her presentation, her manner with them, and the activities that they had the opportunity in which to participate. We culminated our collaboration with an exhibit at the Zeum museum for children, and our youth were present for the opening with the art work that we had created, inspired by the collaborative efforts of both of our organizations. I feel that we made a wonderful friend in Katina, and a valuable connection. ¡Que Viva World Savvy!