Run For Water

This weekend I am running in the The Dow Live Earth Run For Water that will take place on Sunday April 18 in Atlanta. The distance of the run is 6 km, which is the average distance many women and children travel every day just to secure water to be able to drink. The scarcity of water for many people around the world is a growing problem today.

This run is taking place over the course of 24 hours in countries around the world, featuring concerts and water education activities aimed at igniting a tipping point to help solve this global water crisis.

I am excited to be able to participate in this great event this weekend with my wonderful mother. We both share a passion for making a difference in our community and globally, and what better way than to run together and support this great effort.

$25 gives one classroom full of children clean water for a year – keeping kids healthy and in school.

Live Earth was built upon the belief that entertainment has the power to transcend social and cultural barriers to move the world community to action. I recently blogged about the company ignition-inc. after hearing the founder, Dill Driscoll, speak at my University. I was touched by Dill's message and the overall mission of ignition-inc. to make a positive difference in people's lives. Interestingly enough, ignition-inc. actually works on organizing the global runs for Live Earth.

Women’s Leadership Symposium

GCSU Women's Soccer Team pictured with Keynote Speaker
Pictured from left: Wendell Staton,Cecile Reynaud, Ada Bazin, Germaine McAuley, Awista Ayub, Joeleen Akin, Jennifer Graham and Kara Teresi

Georgia College & State University Department of Athletics and the Office of Institutional Equity and Diversity's Women’s Resource Center held the first-ever Women’s Leadership Symposium Monday, March 15 in Magnolia Ballroom. The symposium featured six guest speakers including keynote speaker Awista Ayub, author of However Tall the Mountain, who discussed, “The Role of Sports for Women In Afghanistan.” Here is my personal story about the impact of Awista Ayub’s book. “I came across Awista Ayub on the littlefeet_com twitter page. Our GCSU soccer team partners with Little Feet, a non-profit organization that sends soccer balls to underprivileged children worldwide. Ayub has been a long time supporter of Little Feet sending soccer balls to children in Afghanistan. I clicked on a link that sent me to Ayub’s website, www.awistaayub.com. Instantly, I was captivated by her books cover that read, A Dream, Eight Girls & A Journey Home with an image of an Afghan woman holding a soccer ball above her head. Khaled Hosseni, author of The Kite Runner, gave a quote on the books cover that read, “These young afghan women are pioneers. Their story is one of resilience and courage. This book is a testament to the power of hope and the will to dream in a country where so many dreams have been cut short”. I purchased the book immediately and received it in the mail shortly there after; I read it during our long soccer bus rides and finished the book towards the end of our season. Our team was playing at home for conference game against University North Carolina Pembroke (UNCP) on October 21. It was this particular night when the book came full circle for me. I was standing on our soccer field with my teammates facing towards the Flag as it waved in the wind with the sounds of the national anthem playing behind us. I began to cry. In her book, Awista gives an image of these Afghan girls standing in Ghazi Stadium, where they had once witnessed the Taliban brutally murder many Afghans on this same field. It was right there in that stadium, on that field, where these girls would eventually play soccer and represent their country. I was filled with emotions of how blessed I was to be playing this game of soccer, and living in a country with freedom and liberties. I have never felt more privileged to play the game of soccer than in that moment. We won our game that night, and it sparked a passion within me to e-mail Awista Ayub and share how her book had changed my perspective.” Little did I know, that sending this e-mail would be the beginning of something greater than I had could have ever imagined. Over 60 participants attended the symposium, including 25 high school students. President Dorothy Leland gave a warm welcome and introduction for participants, and spoke of the progress women have made in Georgia College’s history and inspired future leaders to continue in this progress by leading with character and integrity. The symposium ended with Awista Ayub’s keynote address that included a 10-minute ESPN documentary from these courageous young women and their experiences playing soccer in Afghanistan. Below are some participant responses when asked to respond to the question, “What is one thing they will take away from attending this symposium?”

“To be a positive influence in others lives.”

“That I can do something worthwhile.”

“ The desire/goal to form a mentoring program at our school.”

“To get out there and not settle for the least, but to always try and never give up.”

“Appreciation of my personal freedoms.”

“How a small idea can make a huge difference.”

With the valuable impact of this Women’s Leadership Symposium for students, Georgia College hopes to make this a tradition for years to come.

GCSU Women's Leadership Symposium

www.gcsubobcats.com/wlshome
Registration Deadline is Wednesday March 10.

Sponsored by GCSU Athletics and OIED Women's Resource Center the Women's Leadership Symposium will be held
on Monday March 15 in Magnolia Ballroom from 8:00a.m. - 2:00p.m.

The symposium will feature 6 guest speakers. Including keynote speaker, author, Awista Ayub. Ms. Ayub's book, "However Tall the Mountain" is available in GCSU Bookstore, it will also be available at the event and there will be a book signing too.

Leadership topics of discussion include mentoring, community involvement, diversity and much more! There is a $10 registration fee that includes participant breakfast and lunch.

The keynote speaker, Awista Ayub, Author, "However Tall the Mountain" will be presenting at 1 p.m. on the topic of "Role of Sports For Women In Afghanistan" Check out her website at www.awistaayub.com

How do you see yourself using technology?

Digital Bridges is the client for my senior public relations campaign class. On Saturday February 27, 2010 at the Milledgeville Mall we presented our campaign titled, "How do you see yourself using techonlogy? " to the community. We had a nice table set up directly in the middle of the mall and had 4 Apple computers set up with the photo booth application. We encouraged people to sit down and take their "fun"picture and then we printed them off and handed them there picture magnet with the digital bridges logo and mission statement as well as a flyer with the address to Digital Bridges and other information. In addition, we printed off an extra copy of their picture and posted it on our display board and told them to stop by Digital Bridges to see their picture and collect a coupon for Chick-fil-A. During the event, we reached a wide audience including people from the blood drive and beauty pageant going on that day. Our goal was to spread awareness of how technology is fun, and how Digital Bridges offers many great resources to the community from classes for beginners learning to use e-mail or for the advanced learning cutting-edge technology systems. From my experience, I found that the way to have people be most receptive to what we were doing was to 1) listen and be patient 2) hook them with a connection 3) show them the benefits 4) be concise to get the point across 5) always smile :) I think that these same principles apply to working with a client. As a public relations professional, I know that being indispensable to the client is key. From this event, I further increased my ability to communicate effectively, my problem solving skills and my overall campaign management. In answer to our campaign title, " I see myself using technology to connect with others in bringing about positive change in my community and globally." Feel free to post your answer to this same ? on my blog!

Making a positive difference in people's lives

Have you heard of ignition? Well, here they are. These people are amazing. Check them out at www.ignition-inc.com.

I had the pleasure to listen to ignition Chairmen and Founder, Dill Driscoll speak at an event sponsored by the GCSU Entrepreneurial Residential Learning Community (ERLC).

Ignition’s mission is to make a positive difference in peoples lives. Dill talked about his personal philosophy of leadership and entrepreneurship.

During his dynamic presentation, Dill mentioned that no person could be an entrepreneur without leadership. He referenced some great leaders of the past including Moses, Martin Luther King Jr. and Sir Earnest Shakleton.

Dill spoke about how great leaders engage the heart, refuse to accept the status quo, create a sense of urgency, call people to act in accordance to right values, acknowledge the sacrifices of others, paint a visual picture of tomorrow, have compassion, forgiveness, joy, peace, inner-strength, generosity, humor, intelligence, complete trust and poise.

In addition, Dill discussed about the 5 screens today. The first 4 were easy to identify and they included the following: Movie, Television, Computer and Smart Phone. However, the last one he mentioned was that of Human Touch.

As public relations professionals, I believe that it is necessary to understand, Human Touch, in order to be the most effective and the most valued to those who we are working with. At the end of the day it is the friendships and relationships that are being built through our personal interactions with other people.

My challenge to my public relations peers is to get out there and start interacting with other public relations professionals. Handing out your business card is a great way to make a personal connection and let people know how much you care.

You may be surprised to see how something so simple as the human touch can be beneficial in connecting you to people and opening opportunities for you in your career.

I wanted to thank ERLC for having Dill come speak at GCSU. The next ERLC meeting is this Monday March 1 at 12:30 p.m. in the dining hall room next to the ice cream machine. Guess who is guest speaking? Yep, that would be yours truly; I will be speaking about the Women’s Leadership Symposium I am organizing to be held on Monday March 15 at GCSU. See you there!

My Tweet Challenge Experience

I hit over 100 tweets, followed more than 25 new people and used everything from #hahtags, RT's, Links and @replies. This challenge was a challenge for me. Thanks to everyone who followed me and tweeted me! The challenge has helped me to see the value of using twitter to connect with other people and learn new things even if it did consume a lot of my time.

I will admit that not having the Internet physically at my fingertips (i.e. smart phone, iphone,etc.) did limit me in this challenge. Although, today while I was sitting on the crammed shuttle to class, I noticed that the guy sitting next to me was tweeting from his iphone. I engaged him in conversation about twitter and we talked all the way until we got off the shuttle. He had mentioned that there was the option to tweet using text messaging on your phone. Sadly, I am still a simple girl at the end of the day and I do not have unlimited text messaging on my phone so I don't see that really being a feasible option for me, but still good to know for all my readers out there.

However, the lack of Internet at my fingertips was not the only obstacle I faced in this challenge. In addition, I did come across the reality that many professional women may be aware of twitter for their organization, but are not at this point in time using twitter personally. I say this because over the last week, I had the opportunity to attend a PBC Women in Athletics Seminar and a Women's Leadership Forum. I got the names of the guest speakers and some of those who attended and looked them up on twitter, the majority I did not find and the few that were found had not updated their pages for awhile.

On the other hand, I did have some positive takeaways from this challenge. I had the opportunity to take a client that I am working with this semester, Aubri Lanes restaurant, and increase their twitter followers from only 1 follower to a total of 4. I understand that this is just a small measure of improvement, but you see that was just from 1 tweet about @AubriLanes. I believe that if Aubri Lanes will move into constantly updating their twitter page, they could have an even better following. My hope is to see that Aubri Lanes will continue to increase their twitter followers and twitter presence. I'm not sure how I can measure the result of whether or not using twitter brings people into the restaurant, but I do know that it will serve to most certainly increase their brand awareness.

In this challenge, I experienced such a variety of knowledge from my exposure to twitter. I think of twitter as a constantly updated newspaper where I can get information readily about everything there is to know. I am glad that this challenge is behind me now. I look forward to tweeting at the healthy medium for me and that does not include 5 tweets a day, everyday.

PR Tweet Challenge

http://twitter.com/

The Tweet Challenge is 5 tweets a days for 7 days and to follow 25 more PR and social media practitioners. I need your support!

Please follow my blog and tweet me @karateresi

Thanks for your tweet time :) and stay posted as I will be blogging about my experience.