How to create an app that help communities solve their problems? Marnie Webb - the CEO of Caravan Studios, a division of TechSoup, organised by TechSoup Europe and Code for Poland. Caravan Studios build apps that help communities organize, access, and apply local resources to their most pressing problems. These are Community Developed Solutions. Marnie shared how Caravan Studios engages the community in defining problems and developing solutions. It is this method of working with people that is the basis of the success and usability of the solutions created at Caravan Studios. YT recording: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tDFXvJmnBNA FB event: https://www.facebook.com/events/177874676273931

1. CARAVAN STUDIOS
February, 2018

2. WHAT IS CARAVAN
STUDIOS?
And what do we do?

4. But how? You might
reasonably ask.

5. Like this:

6. Finding opportunities for
technology interventions.
Session conducted in
Belo Horizonte, MG, Brazil.

7. Imagine the technology needed
to respond to the generated
opportunities.
Session conducted in Porto Alegre, RS, Brazil.

8. Choose the best of the solutions.
Posters
depicting the
community-
made designs
are shared at
libraries to
gather feedback
and solicit
comments.

9. Develop the products.
Caravan Studios with the founders of JayStack,
the Hungarian technology development group
with whom we work.

10. Share the results and measure
the impact.

11. What unites these
efforts?

12. Issues related to food,
shelter, physical security,
and decent work

13. With youth who do not
have traditional
access to resources

14. At libraries

15. Around the world.

16. And these are the values
we strive to bring to this
work.

17. With not for.

18. Always learning.

19. Collaborate.

20. Open source
everything.

21. Joy.

22. Beauty.

23. Pragmatism.

24. PRODUCTS

26. The problem?

27. There are 98,817 public
schools in the United States.

28. These schools offer
federally funded free and
reduced price meals to
30.5 million students.
For all students, they are
safe places to spend the
day.

29. During the summer, only
1 in 6 school-age youth
are access federally
funded summer meal
programs.

30. https://vimeo.com/180928492

31. What can we do to help
students access
resources during the
summer months?

32. Our response?

34. <demo>

40. As of June, 2017 there have
been 2,011 downloads.

41. The impact?

42. We aren’t sure.

43. Range is good at helping
people find transient or
emerging resources.

44. We have experimented
with…
• A version to show all
Brazilian libraries.
• Displaying water tanks
in Diffa, The Republic of
Niger.

45. We are interested in…
• A rapidly deployable
version that can be
used to showcase
resources in response
to a crisis.

48. The problem?

50. How can we reimagine our
resources to serve all groups
of survivors?

51. Our response?

52. https://vimeo.com/191909703

53. The Safe Shelter Collaborative
has three components:

54. 1. Increase the capacity of
organizations to offer care to all
human trafficking and domestic
violence survivors.

55. 2. Technology to maximize the
ability to find available and
appropriate shelter space.

56. 3. The ability to source funding for
a hotel room, when that is an
appropriate and safe option for
the survivor.

57. [1. Increase capacity.]
• Provide access to training so
organizations offering shelter can better
serve human trafficking and domestic
violence survivors.
• Provide technical training to keep skills
fresh and provide access to promising
new practices.

58. [2. Find available shelter space.]
• Provide access to a technology platform
that allows organizations to send and
receive requests for shelter.
• Provide data to organizations on unmet
need in their community.
• Provide data to the field on unmet need
for shelter.

59. <demo>

61. [3. Source funding for hotel beds.]
• Provide access to a technology platform
that allows organizations to request
funding.
• Manage the SafeNight Fund to help meet
needs.
• Actively engage individual donors to
respond to requests via a mobile app.

63. The Safe Shelter Collaborative
includes 105 agencies in 11
states, supported by 1,398
community members who have
registered as donors.

64. Collectively, they have placed
more than 712 requests for
shelter and received more than
USD$37,000 for hotel rooms.

65. The impact?

66. 100% of participating agencies
recommend the Safe Shelter
Collaborative to other agencies
providing services to human
trafficking survivors.

67. 75% of participating agencies
report placement times have been
reduced from hours to minutes.

68. Most agencies report they have
expanded their referral network as
a result of participating in the Safe
Shelter Collaborative.

69. “A transgender client was able to do
1 intake and find shelter that was
unheard of prior. We would have to
call tons of shelters and ask if they
took transgendered clients - with the
training and the ease of the app our
clients are not judged and accepted
more openly.”

70. “It has streamlined our work, instead
of taking hours and days to find
emergency housing it takes 1-2 calls
on average.”

71. “If our shelter is full, we can still offer
services by offering a hotel stay or
finding space at another shelter.”

72. The Safe Shelter Collaborative
is good at finding capacity
limited services for specific
individuals.

73. We are interested in…
• Developing versions for
other similar service
types
• Such as, veterans,
foster youth, GLBTQ
youth.

75. The problem?

76. Communities depend on
skilled volunteers to specific,
time sensitive tasks in times
of stress.

77. Finding an available and
skilled volunteer to take on a
task often requires multiple
communications, resulting in
too many or too few
volunteers, and frustration for
everyone.

78. How do can we deploy skilled
volunteers quickly and
effectively?

79. Our response?

81. https://vimeo.com/185731875

85. 4Bells had been
downloaded 866 times.

86. 4Bells.org

87. Pilot Use Case: SFFD NERT
Organization and volunteer profile
• Neighborhood Emergency Response Team
• Volunteers organized by: neighborhood and skillset
• Challenge: Keeping volunteers engaged after training
• Deployment: public radio, mass email, and phone
Planned use of 4Bells
• Non-emergency: Training and drill opportunities
• Non-emergency: Social gatherings to keep them connected
• Post-disaster: deployment to command centers around the city
4Bells.org

88. Use Case: Japantown Prepared!
Organization and volunteer profile
• Community Emergency Response Team
• # of Volunteers: Dozens
• Volunteers organized by: type of volunteer
• Challenge: deploying the right volunteer at the time of need
• Deployment: text and phone calls
Planned use of 4Bells
• Non-emergency: Volunteers needed to set up and run events
• Non-emergency: Training and drill opportunities
• Post-disaster: deployment to specific incidents
4Bells.org

89. The impact?

90. We aren’t sure.

91. 4Bells is good at
connecting skilled
individuals to specific
tasks.

92. We are interested in…
• Deploying to other
rescue situations (think:
animals).
• Deploying for specific
high-value expertise
(think: legal assistance).

94. The problem?

95. Large, multi-tiered
constructions efforts present
unique human resource
challenges.

96. Executives may be unaware
of human rights issues at
different levels in the
contracting chain.

97. Workers may be unaware of
required standards and
unable to easily and safely
report issues.

98. How do we expose systemic
issues while providing support
to individual workers?

99. Our response?

101. <demo>

107. During beta testing, migrant
workers have made 137 reports
in their chosen language.

108. The impact?

109. We aren’t sure.

110. Worker Connect is good at
helping people safely report
on-the-ground conditions and
find problem areas.

111. We are interested in…
• Deploying this for
specific populations that
might be facing adverse
conditions, such as
refugees, immigrants,
people of color.
• Reporting on voting
issues.

112. Community Facilitation to Build Issue Facing
Technology Products