Correspondence/Invitation Letter1

Subject: Free Service for nonprofits / NGOs to support education, OD, community relations and outreach

Hi ,

I'm writing to share information about a free service, to help reduce the time and expense associated with developing education, training, community relations and organization development resources. http://www.communityengagementwiki.org

Consider the value of having access to a network community and online space to share ideas, resources, templates and good practices with your peers -- to customize, adapt and revise according to your context and situation.


 * education and training materials
 * marketing and strategic plans
 * funding proposals
 * outreach and advocacy resources
 * leadership development and teambuilding
 * organization and policy development resources
 * HR/career development info, job descriptions, manuals

How It Works
The Community Engagement wiki is an online space - is hosted on WikiEducator.org without charge.

WikiEducator is a top 100K website with 15,000 educators in 120 countries. It is the flagship project of the not for profit Open Education Resources Foundation in New Zealand.(Think Wikipedia for education).

The Community Engagement wiki builds on the Commonwealth of Learning's Community Media / Community Radio Community of Practice which has 100+ organizations in Africa, Asia, the Caribbean, and North America developing and sharing educational resources and good practices. These organizations include: KRUU-FM, US; Maraa, India; International AIDS Society, Switzerland; and Farm Radio International, Canada.

Ready, Set, Go...
To help get started, the Open Education Resources Foundation, NZ and the Hewlett Foundation, US, is offering free wiki skills training, for NGOs / nonprofit organizations. Social entrepreneurs are welcome too! It will be offered in late September/October 2010.

This free online course - with facilitator support - builds on the innovative Learning4Content wiki skills training program that has successfully trained 3,500 people in 120 countries.

Get Involved By...

 * Reaching out to employees or volunteers who want to learn wiki skills, to help your organization use the Community Engagement wiki. (They'll receive a valuable WikiApprentice certification!)
 * Sharing your challenges, successes and good practices
 * Forwarding this note to your networks / communities - so that others can learn valuable wiki skills, and connect to Community Engagement resources and a growing network of peers.

If you have any questions or feedback, please write me directly - I'd be delighted to help.

Best regards,

- Randy Fisher (aka WikiRandy)

P.S. I am on WikiEducator's governing council and specialize in facilitating organizational learning and change, online collaboration and engagement - http://www.wikieducator.org/User:Randyfisher