An Inspired Life Motivates US-Mexico Relations

Guest Blogger: Michael Hyatt, Chair-Board of Directors, Sister Cities International

On December 30, 2009 Bobby Salcedo from El Monte, CA and a leader within the US Mexico sister city network was killed during a random act of violence while vacationing in Mexico. Bobby's life and work were celebrated at the US Mexico Sister City Association (USMSCA) Conference this past weekend in Cathedral City, CA. While some may shy away from relationships with Mexico in wake of such violence, members of the USMSCA called for an increase in the number of partnerships and exchanges with Mexico. The Association recognized that safety is a concern and needs to be addressed, but we must not live in fear.

I, along with Laura Giroux, attended the US Mexico Sister City Association conference this past weekend in Cathedral City, CA. Having formalized our partnership last year, we began to discuss ways to work together. We are working on a track for our 2010 conference which will focus on Mexico. We hope this will attract USMSCA members to attend as well as invite their partners in Mexico. I have also asked Gil Garcia to serve on our Mexico Task Force with its goals of increasing our relationships in Mexico as well as the level of activity.

A foundation in Bobby's honor for scholarships is being established in his name. I will have details on the Sister Cities International website when the foundation is complete. Bobby's death only highlights the need for our work to continue in Mexico and provide assistance to our neighbors.

If your city has one of our 151 partnerships in Mexico, please invite them to the conference in Albuquerque.

Honoring a Sister Cities Icon: Ruth Hashimoto

I have been fortunate in my nearly three-year tenure to meet thousands of sister city volunteer leaders from around the U.S. and the globe. I am always struck by the passion and commitment of our members. Unfortunately earlier this week, the Sister Cities International family lost one of our leaders when she passed away - Ruth Hashimoto, a legendary figure in our organization.

Ruth’s daughter, Ada Jane Akin, shared this message about her passing:

"My mother passed away peacefully on Monday, 1/4/2010, about 5:15am MT. She had been in declining health for the past few months, and her 96-year-old body finally decided it was time to go. My family and I are comforted by the knowledge that she was well-cared for and comfortable during her last days."

As we circulated the news today, in a short few hours I received a notable number of personal messages from sister city members about Ruth. I’d like to share just a few:

• A great loss to our organization. A friend to all, an inspiration and the kindest person you could ever hope to meet.
• It is sad to lose our long-time friend. She inspired so many of us through the years. So many treasured memories... her twinkling eyes, her ready smile, her origami offerings to us, her picture taking and photographs sent to us after each meeting, and most of all, her faith in the good of her fellowman and her steadfast belief in and love for Sister Cities.
• Ruth's legacy will live on through those of us who were fortunate to know - and love - her.
• A great board member and great Sister City enthusiast.
• My first impression of Sister Cities International was my Friend, Ruth. We both shared the same name and she sorta took me under her wing. Every time we met, she made me feel so very special. Her thoughtful and loving ways endeared her to so many of us that we each and all felt her “motherly instincts”. Her passion for SCI was contagious and certainly will linger with us for many years to come. To me, she WAS SISTER CITIES.

Thank you to all of those members who shared their thoughts with me. I didn’t have chance to meet Ruth, which is my loss, but based on everything I know of her, I think she’d appreciate this reflection by British Poet and Painter David Harkins:

“You can shed tears that she is gone,
or you can smile because she has lived.

You can close your eyes and pray that she'll come back,

or you can open your eyes and see all she's left.

Your heart can be empty because you can't see her,

or you can be full of the love you shared.

You can turn your back on tomorrow and live yesterday,

or you can be happy for tomorrow because of yesterday.

You can remember her only that she is gone,

or you can cherish her memory and let it live on.

You can cry and close your mind,

be empty and turn your back.

Or you can do what she'd want:

smile, open your eyes, love and go on.”

I invite those of you who knew her to share your stories, thoughts, and reflections. Add your comment below so we can celebrate her legacy and…go on.  

~Patrick Madden, President & CEO, Sister Cities International

To-Do List Before Dec 31

Before I get into a pithy 2010 blog post, I'm going to make one last pitch for your help. With a few days left before New Years, I've got a few quick ideas for how to spend your time - friendraising and fundraising for us!

• Give a personal cash donation to Sister Cities International. If you’ve already given, can you give again? Visit www.sister-cities.org/donate. (When it asks, "How'd you hear about us?" mention my blog.)
• Do some post-holiday shopping at Amazon.com by using our Sister Cities International link so we receive a donation back. Visit www.sister-cities.org/marketplace/index.cfm. (Save this link, you can use this link any time during the year for your online shopping needs.)
• Send an email to all your Facebook friends, Twitter followers, and LinkedIn associates asking them to donate to Sister Cities International. Send them to www.sister-cities.org/donate.   
• Ask 2 of your friends who you know would be interested in helping advance world peace. Send them a personal note and ask them to visit www.sister-cities.org/donate. (This actually works, I know it sounds ancient, but it's VERY effective.)
• Check with your employer/company to see if they will match your donation. Visit www.giveto.psu.edu/WaysToGive/MatchingGifts/index.html.

To all of you who have given a contribution to Sister Cities International - thank you.

Honoring Corporate Commitments: Google

Each year Sister Cities International recognizes one company for their commitment to philanthropic investments in the international nonprofit sector. Past honorees include Motorola, AECOM, and CITRIX. This summer we honored Google with Sister Cities International’s Global Corporate Responsibility Award.

Since our conference was abroad, the company was unable to send a representative to attend the event, so I had the chance to visit Google’s headquarters this fall and present the award to Jessica Vaughan, a program manager for Google Grants (pictured above). Below you’ll find our short description of Google's recent philanthropic accomplishments:

Google aspires to use the power of information and technology to address the global challenges of our age. Through Google.org and Google Grants, Google has emerged as a powerful philanthropic force in a number of geographic and programmatic areas where sister cities members are active.

Google contributes funding in areas ranging from renewable energy, to global health, to information access, to small- and medium-sized enterprises. Most recently, Google funded research and programs in wind energy, solar thermal power and geothermal resources. Also, Google has invested in improving early detection, preparedness and response capabilities for global health threats and humanitarian crises in Africa and Asia as well as monitoring, analysis and prediction of the impacts of climate change on ecosystems, food and health in Africa and the Amazon.

In the education arena, Google made grants to improve the quality of education in Tanzania and in India focusing on student learning in primary education and benchmarking students to identify learning gaps. To help advance the private sector in Africa, Google funded business plan competitions and entrepreneurship programs in Ghana and Tanzania as well as provided support to spur job creation and strengthen poverty alleviation programs around the continent.

We hope their giving will inspire other corporations to grow their commitment to international philanthropy.

Use Your Facebook for A Good Cause

Dear Sister Cities Fans & Avid Followers:

This is call to action...for those of you who have Facebook accounts and want to use them foster world peace.

Chase Community Giving has partnered with Facebook to run a campaign to give away $1 million. We need you to vote for Sister Cities International! (Not Chicago Sister Cities International – no offense Chicago – nor other local programs). Click the link below to help us make a run for the money

VOTE NOW!

Looking at Global Education

Live from Doha, Qatar – I’m writing at the intersection of exhaustion and jet lag. It’s not a good place but I can sleep on the plane, right? I’m here attending the first World Innovation Summit on Education (WISE). The event is hosted and underwritten by the Qatar Foundation.

This is a serious meeting of the minds from the education sector – university presidents, national policy makers, NGO leaders, education reformers, multinational funders, community education advocates, open source and techie types, heads of state, corporate executives – more than 1,000 people are in the conversation. The Institute of International Education, one of our sister institutions, is one of the key supporting organizers.

 

The conference has been exploring three major themes: innovation, sustainability, and global education. With breakout sessions looking at inequality, higher education, funding, technology, women's education, e-learning, special needs, global mobility, access, social media, conflict zones, and minority inclusion among other topics.

 

The breadth and depth of the dialogue in and out of sessions has been terrific, but let me start with some facts:

• 115 million children around the world are not attending school
• 776 million adults cannot read or write
• 40% of the population in the Arab world is under 25
• One quarter of the world’s youth lives in the Arab World
• One of every three youth in the Arab World are unemployed
• The E.U. provides .5% (of GDP) budget subvention for education and 40% subvention to agriculture
• The cost of one additional solider stationed in Afghanistan is equal to building 20 new schools in the country
• In developing countries, 90% of working women with an education reinvest their salary in their family, compared to 40% of men who reinvest in their family
• 40% of West Africa and South Africa is illiterate
• Half of all the teachers in Sub-Sahara Africa are untrained or undertrained
• Africa needs 4 million new teachers in the next 5 years to meet demands
• One third of higher education students in South Africa are studying via distance learning
• There are 4 billion active mobile accounts worldwide
• There are 1.5 billion active web accounts worldwide
• 2% of student learning worldwide is happening via mobile technology
• A new study suggests adults will have 10.8 jobs by the age of 42
• Only 2% of U.S. students study abroad

 (Note: Facts are from various sources and speakers throughout the conference.)

 

Since I can't do the conference sessions justice by recasting them in summary, (information and speaker videos are online at the WISE conference website), I'm sharing some of my favorite soundbytes, comments, and opinions:

• Education is a basic human right and there is an education deficit globally.
• Seek knowledge from the cradle to the grave. (Arabic saying)
• We need to create knowledge societies.
• It’s no longer a career for life, but a lifetime of careers.
• Nothing is more dangerous than a world view from someone who has had no view of the world.
• We need excellence and equity in education.
• We need to create global competence among our citizens.
• Knowledge transcends time. Knowledge travels.
• We need to change the system. Real reform puts the student front and center not the bus schedule.
• Education is an economic driver.
• Knowledge is the human adventure.
• We have corporate social responsibility, but what we need is intellectual social responsibility.
• An unexamined life is not worth living. (Socrates)
• An educator makes the hard seem easy.
• Technology breaks isolation and brings learning to remote sites.
• Education and innovation will be the currency of the 21st century. (Obama)
• Teachers bring knowledge to life.
• Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire. (Yates)
• Education is the key to building a culture of peace.

My deep appreciation to all of the speakers and participants (quoted and unquoted) who I spoke with for their thoughts, opinions, and passion. My less-than-stellar note-taking doesn't allow me to properly attribute each quote, so I apologize. But clearly, they left an impression on me.

 

All this has me thinking…what else can Sister Cities International and our network of 2,000 communities do to flex our muscles of influence on education globally?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

President Obama: Sister Cities Exchanges Are Wonderful

In a town hall meeting today in Shanghai, China, President Obama mentioned the value of more than 200 friendship cities between the U.S. and China. Later in the event, he was asked about the Shanghai-Chicago partnership. His response:

"I was just having lunch before I came here with the Mayor of Shanghai, and he told me that he has had an excellent relationship with the city of Chicago -- my home town -- that he's visited there twice. And I think it's wonderful to have these exchanges between cities."

He continued by talking about the types of exchanges he thinks would be favorable, such as climate change and clean energy. He finished by saying, "..it's a terrific opportunity I think for us to learn from each other."

Citizen Diplomacy is on the move! A great acknowledgement for the sister cities movement.

Read the whole Town Hall Transcript.