Wednesday, July 6, 2011

Kick-offs at the IBM Offices

4th July

After a hearty breakfast at the hotel, we all piled into taxis and were driven to the IBM offices in Porto Alegre. Once we were verified and tagged, we went up to one of the meeting rooms where we were greeted by various IBM execs, NGOs and members of the OnDemand community from IBM POA.

Ruth who is the Corporate Citizenship lead in Brazil gave a introduction on the work that we're doing and the reason for our 1 month visit there. This was followed by all "project team introductions". The NGO representatives provided an introduction on their work, mission and expectations and all of us IBMers introduced ourselves with a brief background. It was very inspiring to listen to the NGO's and see how passionate they are about the work they do and to see how much they appreciate the involvement of IBM and the work us volunteers have come to do.
Group picture of #ibmcsc #Brazil team 10, NGO's and IBM executives

This was followed by additional presentation for NGOs about IBM initiatives. As this was in portuguese, we  skipped it and held a quick photo session (it took about an hour) in the offices upstairs. 
IBM CSC Brazil Team 10 (minus Michele from Australia)

View from IBM Porto Alegre offices

In the afternoon, Jasmine and myself were picked up and driven to the Fundação Pensamento Digital (FPD) where we did the rounds and Marta (our co-ordinator and FPD Director) introduced us to all the staff and teachers at the center. It was an interesting afternoon seeing the kids at the after-school program and the work that FPD does to help them improve their school performance and decrease the negative impact of social vulnerability. Marta is very passionate about the work she does and spoke to us a lot about the students, the program, the center and its mission (I will write more about this in future blogs).
Jasmine (from IBM China) and myself who will be working together with FPD

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Looks like a nice city. Enjoy your posting!
- Liz

Sylvia S. said...

Hey Lynette, that sounds very much like the afterschool program I supported. I wish you the best of luck. Thank you for keeping us posted. Please say hi to the team from me.