A Rhyme and An Apology
Alex
Violets are blue
No amount of apologies
Will equal 'undo'
The damage is done
And I am to blame
If you want a resignation
My name is fair game.
Your anger is right
My actions were wrong
Now a gorilla on our back
As big as King Kong.
SAGA must now act to
Overcome this adversity
But is that so bad,
Isn't that what we all wanted to see?
Honestly, I was being complacent,
I was being a fool.
For the last four months
I haven't touched a Photoshop tool.
No new designs,
No long-term plans unveiled,
No wonder you were all
Whispering that SAGA failed.
But this is our chance
To turn it all around,
We are not yet
buried into the ground.
Changes can and will happen
That is guaranteed.
Transparency, communication and humour
Will make us succeed.
I'll inspire you again
Because I know I can
But eventually you will inspire me
That's the big plan
I know I lost some of you
But I hope to win you back,
I am writing a goddamn silly rhyme!!
This has to be the right track :-)
On a much more serious note: To those whom I have angered and
disappointed with my previous post, I do wish to apologize immensely.
It was extremely inconsiderate of me to write such irrational comments
with disregard for those who would eventually read it. I placed myself
above those whom we are fighting for and that is inexcusable. Each and
everyone of you have every right to ignore my apology - and if you
wish to have my resignation I will render it immediately upon
request.
But if you like my rhyme (or more importantly, the attitude behind it)
I will try harder than ever to make SAGA succeed in the hopes that I
can eventually win you back. I will let my actions speak for me
instead of my words. I'll make sure SAGA finally reaches its
potential.
P.S. Some of you wished for me to take down my previous post. I am
doing it because I respect those who made the request; but I am also
keeping a personal copy for myself so that I know how far I fell and
so I don't return there again.
Queenie
i'm extremely joyous now. tehe
Chris Schafenacker
stacey der
would still like to meet with you Alex, , see what I can do.......
From: Alex <questio...@gmail.com>
Reply-To: saga_s...@googlegroups.com
To: "Students Against Global Apathy (SAGA)" <saga_s...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: [saga_samurais] A Rhyme and An Apology
Date: Wed, 18 Apr 2007 14:55:17 -0000
Alex
I thought I'd write down a little bit of what I am working/reading
right now so that you know SAGA is moving forward. I am going to use
this past week as a wake up call and show you with actions that I am
committed to fulfill SAGA's potential. Part of the reasons why things
happened as they did was because I forgot about the big picture and
began to focus on a few negatives. This frustrated the perfectionist
within me and was obviously just stupid. I forgot that change is
inevitably messy and that only if you stay true to your vision will
you ever achieve anything.
1) The Dawn of the Cosmopolitan: The Hope for a Global Citizens
Movement
http://www.gtinitiative.org/documents/PDFFINALS/15Movements.pdf
This is a paper by a research group in Boston that analyzes the
requirements of what is needed to create the broad, systematic changes
that are associated with the "Global Citizens Movement". The idea is
kinda the holy grail in my mind; but there definitely are big
obstacles for any group to achieve this. So we'll likely focus on the
small scale right now and grow into something larger with time.
Currently the 'mission' in my head that stands out the most is "to
promote and finance solutions towards global poverty using the
creative genius of the world's youth".
2) Seven Revolutions
http://7revs.csis.org/sevenrevs_content.html
This is an interactive website created by a think-tank in Washington
that shows us what the world is going to be like in 2025. It
highlights population, resource management, technology, knowledge,
economic integration, conflict, and governance. Those headings might
seem bland but there is some really cool facts here that provide great
insight. I am going to use this site (and its many sources) to
establish the groundwork for our long-term strategies. Ex. Did you
know that individuals donated $240.72 Billion to charities in 2003 and
corporations only donated 13.46 Billion. -- Numbers such as these
amaze me and tell me that we can carve out a niche in this sector.
There is also a thing called Seven Futures that looks at what trends
will occur in 2025 of seven global regions.
http://7futures.csis.org/
3) EWB, Ashoka Foundation, Echoing Green, plus others
http://www.ewb.ca/en/whatwedo/canada/approach.html
http://ashoka.org/impact/methodology
http://www.echoinggreen.org/
Previously while trying to plan the next steps of SAGA's growth I
found it hard to come up with everything from scratch. So I am going
to look at highly successful models that others have done and "borrow"
their ideas. I'll see what they did to become successful and try to
incorporate that into what I want to do with SAGA. This will give us a
place to start and then we can add our own modifications and personify
it as our own.
4) A new website??
I am looking into maybe making a new website or maybe just changing
things with the current one. I want to incorporate aspects of Web 2.0
so that we have a more interactive feel. Possible ideas includes
things like voting for t-shirt designs online, submitting designs and
pictures, or even just commenting on something interested that is
posted. We might have a new section for interesting blogs I know of
aid workers overseas or even have our own "SAGA bloggers" to write
articles on some relevant issue.
5) Learning Business Skills
And yeah, I am reading a bunch of business website of how to manage
organizations and become a better leader. They have funny titles like
"The go-to place for management", "Create a Career with Impact", "10
Easy Steps to Developing Your Leadership Skills" and stuff like that.
I laugh at them because I am used to studying E.coli, killer T-cells
and viruses; but if this is what I gotta do to make SAGA into a better
organization, then this is what I am going to do.
Alex
P.S. I use the word "I" in a lot of the referred sentences; but I only
do so because it is exam season and you guys shouldn't have to worry
about these things right now. Our new direction will definitely
encourages more "we" than "me".
P.P.S. If anybody wants to meet up for coffee I'll get back to you
individually.
On Apr 19, 1:16 pm, "stacey der" <stacey...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> would still like to meet with you Alex, , see what I can do.......Stacey
>
Meghana S
I'm very glad that you changed your mind!
Like I said before, I just joined this mailing list recently and I'd love to help you guys out. I have some ideas about potential directions you could expand into. But, I think that before all that you might want to consider becoming a NPO. You will have access to some more funding than you currently do and will have more credibility when you start to move beyond the U of A (eg. into other universities, and high schools or if you decide to make partnerships with businesses).
I know a number of people who have (or are in the process of) starting their own NPO's and I also know a few people who have started their own businesses... so if you need advice or what not, give me a shout!
Meghana
Alex <questio...@gmail.com> wrote:
Ahhh...imagining that irresistible "new car" smell?
Check out new cars at Yahoo! Autos.
Michelle Loewen
http://www.charityvillage.com
A great resource site for NPO's and charities.
-Michelle
Students Against Global Apathy
CharityVillage is definitely an excellent resource and as a bonus it's Canadian!! I've known about the site for awhile, but I haven't been checking up on it lately so I'll do some exploring this weekend. And I am also adding some other NPO resources I know of. They are mostly based out of the US but they have valuable insight for anyone looking into this type of field.
Alex
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