OUTREACH WITH COMMUNITY LEADERSHIP
SECRETARY OF STATE, ALEX PADILLA
On February 20th, Engineering4All’s President met Secretary Padilla when he came to our school to speak about voting and involvement in community. She spoke about our Intro to Engineering Workshop Series and our Engineering Design Club Meetings, showing our work in San Jose, one of California’s most diverse communities. Secretary Padilla connected with Engineering4All further when he spoke to them about his office’s work with the approval and development of nonprofits like Engineering4All. We have connected with him and his office for further work with expansion across California.
SANTA CLARA COUNTY SUPERVISOR, CINDY CHAVEZ
Engineering4All’s Board of Directors has had multiple opportunities to meet with the office of Santa Clara County Supervisor Cindy Chavez. We were able to connect with them about improving the current state of the program, and branching out into a wider range of outreach events. They suggested that we not only work with a few schools, but also collaborate with many more in a larger collective event. Additionally, they offered to set up meetings with the Santa Clara County Office of Education and various library representatives to present our program to a wider audience, and expand it past the realm of schools. We also inquired about other ways that we can make the program accessible to a wider range of students, and about tips for applying to different grants. We are looking forward to communicating further with the office, and moving forward with the next steps of our plan.
SAN JOSE DISTRICT 3 COUNCIL MEMBER, RAUL PERALEZ
On April 8th, Engineering4All’s Board of Directors met with Councilmember Raul Peralez to discuss the expansion of our organization. To expand our service, he suggested working with other schools in the district as well as working at local libraries. In San Jose and in CM Peralez’s district, homelessness crisis is an enormous problem. We discussed creating workshops that would address local issues while still connecting to engineering. To help now with the current COVID crisis, our Board of Directors has decided to create YouTube videos that could be easily accessed and taught during this difficult time. CM Peralez has offered to share the videos in order to spread our message. Problem solving is an essential skill that we teach our students, and the meeting with CM Raul Peralez showed us we can continue to teach kids in these difficult times.