October 8th Meeting Minutes pk

October 8, 2015 Meeting Minutes: The official OneSky Launch

Attendees: Jenny, Pat, Lucia, Lauri, Christine (via conference call), Jane, Ida, Ausannette, Ivy, Melissa (via
conference call), Carol (via conference call), Sandy, Wendy, Katie, & Winnie

OBJECTIVES:

Morning Session (page 1)
• Editing Test eBlast (page 1)
• Updated Email Signer (page 2)
• Brainstorming/Handling Potential Post-Launch Questions (page 2)
• Updating Social Media (page 4)

Afternoon Session (page 5)
§ Go Over Follow-up Questions from the Morning Session (page 5)
§ Jenny’s Discussion Points: Watermarking, Good World, LinkedIn, & Global Giving (page 5)
§ Glossary (page 5)
§ Merchandise (page 6)
§ The Afternoon Website Updates (page 6)

MORNING SESSION

(1) Editing Test eBlast
• Jenny requested that everyone read the Eblast as though we were reading it for the first time and to to
check out all the links as well.
o Table Comments:
§ Pat:
• Don’t use “changes” or “becomes”—Although the eBlast does state these
terms, this will be the only time that we are referring to the transition in
this manner because we need to stress that we are in the process of
becoming and changing so, so we should say Half the Sky is changing its
name and Half the Sky is becoming OneSky.
• Orphanage description is too long.
o Jenny’s reply: all of the paragraphs look the same to her. We owe
the public all of that information.
• If we aren’t changing the HTS-HK office as of yet, why aren’t they
included in the global network eBlast disclaimer section?
o Jenny’s reply: Let’s leave it alone.
§ Winnie: nothing-only thinking about the Hong Kong office
§ Wendy: looks good
§ Ida:
• In the “P.S.” section, should we add “you can still find us at
halfthesky.org”
o Jenny: doesn’t matter, if they hit OneSky, they will still get to
Half the Sky, we want to keep it simple. There’s no way for the
public to go to OneSky anyway.
§ Jane: looks good
§ Katie: looks good, a little long
§ Ausannette: looks good
• Adding Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram
o Jenny: Available on benchmark? Ivy will add them. Ausannette
will send the url links to her again. So 5 social media icons, total.


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Ivy, please make the P.S. more “brick color” (the same color as
the “button”)
• The bullet list is a completely different font style on the computer. On the
phone, the font is the same.
o Jenny requested that Ivy change it. Benchmark is not perfect.
§ Lauri:
• Content a little long
• Color of the font appears too light
§ Lucia: looks good
§ Carol:
• The last sentence of Jenny’s letter “left-behind in a rural village” should
not have a hyphen in left-behind. Lacks consistency.
o Jenny: Carol is correct. Ivy needs to change it to two words.
o Pat: It’s only “left-behind” when using it as an adjective.
• Glad to see the “note about our other international networks” was
included at the bottom of the eBlast.
o Jenny: Too small? Carol’s response: It is hidden, but we can
follow up on Facebook.
§ Jenny:
• Go a shader darker on the three paragraphs about the child sponsorship
info.

(2) Updating Email Signer:
• Per Jenny: for consistency sake, lowercase the “c” in children.
• Lauri: The “Because they all deserve big dreams” is hard to read on the email signer.
o Jane: She agrees, and also how it looks on the phone, you don’t get the turquoise color, so
it’s hard to read. But it looks okay on the laptop, but not necessarily on the iphone.
§ Jenny’s reply: Ivy, move the text and picture to the left to give more room for
readability.

(3) Brainstorming/Handling Potential Post-Launch Questions

Jenny: How to best deal with potential questions that will likely arise with this launch:

• Sandy: What’s going to happen to our existing orphanage children? Are we backing out of China? Are
we shifting focus rather than expanding? Then why are we still funding in the orphanages, too?
o Jenny: Best response: “Actually, we are moving the operations of the orphanage programs as
much as possible over to the government - over to the orphanages themselves- those who
are able to sustain their own operations are doing so, those who are not yet able to, we are
continuing to support partially. In addition, we are creating regional model centers that we
will maintain in order to maintain quality standards. These centers will be training bases for
the whole country. So, we will never stop our training, mentoring, and guidance. We will be
there as long as we are needed. Just like we have always said. We have been for a long
time transitioning from an operating organization to a training and mentoring organization.
This is the next step - allowing institutions that can support themselves to take this
responsibility, creating models, continuing to train, mentor and guide.
§ Pat: Need a template response, include Seed Centers. It is tricky, but our
commitment isn’t changing. Need to work out specific language as people ask,
because we are still working on FAQs. Will be tweaked as we go along. Send any
questions directly to Pat.

• Monitoring quality and care of the programs for those we no longer give to anymore?


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o Jenny’s Best Response: We have trainers and program directors who travel the country
constantly. They go to all sites, they and offer training through the Rainbow program -- all
of the Seed sites get 3 years of intensive training. The model centers - every one of them-
has a project office, and in that project office are child development experts that range out
through their area. At least one CDE IN EVERY REGION. Don’t say PROVINCE. Our
staff is constantly offering training workshops, and inviting institutional staff to the model
centers to see the programs. And at any institution where we provide ANY funding at all,
we do regular evaluations that include a child development checklist for all of our programs,
program audits, and financial audits. We are constantly watching and monitoring those sites.
§ Christine: As well as an eLearning community
§ Pat: say CDE in every region. Don’t say province.
§ Jane:
• Need to know about smaller institutions that we no longer fund, are we
informally checking back in 6 or 9 months? How to answer this question
for donors.
o Jenny’s Best Response: We are available for training.
§ Note: Jenny needs to look into it how we are handling
institutions who aren’t proactively reaching out to us.
Needs to check with Rachel. But Jenny is not sure if
we are still continuing to evaluate. Note, we haven’t cut
off anyone as of yet that can’t afford it. The ones we've
learned through positive conversations can afford it,
are the ones we've been cutting funding from.

• Ivy: Where are you going? What other countries are we trying to reach?
o Jenny’s Best Response: We are rolling out the village models in central China- (Don’t include
the province in external communications, just central China.) That rollout will take us
through next spring and will be been monitoring that program to see what's working,
including a two year evaluation. We are beginning to do research on other countries but we
haven’t made any decisions yet, because we are very active in the work we are doing right
now.

• Ida: Why now? Why after so long?
o Carol: We answered this before, this is natural evolution, the time is right! The government
taking over the programs has been our long-term goals. I engage in in depth conversations
with others, sharing the book with face-to-face supporters, not necessarily on the phone.
Many of them like to be a part of the journey. The backstage story.
o Jenny’s Best Response: “For those who do not want the backstage story: “We have learned
through our work (basically what is in my letter) that the model we created has a universal
application, and we now feel that we have to make sure that we do what we can to make it
available to these children in these difficult circumstances. And we've learned that there are
always many ways of being abandoned, orphaned, or neglected. We feel that the same
models that we've created, the same approach we've developed, will work in other
circumstances. And, we feel compelled to do what we can.”
§ Carol’s reply: Agrees and adds the awareness about how people aren’t doing
anything –this type of work- in the world.
• Jenny’s reply: Disagrees. Hard to say that on a phone call without giving
background info. People don’t want to hear the negative stuff, they will
want the proof. Always stay positive.
o So, if someone asks about your motives, stay positive. Jenny’s Best
Response: “We have seen incredible transformations. We
understand now that this model can work with all sorts of
children in all circumstances. And we must do what we can to
spread that model.”
o Pat: We should integrate Jenny's evolution through her book in
in the “About Us” section.
§ Jenny’s response: Yes, for the new website.


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• Jane: Had a meeting with a donor in the 1-3K range, was told by these donors that they thought that
Half the Sky doesn’t need us anymore because everything is being turned over to the government.
o Jenny: Jane should craft a letter with our appeal letter targeted in that donor range,
explaining why we still need their help, writing from your own experience exactly why we
need their help. So it will be in addition to Jenny’s letter targeted toward the larger grassroots
audience and child sponsorships.

• Jenny: Who do I make my check out to?
o Best response: “Please keep making donations the same way as you always have. We are in
the process of changing our name.” (When we have to make them change, people will find
it easier psychologically change it themselves over time. This is a process.)
o Lucia: For the Pledge Thank You End of year letters: perhaps add a sentence at the end
about this matter?
§ Jenny: Great idea.

• Pat: No U.S. donation form on the website? We updated the HTS-HK form, but we should make
sure everything is updated. And not change anything to OneSky for HTS-HK. HTS-HK is happy
with what we have done. Need to take down the Chinese form. Winnie and Katie should work on
this.

• Lauri: Differentiating between village children and orphanage children?
o Jenny’s response: Go to the blogs. They are very simple. Extract from there.
§ Pat: Especially the horrible story about the pesticides, plenty of information on the
website.

Side Advice:
Jenny: Don’t mention anything about:
• About us building a new website.
• Never talk about where we are going because we don’t know if we will
actually get there.
• Or which country we are going to next. Only the info on the website.

• Pat: We will deal with FAQs as they come, won’t over share, and we want to stay flexible. Do you
still care about us the small donors anymore? We may get that question, especially because we're
telling longtime sponsors that they have to give $10 more, $35 not $25.
o Carmen’s suggestion: Providing only 2 regional updates in the program. Per Lucia, we have
around 300 long-term donors - many of them are grandparents on a fixed income.
Grandmother them in?
§ Jenny’s response: Perhaps for special cases, our long term donors:
• In the renewal letters, add a “P.S.” to the bottom “If anything presents a
problem…” ---we will not announce it. Pat and Katie will work on
editing the renewal letters to reflect that.

(4) Updating For Social Media:
§ Ausannette: Will hit on every social media. Needs to be sent the link to Jenny’s letter so she can link it
the social media posts. Ivy will send the link. Link from the home slider.
§ Jenny:
o For Sandy and Winnie (and Ivy), change top navigation on our website from “Village” to
“Why OneSky?” And then, add underneath links to “Jenny’s Letter,” “Models for Change,”
“Orphanages,” (links to the Journal) and “Villages” (links to the former OneSky blogs)
o Change “Our Story” to “About” to save space.
o Lay out the complete eElast with all appropriate links to the journal.
o Ausannette should use the “yellow photo” -Ivy will provide her with a Facebook badge
§ Pat: Phase 2 social networking will be next week
§ Christine: Working on the Facebook message for the global network. Needs to make sure to get
across the fact that nothing will change, including the Netherlands.
o Pat: Suggests letting Christine handle it and she will edit.


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AFTERNOON SESSION

§ Went over the $25 to $35 transition
o Pat: We are working on a letter for current sponsors (the renewal letters), and working on
nice looking emails because we don’t have the welcome kits yet. Note, per Wendy, there are
over 100 sponsors on the verge of lapsing, will be lapsed, so that way Shelly will have a
better idea on how many children we will have…

§ Janice: OneSky Logo on all of the curriculum? What about China’s curriculum?
o Jenny: Print with the old logo for now.

§ Jenny: Which email to use?
o Still use halfthesky org for now
o The only ones that will change are donate.org and sponsor.org, which will say OneSky
consistently via email.
o Put the disclaimer on EVERYTHING on any material that discusses donating to the
organization.
§ On the website’s disclaimer sentence: Get rid of one “our” and take out “bold”

Jenny’s Discussion Points:

§ Watermark all of our photos and videos
o Make it transparent, going forward, everything!
o Why? Very concerned about the village kids and misusing the photos. We must protect our
children.

§ Good World
o Can put a Hashtag donate link to our Facebook posts, so it will go to a donation site that is
ours. Need to know where the money goes to…Ausannette will check with Sandy.

§ LinkedIn:
o Will transfer over to Ausannette

§ Global Giving Campaign for Child Sponsorships
o Pat said we need a project. Lucia said that we don’t have that many of these sponsors. For
now, it’s the Family Village Project.
§ Jenny’s response: the Rural Village Project, support through sponsoring a child.
Christine will research this project. $35 a month.

§ Glossary:
o Pat:
§ Biggest challenge: OneSky now includes villages and orphanages. How we talk
about it is very important!! We now have two models.
• Basecamp: have already uploaded the temporary prospectus and
orphanage model and village model 1 sheets. Will upload the glossary
there when it's done.
• OneSky is our official name organization
o In writing, the OneSky Village Project is now “Village Model-
China” (with the hyphen), but in conversation, say “The China
Village Model”.
o NOT TO BE SHARED: Migrant Model-China and Migrant
Model-Vietnam----these are a work in progress, so no one
outside of the organization know about these projects yet or are
in existence yet.
§ Jenny: We have an Orphanage Model-China, but it is
unlikely (at this moment) that we will have an
Orphanage Model-Vietnam.
§ Jenny passed out the temporary “prospectus” to everyone at the conference table:
• Pat’s comments: We had the Rainbow Program. But now, we have the
Orphanage Model and underneath of it, we have all of these programs


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included now: National Model Centers, Seed Centers, Rainbow Programs.
Note: “Seed programs” are no longer an initiative. It’s a program.
• Phase out Rainbow Program, so in conversation, say “In China it is called
the Rainbow program.”

o Ida: In the prospectus, we list “preschools” versus on the
website they're listed as “ECD Centers”?
§ Jenny’s response: different words for different
audiences.
• Why? Publically, we call them ECD Centers,
so they remain not officially under the
Ministry of Education. If we call them
“preschools,” the Ministry would have more
regulation over them.
• We keep the term “preschools” in the
proposals because donors understand
“preschool.” Only for our sophisticated
donors.
• Use “ECD Center” on the web or in public!

o Pat: Taking out our Little Sisters, so will be addressed in the
glossary, too. Christine has created a draft glossary that will be
edited to reflect our name change.

o Melissa: The family center for the village model, for the 0-3 what
do we call it?
§ Jenny: There are 3 programs: family skills (training
caregivers at the family centers with infants and
grandparents, as well as home visits); preschools and
community engagement. So the programs include 0-6,
not just 0-3.

o Pat sent around Janice’s Glossary Terms (Version 6) via email that has been finalized in
English and Chinese. It will be included in the new glossary.
§ Pat and Christine will finalize the comprehensive glossary in English
§ The Chinese staff will add Chinese
• Ida: Notice that CDE is not included: How to differentiate among all of
the titles including Senior trainers? Early Education Field Trainers?
o Pat’s response: Will talk to Janice. Janice may or may not want
to retire the title. Jenny also requests for Pat to go over the
preschool ECD matter with Carol and Janice.

§ Merchandise Matters
o T-Shirts: (Jenny had originally felt that the timing was too tight, but now with the name
change, it may be a good idea. Just need a new logo)
§ Per Pat, perhaps try bonfire.com. Just concentrate on one t-shirt rather than trying
to fill out the entire store.
• Lauri needs to research this matter, how much they charge, etc.
§ Per Pat, perhaps for logo purposes, she sent around a Save the Elephants link to
their website. Everyone at the meeting liked the elephant.
o New (Holiday) Card:
§ Ivy has contacted the artist, but the artist is not sure whether she will have time. Ivy
liked the photo of the group of girls and feels hopeful that it will work out.

o The Afternoon Website Updates
o Winnie: Resizing the “Sponsor a Child” images so they are even.
o Per Jenny, changing the “One-skee” to ONESKY, and add the slider “Why We Do It” to
keep the slideshow upbeat.
o Prioritize and send any website recommendations to Pat and Winnie
o Katie: editing suggestions for the disclaimer at the bottom of every website page


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o Everyone on staff is reviewing the slider links and editing the Models for Change website
page

o The updated website and eBlast were officially launched.


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