From this point forward, we’re going to recap the amazing-ness that is our monthly member meet-ups.  On the third Thursday of every month, 25-40 Hive NYC members gather to learn more about other youth programs in the city, brainstorm around new opportunities, share updates on their projects, and generally enjoy each others company. It’s an incredible group of educators/peers/colleagues/friends, and we’d like to share a glimpse of what results when we’re able to come together to do cool stuff. The structure is generally as follows:

• Host organization leads a brief ice breaker
• Host presents overview of their youth programs, or more specifically, updates on their Hive-supported projects
• Sometimes a guest will join us to introduce/demo a relevant tool or concept
• Activity and/or brainstorm around a timely topic, upcoming event, emerging product theme (either as an entire group or in break-out groups followed by a share-out)
• Snacks!

Last week we were hosted by The YMCA of Greater New York, at their international headquarters on West 63rd St.  Lori Benson, VP of Healthy Lifestyles and Membership initiatives, kicked off our ice breaker – there were a variety of cards on a table with different images, and we were all asked to select a card that spoke to us in a positive way, then share why we chose that card with the group.  Through this activity, we discovered a bit more about each other, who were the music lovers, the artists, the childhood camping enthusiasts, the world travelers, and those that directly connected the images and positive experiences with the work we do in the Hive every day. Next Dana Mantella, Director of City-Wide Teen Programs, shared an overview of programs that address everything from college readiness and civic engagement to healthy lifestyles and the arts.

Then we announced that Leah Gilliam, formerly of Institute of Play, joined Hive NYC as Portfolio Strategist, where she’ll help develop systems and pathways that align youth across projects and programs, as well as work to productize, ship and scale the best ideas that come out of the network.  She’s been a Hive member for quite some time, and we’re excited to have her on board! Also, we introduced that Rubin Museum of Art has joined as a new member of the network – also looking forward to the opportunity to collaborate with them moving forward. Next up: Mark Surman introduced Mozilla’s Summer Code Party campaign, and explained the commitment to make stronger the connection between making and learning, as well as the desire to help the world become more web-literate!  Jess Klein detailed how she’s working on developing projects that make it easy to learn how the web works, using tools such as Hackasaurus and the 2-pane editor.  You can follow her process and her progress, as well as see some mock-ups  on her blog.

She also facilitated a short brainstorm where everyone shared the most common tools and places their youth spend their time online, as well as their current interests. Having this information will help Hive NYC, Jess and the Mozilla Learning team plan and build projects that address the direct interests and skill sets of one of the core audiences for campaign – youth!

As an example of the type of Hive project that would work well as part of the Summer Code Party campaign, I briefly shared my own experience beta testing a project with my daughter that combined Hackasaurus with Inanimate Alice, to use storytelling as the entry for learning how to remix the web. Jess will be hosting open office hours for Hive NYC members on May 9th from 2-5pm, in case you’re interested in discussing or developing webby projects to feature on Mozilla’s campaign site.  Please email her if you’re interested.  If you’re interested in learning more about Mozilla’s campaign, developing your own webby activities, or just joining the party, sign up here. Jeff Smink from The National Summer Learning Association shared an update on their efforts to help connect the DOE with Hive members to develop innovative summer programs.  As a pilot this summer, Global Kids will be working with two high school teachers to co-plan and deliver a program, and will document their process to help inform planning for summer 2013.  Stay tuned! We wrapped up with members sharing updates on upcoming events and projects – best way to stay up to date on activities and opportunities is via our Facebook page or @HiveLearningNYC on Twitter. Until next month!