iCare Blog

Despite all that we hear about tragedies in our connected world, it is often difficult to appreciate the magnitude of such events, particularly when they occur far away. Today I would like to share with you an October summary from Azmi Jafarey, our CIO, of the huge the scale of the flooding in Pakistan.

Ipswitch employees donated $13,500 toward the relief effort (through CARE), and Ipswitch double matched the donations with another $27,000.

Here is what Azmi wrote.

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I thought I would supplement what you have heard with some statistics about the Pakistan flood. The numbers are tough to comprehend. This BBC Dimensions map shows the magnitude of the area affected:

Pakistanis Directly Affected: 20,000,000+
(According to the UN this eclipses even in the 2004 Tsunami, 2005 Kashmir Earthquake and the 2010 Haiti Earthquake combined.)

Proportion of Pakistan now Submerged: 20% (One-Fifth) of the Country
(Greater than the size of all England, all Bangladesh, and some 140 different countries.)

Proportion of Pakistanis now Affected: 11% – 1 Out of Every 9 Pakistanis
(Greater than the entire population of Sri Lanka, Netherlands, Switzerland, and over 150 different countries.)

Pakistanis in Urgent Need of Food Relief: 6,000,000+
(Others need assistance too, these are life-threatened.)

Children at Risk of Disease: 3,500,000+
(Cholera outbreaks have already been reported.)

Pakistanis now Homeless: 2,000,000+
(In need of immediate shelter assistance.)

Pakistanis Reached by Relief Efforts: 500,000
(Compare to numbers above.)

Source: Professor Adil Najam’s blog site: Pakistan Flood Scale and Pakistan Flood Relief.

Professor Najam heads Boston University’s Pardee Center for the Study of The Longer-Range Future, and is also Professor of International Relations and Global Public Policy at BU.

At this time of year when we gather with our families for a feast of food and shared company, I especially appreciate our employees who make the time to help others celebrate Thanksgiving.

Here are employees from our Atlanta office helping sort at a food bank.

Here Sam Kirkland, Dan Kirkland and Kasey Relford from our Atlanta office prepare to deliver food to those who would otherwise not have a Thanksgiving.

Here is a more complete description from Cindy McEnerney in Atlanta.

Thanks, guys!

On October 25, Ipswitch sponsored a food drive on behalf of North Fulton Community Charity, “NFCC” – specifically cooking oil, laundry detergent, diapers, and soup or soup stock as the pantry was out of those items.   Ipswitch matched item for item the donated food, collectively Ipswitch and 46 employees donated 12 bottles of oil, 14 boxes of cereal, 4 containers of detergent, 5 bags of diapers, 26 cans of soup, 8 canisters of oatmeal.

On November 8th, 13 employees went to North Fulton Community Charity to stock the shelves and present NFCC with a $1,000 donation from the iCare program.  Getting the food to those who need it, that was an eye opener.  The volunteer staff from Ipswitch started our work  day with an explanation of the how NFCC came to be, who they serve and what they offer.   When we arrived we took the donated food to a staging area and found a large pile of donated goods there as well.  We began separating the peas from the peanut butter, ramen noodle soup from chicken noodle soup, so on and so forth.  Imagine a grocery store receiving a shipment of groceries all mixed together, that is what we had to sort through.  So once the food is separated, then it is put on a shelf for the food distribution volunteers. Each qualified family receives enough groceries to last 10 days.

We didn’t stop there, we continued to collect donations from our employees to buy turkeys for the NFCC Thanksgiving Meal.  The donations in this case went to purchase turkeys and Ipswitch matched our  turkeys; together we purchased 112 turkeys.  Last year there were 1,000+ families that were selected for the Thanksgiving meal distribution, but only 100 turkeys were available.  This year there are 1,200+ families.  On November 21st, Dan Kirkland, Sam Kirkland and Kasey Relford picked up 112 turkeys and delivered them on behalf of Ipswitch Inc. to the Thanksgiving Meal Distribution Center doubling what was given away last year.  A special thanks goes to Dan Kirkland who spearhead this activity on behalf of Ipswitch starting in October and who negotiated a deal on our turkeys stretching our dollars.

Our initial goal was to purchase 30 turkeys, working together as a team we surpassed it!

Last night Jim Stevens of Gifts to Give hosted a remarkable dinner attended by over a hundred people from New Bedford and surrounding towns. Most had not visited the refurbished textile mill that houses Gifts to Give. I always enjoy seeing how moved people are when they see how much is being accomplished with so little.

Gifts to Give uses volunteer labor of all ages to sort donated books, clothes and toys and put them into custom packages for kids in need. (iCare is a major sponsor.) While parents and older kids are sorting donations, littler kids as young as 2 draw custom birthday gift wrap. Just talking about this gets me choked up. You can imagine the effect it has on a kid who doesn’t usually get birthday presents to receive one with hand-drawn wrapping paper, just for them. I consider Jim a true pioneer – he has a vision and the determination to make it happen. That he does it in a way that brings people together doing work that makes them feel a part of building a stronger community makes it especially heartwarming. Last night was a magical way of seeing what he has accomplished in a short time, and a way to inspire the local community to build and sustain Jim’s dream that is becoming reality.

As with all natural disasters, the earthquake relief effort is fading from the headlines as the months pass. Because we and our employees offered some financial support through CARE, we received this report, which gives an update on what has been done and how agencies are approaching continued relief and development efforts. I thought it might be interesting for others to see what agencies are doing and how they assess their work.

Inter-Agency Real Time Evaluation of the Humanitarian Response to the Haiti Earthquake

The magnitude of the need is overwhelming, and the challenges of providing effective assistance are daunting. But that is the nature of humanitarian crises. I am glad that CARE and other agencies have such dedicated staff working so hard to help Haiti recover, and that CARE shares these reports.

For our first few years, Ipswitch didn’t lose money, but we didn’t make much either, so philanthropy was always something to think about in the future. Then, in the mid-90′s, profits started to grow and I started to think about corporate community involvement. For the next few years I continued a practice I had started to make annual personal donations separate from Ipswitch. By 1999, though, I had concluded that philanthropy could be something more than me or any individual making their own personal decisions about what non-profits to support. I realized that Ipswitch was beginning to have a voice that we could use to bring attention to the agencies that were doing good work to address important causes. I realized that we could involve Ipswitch employees in deciding where to focus our philanthropy, and encourage employees to volunteer and support their non-profit involvement. I realized we could introduce employees to giving and community involvement in ways that would enrich their lives. I realized that by building a community program we could attract employees who share our values. This all made it an easy decision to create iCare.

On Saturday 131 students and 32 adults gathered at Gifts to Give in New Bedford to do service in memory of 9/11.  Eleven families, the Marion Boy and Girl Scouts, Youth Court kids, Trinity Academy students and the Gifts to Give student leadership council and students from seven area high schools processed a ton of donations, filled gift orders, harvested vegetables from the garden, tended to the pumpkin patch, picked up litter in our neighborhood and the Trinity students unveiled a mural from their summer service learning project to identify and interview a local hero – Sister Rose Gallipoli.

Ipswitch sponsors Gifts to Give as part of our iCare program. They have a wonderful mission of bringing a true cross-section of society together to learn about service and improve the lives of kids in need.