Community Clicks

Deborah Oakes

Some people are born “givers.” They take pleasure in giving back to the community.

Take Deborah Oakes of Compuware’s Milwaukee office.

Oakes, 24, joined the company as an information analyst in August 2011. Three months later she was using her web design skills to help students involved in a nonprofit called FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology).

Dubbed a “varsity sport for the mind,” FIRST combines the excitement of sport with the rigors of science and technology to help young people develop a passion for these fields. Under strict rules, limited resources and time limits, teams of students are challenged to build and program a robot to perform tasks against a field of competitors. Several volunteer professional mentors lend their time and talents to guide each team.

As one of the mentors, Oakes has helped renovate the website for the Brookfield, Wis., East High School FIRST Robotics Club and teach 25 students about the technology and best practices involved.

“At the meetings, I work one-on-one, or in smaller groups with the students, teaching them basic HTML, how to read the cascading style sheets and how to use WordPress to build a website,” she said. “I helped them create a lot of new content and work with them weekly updating a blog for the site.”

Oakes says they meet four times per week during the robot- building season from January to March. Meetings last three hours each, except for Saturday meetings, which go from 9 a.m. – 3 p.m. Outside of build season, students meet once a week during the fall and spring after the regional competition.

The teens take their website seriously.

“Once the students understood the new technology involved, they became proactively engaged and approached me about working on the site on a regular basis instead of me approaching them” she said. “It’s rewarding to see them take ownership of the website and put effort into it. They want to utilize best practices and be an ‘industry leader’ so to speak – They want other teams to imitate our website.”(www.beastrobotics.com)

The website’s blog chronicles the building of Brookfield’s 2012 robot in line with the year’s theme, “Rebound Rumble.” The amazing robot can sweep up small foam basketballs and shoot in baskets set at different heights and point values. It will vie for the gold in the regional competition, March 22-24, in Milwaukee.

“Last year was our most successful season,” Oakes said. “We won the GM Industrial Design Award and placed third overall in the standings. We hope to win more awards this season and hopefully progress to the national competition in St. Louis.”

But whatever the results of the competition, Brookfield’s team members are all winners, according to Oakes.

“President Obama recently said the countries that out educate us today will out compete us tomorrow,” she said. “I firmly believe that FIRST offers students an advantage to remain competitive later in life. Most of our alumni from the team have gone into science and engineering fields, and they’ve received fantastic scholarships for their involvement in FIRST. I believe these students are some of the future leaders in science and technology because they’re so bright already, although some can’t even legally drive a car yet.”

Brent Green, with friends, is at upper left.

For some people, doing volunteer work is a nice thing to do.

For others, like Brent Green, it’s a calling.

That’s what drives Green to work with the Appalachia Service Project, a Christian non-profit organization specializing in home repair for low-income families in rural Central Appalachia. Each summer about 14,500 volunteers are assigned to 30 different locations in Kentucky, Tennessee, Virginia, West Virginia and North Carolina.

Green, a Compuware project manager, is a volunteer from First United Methodist Church of Northville, Mich. For 14 years, he has led more than 75 people from his church to spend a week in early July helping the “poorest of the poor” in coal country.

During this time, Green and his teams have made many low-income homes warmer, safer and drier.

“We’ve done a variety of home repair jobs, working on porch and roof repair, putting in new windows, clearing drainage ditches and replacing floors,” he said.

“The work is great and humbling,” he added. “A lot of people go on these trips thinking that they’re going to give more than they get in return. But it’s overwhelming for some to see how much they get back in terms of the gratitude and heartfelt thanks from the families we help.”

Carolynn Bailey, the organization’s manager of volunteers, says there is a tremendous need for home repair.

“We help 500 families each summer, but that’s just 1 out of 10 referrals,” she said. Referrals come from churches and the departments of human services in different states.

She added: “Many of those we help have been left behind by service organizations.”

Bailey genuinely appreciates Green’s dedication.

“Brent is a really special person, “she said. “There’s not much we can do to reward him, but without people like him, the ministry wouldn’t happen.”

Green, though, takes a more humble view.

“We’re all here to serve each other with the gifts that we’ve been given,” he said. “Being Christlike is what it’s all about in a lot of cases.”

Alex Francoeur

Thanks to Alex Francoeur, dozens of employees in Lexington, Mass., responded to the call to “Go Red” on Feb.3, the American Heart Association’s National Wear Red Day.

Popular in the Boston community, National Wear Red Day is designed to encourage employees of local companies to donate $5 and/or wear red. It is a way to raise awareness and funds to promote a cure for heart disease.

Francoeur, a Compuware test engineering team lead, believes the statistics for heart disease are “pretty alarming.” His family has had a history of high blood pressure, and a few relatives have had cardiovascular problems.

“Heart disease is the number one killer of both men and women in the U.S.,” he said. “It kills more people per year than the next three top killing diseases combined. It is rewarding to know that my company can get behind an effort that I am passionate about.”

He added: “I was surprised to see how successful we were! For our first time participating, we raised $300. I am excited to see if we can increase participation and fundraising for next year.”

Said participant Joe Partynski, a tier I team lead: “It would be great to increase participation and fundraising, as there is always more that can be done. I do believe, however, that this year’s turnout was a great start.

“If nothing else, it made people at least aware of cardiovascular disease and stroke. It is important to help fund such critical research that helps so many people every year.”