Giving Back in the Tech Age
Last week marked the first day of school here in San Francisco. Here in the Tenderloin, that means that Safe Passage is back in action! As we geared up in bright colored vests to go stand on the Turk Street corridor near the Tenderloin Community School, we were excited to see the smiling faces we’ve missed all summer long. That first day of school shift, however, the Safe Passage might just have been a little more exciting for Yammer employees, as we officially launched the app our engineers have been building for the organization over the past few months.
It was so exciting to see hours of volunteer work finally come into fruition as the Safe Passage neighbors and advocates filed into Boeddeker Park and signed in on the tablets. We anxiously awaited for the sign ups to slow down so we could see the algorithm work for the first time outside of testing. I am happy to say that it worked flawlessly! Every person was properly assigned to a partner and to a corner. In fact, Safe Passage had enough volunteers to branch out onto a couple new corners in the Tenderloin for that first day of school. My co-corner captain and I walked up to Ellis and Leavenworth and saw over 100 kids and toddlers walking to their after school programs.
I feel very privileged to have an organization like Safe Passage in my community. An organization built by volunteers to come together and keep our neighborhood children safe. As the kids marched home and to their after school programs on Monday, they chanted a unanimous “we want to feel safe” while holding signs. With the estimated near 4000 kids living in the 8 x 8 block radius of the Tenderloin, I’m proud to support an organization that helps them feel safe.”
