Perhaps I can make a ripple,
that will make a wave,
that will make a tide,
that will make a change.
- stolen from fellow Emory Scholar Julia Thayne's facebook page

I am really interested by the whole administrative/face-to-face struggle that Helen posted about. Last summer I had a face-to-face type internship working as a counselor, even though it was certainly not as challenging as Helen and Richelle's sounds, it was definitely very fulfilling to be able to help my kids by talking and playing and interacting directly with them. But the thing thats really frustrating sometimes about non-profit work is that sometimes to do this grand, glamorous good you have to do some filing.

For example, right now I have an admin side internship. And I'm working on a big project that I think will really help my organization become more efficient and effective, and it is totally and completely tedious. We have all our contact information in random folders and you can't find anything you need, so we have trouble contacting our members to mobilize them when we need to. So I created this database (by doing a very amateur hack job at Microsoft Access), and now all the interns and myself have to move all the data into there. There are SO many files! But it really has to be done. I have the same feeling of helpful boredom anytime we do a mailing. Label label label label label...ugh. But we are getting potentially influential information to decisionmakers, and that's what its all about really, so you gotta put on the labels. Oh and don't worry, I do a lot actual intellectually-stimulating work too. Like yesterday I learned about ports and wind turbine vessels. Annnyway...

A lot of what I do on a daily basis has no tangible result--we had a tough day today when a coal plant was approved despite everyone's efforts, the same as if we had done nothing. So that's hard. But I like the quote I just happened to find a minute ago that's at the top of this post, cause if you can make a website better, maybe that will make a ripple that will make a change. Profound, I know.
Peace out ATL.

-Natalie