Technology

On Friday, November 1, 2024, I was very fortunate to attend a special presentation at the International Women's Air & Space Museum about the future of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). I have known about the museum for fourteen years, and I have seen their booth at official NASA events, but I have never attended one of their hosted programs.

It was fantastic to learn directly from Johnson Space Center Director Vanessa E. Wyche about what is currently being developed at NASA!

I am grateful to the sponsors of this event! The "Dinner with a Slice of History" series is made possible with the support of Cuyahoga Arts & Culture, Signature Flight Support BKL - Cleveland Burke Lakefront Airport, the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics - Northern Ohio Section, HX5, and the America 250-Ohio Commission.

Thank you to the International Women's Air & Space Museum staff and board leadership for this great event.

I was scheduled to be out of town, but when my plans changed, I purchased my ticket to attend the Data Days CLE 2024 annual conference. The conference took place on Tuesday, October 22, 2024, at the Cleveland Public Library-Louis Stokes Wing. I have been following the activities of Data Days CLE on social media for years, but I have never been able to attend any of their events. I knew I would be in for an impressive day, and what I got was even more. It ended up also being a reunion with people I had not met in person for a while, and gave me the opportunity to meet new people who were attending or presenting.

I like how the Data Days CLE 2024 organizers make an effort to make it easy for all who are interested to attend their events. Since I follow Data Days CLE on social media, I had the opportunity to use the social media promo discount they offered to their followers. I recommend you see their current list of social media accounts at the bottom of their DataDaysCLE.org website, and follow those that you are active on, so that you learn about their future events.

I put together this blog post to share the photos and notes I took during the event. Of most importance is that I want to thank the organizers, sponsors, and presenters for making Data Days CLE possible. I enjoyed learning how our community is now better served after several years of work by the people participating in this annual conference.

On Tuesday, October 15, 2024, I was scheduled to be out of town on a backpacking trip that was unfortunately canceled. As that adventure opportunity closed, I was fortunate that another opportunity was presented to me as I was invited to attend the Eighth Annual Better World Day -- Cultivating Gamification for a Better World 2024 -- that took place at Hyland - Building #3 in Westlake.

Looking back at past years in my calendar, I see this is the fifth year I have attended this event. In this blog post, I will share both my photos and notes from Better World Day 2024. I want to encourage you to learn more so you can help spread the word about this great annual event that provides support to nonprofits!

I hope this blog post encourages you to attend future Better World Day events! A BIG thank-you to Todd Packer and Marc Majers for gathering such great presenters for the past eight years, and continuing to work to make a better world through technology for local nonprofits.

I was scheduled to be out of town, but when my plans changed, I offered to volunteer at the NASA International Space Apps Challenge Cleveland 2024 that took place in person at the NASA Glenn Research Center and also had an online option. I attended the first day (Saturday, October 5, 2024) of this two-day event. I knew it would be a great event, since I had attended in 2019.

I decided to put together this blog post to recognize the real heroes who made it possible for the participants to take part in this 2024 NASA weekend event -- the organizers, mentors, judges, and sponsors.

In this blog post, I will list the teams, share my photos/videos from the event, and encourage you to learn more so you can help spread the word to more people about this great annual NASA weekend hackathon!

I was fortunate to be able to attend the Friday, January 26, 2024, SOLD OUT DigitalC Citywide Network Launch Party -- so much information was shared that evening about what will be happening this year in Cleveland!

I am putting this blog post together for three reasons:

• First, to share a little about the interesting information I learned at the launch event and my past interest in DigitalC's work. Creative solutions to the digital divide issue in Cleveland has always been of interest to me.

• Second, to establish what I publish here as a starting benchmark of expectations. From this starting point, the community can measure the progress of DigitalC's staff as they move forward with the Cleveland digital revolution that they have envisioned.

• Finally, to make this my first step in fulfilling the commitment that all the attendees to the DigitalC Citywide Network Launch Party were asked to make: To support the mission of the organization using whatever resources you have available.

It is my hope that this blog post encourages you to join the people who attended the launch event in making the commitment to support the DigitalC mission.

The day after attending IngenuityFest 2023: Biologies & Geologies (September 22 & 23, 2023), I left on a trip. Now that I have returned, I want to publicly express here how grateful I am to Ingenuity Cleveland leadership and their community partners for this year's gathering of creative people in Cleveland.

My son, Mike, and I enjoyed exploring the artistically lit caverns of Ingenuity Cleveland's 300,000-square-foot Hamilton Collaborative on the evening of Friday, September 22, 2023. There we found music, art, and much more!!

Then, on Saturday, September 23, 2023, Mike and I returned with our whole family to explore more. In addition to seeing more of the exhibitions I enjoyed Friday night, I spent time talking to people at the community organization booths in the upper part of the building. There is where I learned about the latest new happenings in Cleveland.

Since its founding in 2004, IngenuityFest has featured both technology and art. These are both areas that interest me greatly, so it is no surprise that I have been writing about IngenuityFest from the first year I started writing my blog in 2012.

I have been writing about IngenuityFest since 2012, but I have been taking my family to this great event for even longer. I look forward to attending again next year!

Thank you, NASA Glenn Research Center, for the NASA Aviation Day which was a free, public event that took place on Wednesday, September 13, 2023, at the Cleveland IX Center. I enjoyed talking to NASA Aeronautics staff members. They shared their knowledge about new technology developments with great passion.

I am sharing my photos, videos, and comments about the day in this blog post, since I appreciated the opportunity to learn about the latest NASA developments for the aviation industry. I also want to thank Tom Kunsman for recommending that I attend this NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) event! I recommend following Tom on social media (on BlueSky), since he does an excellent job of promoting all things NASA happening in Cleveland.

I enjoyed the morning's panel discussions at NASA Aviation Day. I learned about very new technology and safety developments happening at NASA Aeronautics.

Four Transformations for Sustainability, Greater Mobility, and Economic Growth:

• ULTRA-EFFICIENT AIRLINERS
• FUTURE AIRSPACE AND SAFETY
• HIGH SPEED COMMERCIAL FLIGHT
• ADVANCED AIR MOBILITY

After the morning's NASA Aviation Day panel discussions, I toured the NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) display area. People usually associate NASA with space travel, but at this event, the emphasis was on the first "A" in NASA -- Aeronautics.

I truly enjoyed talking to NASA Aeronautics staff — they have such incredible passion for what they do, and are willing to share their knowledge as I ask questions .

NASA events are always interesting. I look forward to attending more of them in the future.

I normally spend three full days at the annual IngenuityFest Weekend, but family commitments only allowed me to visit on Saturday, September 24, 2022, for three hours in the evening. I was so impressed with the event, I want to share in this blog post the photos/videos that I and others shared about the weekend. After 2020's IngenuityFest being canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and last year being an outdoor event at the Cleveland Metroparks, it was good to be back at a more traditional IngenuityFest Weekend of creativity at the Hamilton Collaborative location.

I also want to mention that one of the highlights, in addition to the incredible displays and performances, was reconnecting with people that I have not seen in person the last few years. It has been a difficult time for many people, and I am grateful to the artists who are IngenuityFest, and the sponsors that support their work.

After missing 2020 and going virtual in 2021 due to COVID-19 safety considerations, at the start of 2022, the Cleveland GiveCamp Steering Committee was open to new possibilities as to what form the free tech solutions would be provided to local nonprofits.

Cleveland GiveCamp 2022 stayed with the weekend format of nonprofit teams and standup progress meetings, but new this year was:

• the location -- Hyland
• the month -- August instead of the traditional third Saturday in July
• offering a hybrid option -- a combination of remote and in-person volunteers, which one nonprofit team utilized

In this blog post, I will:

• convey what happened before and during the August 12-14, 2022, Cleveland GiveCamp Weekend
• thank the volunteers and sponsors that made it possible
• share information about the nonprofits served

While the most important activity happens over Cleveland GiveCamp Weekend, when the tech solutions are actually developed for the Nonprofit Partners, Cleveland GiveCamp is a year-round organization plannings and preparing for the weekend of service.

The Cleveland Public Library, for their Ninth Annual Maker Faire Cleveland, did the event a little differently than in past years. Instead of just a one-day maker event, they planned "family-friendly, free events at Cleveland Public Library locations across the city" for a full week! The week-long maker activities culminated in the Maker Faire Cleveland Showcase 2021 on Saturday, November 20th, at the Great Lakes Science Center.

In this blog post, we will share tweets with photos/videos leading up to and including our attendance at the Maker Faire Cleveland Showcase 2021.

A BIG thank-you to Tom Kunsman who made it a point to be sure that we knew about the Showcase. If it weren't for his tweet, we might have missed this year's event.

In addition to the Cleveland Public Library's Cleveland Maker Faire, we also learned about the The Best Buy Teen Tech Center, which is in partnership with The Clubhouse Network.

Thank you, Cleveland Public Library, for the FREE night at the Great Lakes Science Center for the Maker Faire Cleveland Showcase 2021! We appreciate that the Cleveland Public Library plans interesting tech and NASA-related events. We have attended several of them! The library is "The People's University" in Cleveland.