Technology and Impact in Nonprofits

Hello there :)

When I first started volunteering at the Greater Portland Immigrant Welcome Center in Maine and later at the New Arrivals Institute in Greensboro, North Carolina, I was eager and passionate to help newcomers adjust to life in a new country and society.

What I found across my 7-8 years in nonprofit work is that there is a significant apparent pattern across modern local-level nonprofits (despite their dedication, grit, and passion): they are profoundly behind in technological utility and application.

Paper client form data is routed to a scattered mixture of spreadsheets, sticky notes, and filing cabinet space. This way of tracking volunteers, donors, and community engagement is not only cumbersome, but leaves valuable insights, statistics, and information under the bus -> heavily hindering the impact of programs.

This experience of passion and human connection inspired me to teach digital literacy to underserved people who had little to no exposure to technology at the Greater Portland Immigrant Welcome Center. I directly worked with students and immigrants to give them the education to be able to navigate computers, digital tools, and basic technical skills, which are critical for career and education contexts.

In 2024, I brought these lessons to North Carolina with the expertise of Casey and Vihaan to develop a nonprofit that particularly tackled the lack of accessible STEM education in the Greensboro and Triad area.

As a part of my internship with Mokxa Technologies, I was tasked to develop an app using one of its partner products, Joget. Joget’s easy-to-use interface and development design allowed the perfect application to the real-world context of nonprofit data collection and analysis.

Furthermore, the impact has been clear: gaining grant/donor/sponsor attention has become both simpler and more robust -> allowing the organization to make data-driven decisions that strengthen our nonprofit initiatives - just like our 2-week-long camps that just ended 2 weeks back, where we worked with primarily younger students regarding robotics and technical education, including circuit, arduino project, and programming development.

Take a look at some of the pictures we captured:

Ultimately, what excites me most isn’t just the efficiency of joget but its ability to amplify impact. By employing such technological applications in non-profit contexts, we create organizations that can serve more people, respond more effectively, and sustain their initiatives over time.

As we see modern artificial intelligence advancements, it’s important to make sure that we combine good intentions and technology to build bridges that achieve meaningful change.

–Saihaj :)