School: St. Theresa Catholic School
    Austin, Texas, United States

3 students, ages 14, 13, 13 worked together to complete this Doors to Diplomacy project on February 9, 2012. They have participated in Doors to Diplomacy in the following year(s): one

Classes and Teachers: Mrs. Pesqueda, Nathan, Olivia, Meagan

E-Mail contact:

Our School's Web Site: http://www.st-theresa.org/v2/

1. Description of Our Team

Our team includes Olivia (13 years old) Nathan (14 years old) and Meagan (13 years old). We were assigned into this group to do a project about hunger. To divide the work up evenly, we first figured out what we had to do. Then we divided up the work, giving all three of us and even amount of work to do. Our adult coach, Mrs. Pesqueda helped us a lot by making sure we knew what we had to do, and when we had to get it done by. She helped us stay on track.

2. Summary of Our Project

The overall topic for our project is hunger. Our group's subtopic is the causes of hunger. We focused mainly on three causes of hunger. The three main causes of hunger are nature, war, and poverty trap. Climate change and natural disasters are huge causes of hunger. When looking at statistics, you can tell that places with the most hunger is where war is. Poverty trap is a huge problem involving hunger, because it is already a big problem itself, but is also a bug impact on hunger. But if we all work together we can end world hunger, and save millions of lives.

3. Our Computer and Internet Access

A. Percentage of students using the Internet at home:less than 20

B. Number of workstations with Internet access in the classroom:more than 6

C. Connection speed used in the classroom:dial-up modem

D. Number of years our classroom has been connected to the Internet:more than 6

4. Problems We Had To Overcome

While working on our project, we had some problems with slow internet connection. Also, we had problems finding photos invovling hunger that were not copywrited. In addition, we had some small dowwnload problems.

5. Our Project Sound Bite

Doors to Diplomacy is a contest to me that i am looking to help win for our school. It means a lot to our comm apps class. We are entering our website in to this contest. For our comm apps class, it means everything because this is what we've been doing most classes.

6. How did your activities and research for this Doors to Diplomacy Project support standards, required coursework and curriculum standards?

We learned a lot of new skills and the new technology we used to create our website. We met the requirements our teacher wanted. We learned to work with other schools. I also discovered about causes of hunger. Yes, being educated in technology is really useful.

1) What information tools & technologies did you used to complete your Doors to Diplomacy project?

We used weebly to make our website which provides tools and other helpful techniques to make our website good. Our school provided laptops to help us get on line. We had a computer program called filezilla which let us transfer documents onto a shared server. The tools also included animoto, flashvortex,stixys, tagzedo and twiducate. Weebly was the most useful to create our website.

2) In what ways did you act as "ambassadors" and spokespersons for your Doors to Diplomacy project both on-line and in person.

We presented our websites in front of people at our school twice. we also helped raise awareness of the causes of hunger and the tools we use on line.

3) What has been the impact of your project on your community?

It helped to reach out to those with hunger problems and learn about the cause of hunger in our community. It will give others in our community websites to donate to those with hunger and will inform them of the causes of hunger and other ways to help. It will help those with hunger problems and the people that have seen our website have probably helped by looking and being informed and maybe helped. We have received feedback that people have seen our website. It has probably helped them by giving a link to donate and inform them.

4) How did your project involve other members of your community as helpers and volunteers?

I have Meagan and Olivia to help and that's mostly it. We are assigned together so i didn't really choose them. But I want to thank them a lot for helping and they did a great job. I also have people from other schools that share documents on to a shared server but we really haven't done that much with the other schools.

5) Discoveries, Lessons and Surprises (Optional)

Yes. I learned a lot in the making of our website and I learned how to make a website. It showed me the causes of hunger and how I can help inform people about how to help. It didn't lead to awards yet but this doors to diplomacy will lead to recognitions and awards.