July Update: Get Connected! on Health Care, Transit & Independent Businesses / Classes & More

We have some exciting events coming up this month and next –  Get Connected! meetings with Physicians for a National Health Program and Health Care for All- Minnesota; Metro Independent Business Alliance, and Transit for Livable Communities; a low-cost class on Telling your story to make a difference, plus a Social Media Clinic, and lots of free Newsroom Cafe workshops. Scroll down for details, and our editors’ reports.

Get Connected! is the Twin Cities Media Alliance’s series of meetings highlightingorganizations working for change in the areas of Education, Transportation, Work, Immigrant Communities, Health and the Environment. At each meeting, you’ll have a chance to find out about the organization, how you can get involved, and how you can use social media to work more effectively on the issues that you care about. Each meeting also includes an opportunity to socialize and network over food and drink. Get Connected events are free, but registration is requested.

Wednesday, July 18, 6-8 p.m. : Get Connected! with the Future of Health Care Reform in the Digital Age  with Physicians for a National Health Program and Health Care for All- Minnesota  at the Amsterdam Bar and Hall, 6 West 6th Street, Saint Paul. Wednesday, July 18, 6-8 p.m. Refreshments will be provided. To register, click here.

Wednesday July 25, 5:30-7;30 p.m.  Get Connected with Transit for Livable Communities at the Hopkins Center for the Arts,  1111 Main Street, Hopkins. Transit for Livable Communities will briefly present on who they are and what they do, including an update on where things stand with there work on the Southwest Light Rail Transit (SWLRT). The Twin Cities Media Alliance will be demonstrating on how to use new media tools to connect and engage over transit policy. Light refreshments will be served. Click here to register or for more information.

Thursday, July 26, 5-7 p.m. Get Connected! How businesses use new media to engage their communities with the Metro Independent Business Alliance (Buy Local Twin Cities),  at Open Arms of Minnesota, 2500 Bloomington Ave, Minneapolis. Refreshments will be served. Register at the DataBank.

To find Jay, just look for the laptop with the Freaky Deeky sticker. To find Mary, just look for the laptop with the sticker that says “I heart the First Amendment.” 

Staff reports: 

Community Engagement Coordinator Bruce Johansen reports: 

June was a busy month for the community engagement team: Marcos Lopez-Carlson, Clarence White, and Bruce Johansen. Folks from across the metro area converged at Rondo Library on the 26th for our first New Normal 2012: Get Connected! community meeting on transportation. The event showcased the work of the Alliance for Metropolitan Stability, a presentation by Marcos on new media tools, and offered ample time for people to connect over tasty food from Homi Restaurant. The next day we co-hosted a Get Connected! meeting with Wilder Research. Jane Tiegan, research associate at Wilder, addressed how important it is for everyone to have solid, reliable data at their fingertips. She highlighted Minnesota Compass’s online tools. Coming up this month, get connected on health care reform with Physicians for a National Health Program and Health Care for All Minnesota at Amsterdam Bar and Hall (Wed., 7/18 at 6:30 p.m.) We team up with Transit for Livable Communities at Hopkins Center for the Arts (Wed., 7/25 at 5:30 p.m.), and with Metro Independent Business Alliance for a community meeting on work at Open Arms of Minnesota (Thurs., 7/26 at 4:30 p.m.) All Get Connected! events are free and open to the public.

Arts Editor Jay Gabler reports:

One of the great things about the Internet is that everyone can be a publisher: you can start your own blog and be read around the world, at no cost to you. But how do you get readers’ attention? A boost from a recognized news source can make a big difference, and that’s where the Daily Planet comes in. We help our citizen journalists and media partners to find an audience for stories about their communities—and sometimes that audience is very large, as large as six million. That’s how many users of the Tumblr blog network were recently alerted to a great art exhibit in Minneapolis’s Marcy-Holmes neighborhood when an image from our article about Hedge Magic was highlighted on the Tumblr Radar. Who wrote the article? My aunt Betsy Gabler, who’s always been an art lover and now uses the Daily Planet to tell the stories of local art projects such as the “Neighborland” billboard project. The Daily Planet can help you tell your local story too—come to one of our Newsroom Cafe meetings and learn how.

Editor Mary Turck reports:

We publish a lot of your stories in the Free Speech Zone, where recent contributions range from opinion (FREE SPEECH ZONE | From across the river… notes on Wisconsin Recall and FREE SPEECH ZONE | Can the Vikings Stadium be stopped?) to arts (Must-see exhibit at the Frameworks Gallery) to news (FREE SPEECH ZONE | Mahtomedi Zephyr Wind Project is community-wide effort and powerful educational tool). The common denominator for Free Speech Zone articles and blogs is that they are not edited — we just don’t have time and resources to edit all contributions, though we do take time to help with posting articles, adding photos, or updating your profile. This month, we are celebrating with Sheila Regan and Ifrah Jimale who have won Page One awards from the Minnesota Society of Professional Journalists for work published by the Daily Planet. We’ll have details of the awards next month, after the June 19 ceremony.