In addition to volunteering at the Freedom Farmers Market and Doghead Farm, Elena and Viraj teamed up to design TWO projects for their community partner, Concrete Jungle: one public-facing social media campaign, and one internally-focused data model of the organization’s volunteer pathways.
You can check out Elena’s campaign, Fruit Fact Fridays, as it appears week to week on Concrete Jungle’s Instagram (no spoilers!).
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Hey everyone! I’m Viraj, and I have partnered up with Concrete Jungle this semester. In this blog, I would love to share my experience with the organization and the projects I undertook. Volunteering with Concrete Jungle was a big learning experience for me. During my time with Concrete Jungle, I worked on several projects that allowed me to contribute my skills and time to their mission. One of the most interesting and satisfying tasks I performed was analyzing their data and making sense of volunteer journeys using machine learning algorithms.
The first step in this project was to clean various datasets, merge them together, and conduct exploratory data analysis. This step helped me to understand the quality of data and identify general patterns. Next, I used deep learning algorithms to cluster similar journeys and identify patterns in volunteer behavior. This helped the organization understand how volunteers engage with the organization and identify areas for improvement.
Additionally, I volunteered for Freedom farmer’s market pickups every other Saturday with Elena. We collected left-over fresh produce from the Freedom farmer’s market and delivered it to a nearby soup kitchen called Intown Collaborative Ministries. It was a great opportunity to explore the market, talk to vendors, and meet many generous people. On average, we collected 30 pounds of fresh produce every other Saturday. This was a very rewarding experience because it allowed us to directly impact the community by ensuring that fresh, healthy food was not going to waste.
Finally, I also worked on the organization’s Doghead farm. I worked on terracing a slope on the farm with a few other volunteers. This involved leveling a hillside’s ground in sections so that the flat areas stack like stairs. This was a physically demanding task as we had to dig and unsoil the inclined part and level it with the flat portion of the farm, but it was incredibly satisfying to see the progress we made. It was also a great opportunity to connect with other volunteers and learn more about sustainable agriculture.
Overall, I believe that my engagement with this organization made a meaningful impact. By collecting and delivering fresh produce to soup kitchens, I was able to directly impact the community by providing healthy food to those in need. Additionally, by using my quantitative skills to help the organization analyze their data, I was able to provide valuable insights that will help them improve their volunteer engagement efforts. I believe that my final project can contribute to the organization in the future. For example, I was able to find some irregularities in the data collection process, which the organization can fix and would help them in the future. Moreover, the volunteer clustering algorithm I designed could help Concrete Jungle predict volunteer’s next move. Then the organization could explore various incentives to nudge volunteer behavior and maximize their full potential.
Over these past few weeks, I have been volunteering and doing various things for the Concrete Jungle organization. The first task I was asked to work on involved their social media platforms and designing a new template for them. In an effort to highlight produce that is underutilized, they asked me to create a template for a new weekly post called “Fruit Fact Friday.” The template consists of three slides: the first being where I can present the title and picture of the fruit, the second slide provides the fun fact, and the third highlights a picture of them actively harvesting the fruit. First, I came up with three different template designs to ensure I was providing them with the exact template they are looking for. I then emailed them all to the Communications Director; where she was able to look through them and pick her favorite. I am now in the last stages of finalizing the template, using the corrections I was given. Once it is finalized, they will be able to use this template for every fruit they harvest and post something every Friday to keep engagement up!
Along with the social media side, I have also been helping in their volunteer opportunities. The first one Viraj and I have done has been the farm days. Concrete Jungle has an area of farm land right in Atlanta where they grow apple trees, pear trees, guava-pineapple trees, various vegetables, and much more. On the first farm day, we helped to de-weed the vegetable beds and the various fruit trees. I was told that this would help the trees and veggies to thrive. The second volunteer task we have been doing has been going to a local farmer’s market, Freedom Farmers Market, and collecting left over produce. On these days, we first head to Intown Collaborative Ministries, a local soup kitchen, and pick up a wagon for the produce and “Concrete Jungle” aprons. From there, we head to the farmer’s market and go around to different vendors with fresh produce. We start off by introducing ourselves and what we are there for. We then ask if they would like to donate any of their produce that will go bad soon to a local soup kitchen. Collecting all the produce we get; we then return to Intown Collaborative Ministries where we weigh the produce we got and deliver it to them to give out at their next soup kitchen drive! I have loved working with Concrete Jungle so far and learning more about this organization and their mission!