In recent weeks we’ve met with people from a few organizations that we thought might want to use Squarepeg. We have a hard enough time containing our enthusiasm already, so you can imagine how we felt when they said this about us.

Kirsten Merrell, Awards for Excellence Coordinator, AFS Intercultural programs -

We sat down to speak with Isaac from Squarepeg and were really impressed with some of their ideas and what they are doing. We work mainly with young people and have been trying to figure out how to connect in a way that is productive for us and satisfying for them. Squarepeg seems to be working on some of the problems we’ve been trying to solve, so we’re excited to give their site a test run in the coming months.

Nick Triolo, eMarketing Assistant, AFS Intercultural Programs -

Squarepeg’s vision is a progressive movement to leverage current social trends to create substance, change and, finally action. No longer is “social networking” only the simple act of peering into the lives of others. It now can be used to share ideas regarding the stuff that really matters, the issues that need a true compilation of perspectives. Squarepeg seems to be working in this direction, and I fully support and encourage the proliferation of such social networking enterprise.

Dr. Eban Goodstein, Project Director, Focus the Nation -

With Focus the Nation, we have a lot of participants who are dispersed pretty much all over the country. Having everyone feel connected to this movement and our impact is a big challenge for us, but to be honest I feel like dedicating resources to social media has burned us more than it has helped. We just haven’t been able to find the return on investment yet, but Squarepeg seems to have solutions to some of the issues we’ve been struggling with. If we invest in online communication, we want it to help us move people offline, so we’re excited to have Squarepeg use Focus the Nation as a testing ground this fall.

Rick Ray, Technology Manager, The Archimedes Movement -

The Archimedes Movement is working to engage citizens from all walks of life so that we can advance solutions to the common problems we face, starting with the health care crisis. We have nearly 40 community chapters. Though most of our supporters are here in Oregon, they are dispersed geographically. We would like to feel more connected to all of our members (and the members to each other). We have created a drupal-based site, pages for each chapter and can schedule events, but it just isn’t doing quite what we want and we aren’t able to invest a lot of resources into improving it right now.After talking with the people from Squarepeg, we think integrating their software with our current site might be a great solution so that we can get better feedback from all our members and make this grass-roots process more democratic. We’re waiting for them to finish the beta site, and hope to see it soon.

A bit about these organizations:

AFS Intercultural Programs is one of the world’s largest community-based volunteer organizations dedicated to building a more just and peaceful world through international student exchange. Nearly 13,000 students, young adults and teachers participate in AFS programs each year.

On January 31st, 2008, Focus the Nation organized teach-ins, workshops, and debates on the topic of Global Warming Solutions for America with over 1900 universities, schools, and civic groups. They engaged over 1 million people, and aim to engage over 5 million during a day of focus in 2009.

The mission of The Archimedes Movement is to create a new space for civic engagement outside our traditional legislative and governance structures to advance solutions to the common problems we face. They have nearly forty community chapters, mostly in Oregon.