I just got involved with my favorite nonprofit of all time: Spark.  Their mission is to connect people in industry with middle school students who are interested in a particular career.  I’ve been working with the coolest dude in town, Jamal Morris, to build a website that uses videos to teach others how to do tricks on skateboards.  We’re just getting started on the site but made some pretty great progress in the past few weeks and have a couple of recording sessions coming up between now and the final presentation (“Discovery Night” in Spark lingo).

Jamal and I are also going to head down to Google in a few weeks and check out the scene down there — he’s excited but I’m not sure if he realizes what he’s in for yet.  It should be pretty great.

All in all I think that Spark is addressing one of the most critical education-related problems that today’s students face: motivation to care.  School can be pretty drab and careers can seem like they’re lifetimes away, but Spark is trying to close that gap by showing students how big of an impact education and (more importantly, in my opinion) effort can go towards getting where you want to be.  The lifetimes actually end up passing pretty quickly.

Not only that, but Jamal’s been teaching me as much as I’ve been teaching him.  I think his brain may literally be made out of sponge.  Check out Spark’s website — I’d highly recommend getting involved if you’re passionate about what you do.  Jumping on board has easily been one of the best choices I’ve made since moving westward.