Events
Join the conversation with a worldwide community.
Events
Friendly Water for the World in-person United-States-based events are currently suspended. We continue to evaluate the impact of Covid-19 on all of our communities and look forward to seeing all of you in-person as soon as it is safe to do so.
You can learn about our work and participate at virtual nonprofit events we host. These events are listed in this Future Events section and are run through an online service, usually Zoom.com. They are free and only require that you register. We take care to secure these online events, which is why we include registration. This helps ensure your privacy is protected and that there is no disruption from unauthorized participants. Upon registering you will receive an email with the link and connection information. If you don’t find our email, please check your SPAM folder and if you’re using Gmail, the Social or Promotions tab.
There are a variety of Friendly Water for the World events to choose from including Board Meetings, fundraisers, and most popular of all, our monthly Chats. We (will) cover all the topics that impact our programs and communities. These topics range from key steps in our process like Community Engagement, all of our technologies (Brick-Making is one of our most popular past Chats), and learning about our communities, so many of which are vulnerable and underserved.
Our events are only as successful as your participation and the people who attend. So, please, spread the word. We are advocates for diversity and inclusion. We believe the more different our community, the more effective our program. We look forward to seeing you in the virtual world until we can see you in the real world again. If you want to be notified of upcoming events, make sure you sign up at the bottom of the page to receive our newsletter.
Future Events
January Board of Directors meeting
The Friendly Water for the World board meeting is open to the public. Each board meeting is different, but we always share updates about the core functions of our work and the current administrative status of the organization. If you’d like to know what it’s like on the inside, register to join the fun. We want everyone to have the opportunity to participate, so these meetings are hosted online using Zoom.com video conferencing. We look forward to seeing you there.
WHEN: Tuesday, January 18 2021. 6:30-8:30pm (Pacific time)
February Board of Directors meeting
The Friendly Water for the World board meeting is open to the public. Each board meeting is different, but we always share updates about the core functions of our work and the current administrative status of the organization. If you’d like to know what it’s like on the inside, register to join the fun. We want everyone to have the opportunity to participate, so these meetings are hosted online using Zoom.com video conferencing. We look forward to seeing you there.
WHEN: Tuesday, February 15 2021. 6:30-8:30pm (Pacific time)
Past Events
When the Covid-19 pandemic started Friendly Water for the World went online to ensure we were able to keep interacting with our community. It all began with a successful Chat in March of 2020. More than 20 virtual events later, we haven’t looked back. We record our virtual events so they can be watched later at your convenience. The videos are hosted on our Youtube channel and can be viewed by clicking any of the Watch buttons below. On Youtube, you can subscribe to our channel to automatically be notified of new videos that we upload. We are always trying to make our content and this process better for our community. If you have any difficulties watching our videos of have any suggestions on content that you would like to see, please contact us.
Watch our most popular videos
Sustainable
Development
Community
Engagement
Sustainable
Brick Making
Permagardens
Chat about our partners
In the development world, one is truly the loneliest number. A decade of experience has shown us that it takes the expertise of many community, implementation, technology, and funding partners to build a successful program. Many of them become more than partners, they become friends, and part of our global community. In this Chat, we share what it means to build a partnership, and introduce you to the many talented partners and friends who help us do things like meet village chiefs, receive government certification, and even design toilets. Aired: October 29 2021
Chat about community-led development
How do you create the conditions that inspire and free people to transform their lives? How do you share the goodwill and knowledge of one community with another? And how do you help solve or mitigate big problems like climate change at a local level? We believe that the answers to these questions are found in the application of community-led development (CLD) – an approach and framework that places people at the center of their own future. In this Chat you’ll learn how CLD works and how our partner communities are turning this new knowledge into their own vision of prosperity, health, and social good. Aired: September 24 2021
Chat about table banking
Did you know that women contribute about 80% of the farm labor in Kenya, but only hold title deeds to about 5% of the land? As they do not have collateral to borrow against, they are frequently excluded from the financial economy. That’s a problem not only for these women but for society at large. One of the fastest-growing vehicles for financial inclusion is table banking. Watch our Chat to learn how it works and see how Matsakha Development Group, our partner in Kenya, is using it to build more equitable futures for all of its members. And catch a special guest appearance by Vosca Omoro, a member of Women Enterprise Fund. Aired: August 27 2021
Chat about water for schools
How do you create more than one million liters of water security for school children in Kenya? You build 50 rainwater catchment tanks at their schools. Big 25,000 liter tanks designed to last 30 years and made with innovative interlocking stabilized soil bricks. Our new program has the chance to impact the lives of at least 7,000 students of all ages, their teachers and staff, the families they all return to at the end of each day, and community members who rely on water from the schools. Watch this Chat to learn how we are building tanks and water security differently. Aired: July 30 2021
Chat about one million liters of water security
We are embarking on our largest Water Security program ever – installing one million liters of rainwater catchment tank capacity at schools in Matsaka, Kenya. A big program like this is made possible by building upon many small successes. As we start to share more details about this program, we want to take a moment to acknowledge all the things we have recently accomplished together to make the effort possible. Watch to hear about making more than 20,000 bricks, selling 2,000 liters of Meta Soap, and the many small achievements behind them. Aired: June 25 2021
Chat about building better
They say every brick has a story to tell. Well, we have a new story to tell about bricks. And building. For millennia, people have been using dried, compressed, and fired bricks to build. Bricks that didn’t last. Buildings that fell apart. Now there is a new brick. And with it, new opportunities to build sustainably, for less money and less harm to the environment. Last year our partners built a school with these bricks. Last month we built a rainwater catchment tank. What will people build next? Let’s find out together as Chat about our building better program. Aired: May 28 2021
Chat about sustainable development
What is the one thing we can do to assist communities in combating not just water scarcity, but also deforestation and infectious disease? We must make the outcomes of our work sustainable. Every technology and training and optimizing action must be designed for sustainability. But what do sustainable Rainwater Catchment Tanks look like? How do you engage communities in sustainable long-term partnerships? Why do so many technologies and solutions on a continent like Africa, which receives billions in aid each year, become unsustainable and fail? Watch this Chat to learn why development programs don’t last, and what we are doing to fix it. Aired: April 30 2021
Chat about the future
During the past year, Friendly Water for the World has organized 17 Chats with you. From community engagement to the stories that made us and rainwater catchment tanks, the Chats continue to be an opportunity for people to hear and ask questions about what is happening in the field, learn about new program features, and share how we can work together towards a better world. Our Chat about the future is one part anniversary, one part World Water Day celebration, one part fundraiser, and one big part sharing our vision of the future and what we hope to accomplish together. You’ll hear from our entire team and our new Board Chair. Aired: March 26 2021
Chat about Multipurpose Soap
Soap is something we usually take for granted. Until we don’t have it. And schools in Matsakha Sub-location, Kenya, don’t have it. In the middle of the Covid-19 pandemic. We are now working with the Matsakha Development Group, local NGO TCSC, and two teams, one for soap production and one for soap and hygiene information and marketing, to finalize a new Multipurpose Soap effort, provide training, and get soap to schools and the wider underserved community. Listen to details about the most long-term, comprehensive Multipurpose Soap project we’ve ever undertaken, with lots of unanticipated steps and insights. Aired: January 29 2021
Helping Hands, 10-year anniversary Fall fundraiser
This year on Black Friday, we traveled the world without ever leaving home. And we recorded it for everyone to see. It was an evening of fun and generosity as we heard from partners in India and Africa, supporters who have traveled with us to Uganda and India, learned more about the scope of caste-based discrimination, and introduced our next projects in Matsakha, Kenya. You don’t want to miss it. Aired: November 27 2020
Chat about Community Engagement
Did you ever wonder how relationships that span 9,000 miles get started? This month Eric Lijodi, our Africa Programs Manager, is on a journey to explore a new partnership with the people of Matsakha and Kenyan peacemaking group Transforming Community for Social Change (TCSC), in the first community engagement out of our Kakamega center. In this Chat Eric, our Executive Director Curt Andino, and Getry Agizah of TCSC share what it is like to grow our global community, and we’ll learn how Community Engagement and our new 4-step is transforming how we work. Aired: October 30 2020
Chat about helping people help themselves
This year marks the passage of our 10th anniversary. It’s been a subdued celebration as so many people continue to suffer through a difficult year. But we are needed more than ever. And we continue because of you; supporters and local partners and communities who believe in each other, hope, and good work. To honor both the past that made us and the new future we are creating together, this year we are launching a new website. Our website is a way for us to tell our story and invite others to help people help themselves. In this Chat we share our new site and then, most importantly, share the different ways you can join and participate in the good work of so many. Aired: September 25 2020
Chat about building opportunity in Monze
More than a year ago we met representatives from the Zambia Women and Girls Foundation to learn about their community. Those meetings inspired a multi-technology project training, a training that produced our first Coach and skills that would empower the community to build the first school made with bricks using a Friendly Water for the World Interlocking Soil Stabilized Brick press. Now we are planning to build on those successes by scaling the project into a program that can benefit the entire community and the additional 30 schools they hope to build. In this Chat we introduce Monze town, share how we got here, and what the future may hold. Aired: August 28 2020
Chat about rocket stoves
Little known fact: smoke from cooking fires kills more people worldwide each year than AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria combined. And it is a leading cause of blindness and respiratory disease. How can we help? Well, we have a field-made rocket stove that burns so hot that it attains almost complete combustion – smoke and pollutants are consumed in the fire. And we are learning how to implement it and other designs by studying cooking habits and customs from around the world. Watch our Chat to learn how improving a cooktop can save forests, reduce burns, and accelerate cooking. That and we share updates on our work in Monze, Tijuana, Wardha, and Raranya. Aired: July 31 2020
Chat about stories from the field
This week our presenters take us on a journey to four corners of the world: Kenya; Bolivia; India; and Mongolia. If you’re curious about how you travel to the remote places where we work, what it’s like to walk alongside our communities, how a training takes place in the field, or the impact it can have on you lending a hand to people around the world, you don’t want to miss this Chat. Several of our supporters volunteer their time and their memories of the life-changing travels they’ve made to support people and communities most in need. Aired: June 12 2020
Chat about sustainable brick making
What do water and bricks have in common? Quite a lot it turns out. Bricks form the foundation of water catchments, microflush toilets, and lots of opportunities. They also become walls for better schools and healthier clinics. And they’re an asset that builds resilience and greater confidence in the future. Hear how we are deploying Interlocking Soil Stabilized Brick presses to create bricks that don’t need to be fired, can be created on site with a small team, are low cost, and are significantly better for the environment. Aired: June 5 2020
Chat about our new Coach
Most of us have had a coach. Their job is to help the team unlock and reach its full potential. To get the most out of every situation. To achieve things that maybe they never thought they could accomplish. And that’s just what our new Coaches will be doing with their local communities. This week we introduce our first Coach, Warren Mwenda of Monze, Zambia. Hear how he, and this new approach to improve the effectiveness of our development projects will be a cornerstone of our post-training programming. Aired: May 22 2020
Chat about climate resilience
John MacLean is the President of Energy Efficiency Finance Corporation, a former Adjunct Professor at Evergreen State University, and an expert in international financing for sustainable economies. In this Chat he shares his experience working with the World Bank and Green Climate Fund to finance projects in developing countries that build climate resilience. Aired: May 15 2020
Chat with our global friends
Join Eric Lijodi from Kenya, Godfrey Mtega from Tanzania, Binyamin Christy from India, and a global group of friends, as they share the impact the novel coronavirus has had on them, their countries and local communities. And discover how it is but one of many hardships their people face.
Aired: May 8 2020
Chat about BioSand Water Filters
Three feet down. That short distance trip is all it takes to turn dirty water clean, to turn sickness into health, and to provide an opportunity for a better life. This week discover how to build a cement box that can create 30 years of clean water every day for a family of ten. All using local resources and local communities. Based on almost 200-year-old slow-sand filter technology, our Project Manager Wayne Medrud explains both how to build and run a BioSand Water Filter, and why this low-cost and low-tech approach is so effective saving lives. Aired: May 1 2020
Chat about David's trip to India
For 43 years David Albert, our Board Chairman, has been visiting India, promoting ideals of peace and nonviolence, equality and community, ecological sustainability and stewardship, and meeting and sharing with friends who have devoted their lives to do the same. In this Chat, David, joined by Ronelle and Uma, talks about his experience awarding purple umbrellas, sharing our technologies with other nonprofits and foundations, and most importantly, seeing our work come to life for refugees, Dalits, and other marginalized and disadvantaged people. Aired: April 24 2020
Chat about permagardens with Peter Jensen
How do you grow food with no water? How do you ensure children eat and eat nutritiously? How can you give people the hope, confidence, and knowledge to feed themselves? Discover the answers to these questions from permagarden expert, Peter Jensen. Permagardens combine components of permaculture, bio-intensity, and design to create sustainable agriculture that maximizes production. The method shows how farmers around the world with only a small amount of land can produce food throughout the year using proper gardening and resource management. Aired: April 17 2020
Chat about Hydrophilanthropy and Africa
Join our first guest speaker, current volunteer and former board member Ginny Stern as she takes you on a journey to Tanzania. Ginny is a former hydrogeologist who has led water projects for marginalized communities across Tanzania. As a scientist she understands and will share the extraordinary challenges they face and how hydrophilanthropy has become an important vehicle to build resiliency and self-reliance. Aired: April 10 2020
Chat about the stories that made us
10 years ago, Friendly Water for the World formally started working to create hope through clean water around the world. The genesis for the organization began long before that, as serendipity and generosity brought together two men, one ancient but new technology – the BioSand Water Filter, and a new way to mobilize people to develop communities. Hear David Chat about how it all started, before Curt shares where the organization is going next. Aired: April 3 2020
Chat about Covid-19
Are you craving some conversation? Looking for something new to do? Maybe you’re disappointed that we had to cancel our World Water Day event? Then join our Board Chairman, David Albert and Executive Director, Curt Andino, for a community conversation. In our very first Zoom Chat we talk about Covid-19, how it is impacting families in India and Africa, and share some information about Friendly Water for the World. Aired: March 27 2020
