The Program for Early Parent Support is a non-profit corporation that relies on a highly mobile cadre of volunteer leaders to run a series of weekly meetings for new parents. Each volunteer commits to staffing these meetings for a four month period of time. Prior to DataWeb’s participation, reports were written at the conclusion of each meeting that included attendance, topics of discussion and a timesheet of total hours by volunteer in several different categories. Volunteer leaders were also required to collect contributions and manage a rotating meeting roster. In addition, another group of volunteers were responsible for providing handouts and minutes from previous meetings.

Before the DataWeb application, all of this activity was managed manually. Reports tended to be mailed all too infrequently. In addition, group leaders had little contact with each other and tended to rely on their own organizational resources to prepare handouts. Training of volunteers was difficult and managing the content of each handout for each meeting was proving very difficult.

About 18 months ago, a PEPS volunteer familiar with DataWeb created a system to automate the key aspects of a volunteer leader’s primary tasks. After training, each leader signs onto a secure web site with their own logon ID and password. They immediately have access to their roster of parents. They can then manage this roster online, filling in missing or incorrect data (such as child’s name and birth date). DataWeb also offers a simplified email facility for contacting the parents as a group for various routine tasks.

After the meetings have begun, the volunteer leader can use a DataWeb scheduling system to track the next meeting’s host and location. Both this and the group roster can be easily emailed to all the parents. Then, each week, the leader logs on and in 5 minutes completes an attendance report, topic report and the timesheet. This report is logged in the database and is also emailed to the volunteer coordinator with PEPS.

While online each week, the leaders can use a DataWeb discussion board to share information about commonly asked questions and other issues important to new parents. Parents can also download a whole library of important information available at the PEPS web-site. Often leaders will leave comments for follow-up by the coordinator. Instead of being reviewed weeks later, the comments can be acted upon immediately for benefit of all involved.

Back in the PEPS office, various staff members have different levels of administrative access to the admin website. DataWeb makes it simple to provide tailored reports and administration capabilities to track each group's progress. Many of these reports provide essential data for government and private funding agencies. Other reports allow analysis and reassignment of parents whose needs have changed. Also important is the close integration with the in-house Microsoft Access database system which automates the loading of the initial roster for each new group onto the PEPS web site.

Customer Experience:

“DataWeb has been very easy to work with. It was easy for us to build out an application that fully reflected our requirements in less than two weeks. We especially like the ability to quickly add functionality to our over-all application with very little effort. The time necessary to develop, manage and to maintain this system has been minimal”

Michael Mee
PEPSGROUP.org
San Diego, California