hot take :/ Would you really have trouble trusting the OP?
Maybe you just don't want to donate resources in general, because otherwise surely there exists some channel you could witness with your own eyes and donate to with confidence.
Maybe you just don't want to donate resources in general, because otherwise surely there exists some channel you could witness with your own eyes and donate to with confidence.
> hot take :/ Would you really have trouble trusting the OP?
Yes? Your first instinct when someone tells you a sob story or an epic western savior spiel is to do your due diligence.
Recent HN account, the website is a year old, they don't list the 501 EIN and searching for "Tanzania Education Project" on https://apps.irs.gov/app/eos/ yields nothing. OP doesn't list his name on the website (but it is on gofundme).
OP seems genuine, but there are many red flags.
My name is Luke Bodmer. I graduated in June with a PhD in Computational Science from the University at Buffalo in New York and I am currently working in los angeles as a post-doc in Nuerosurgery at a major hospital doing cancer research. I'm a real person, you can look me up!
Not listing the EIN was an oversight. It is EIN: 87-3919577. I'll add it to the site when I get home tonight from work. If you look it up you might see "Ibumila Fund" which is what it was called before I named it to Tanzania Education Project.
The epic western savior thing is very cringy and I don't know how to avoid it at his point in the project. I try to limit my role as much as possible and have everything done by Tanzanians in Tanzania. Eventually I hope to remove myself from the site and the story and have it be a fully Tanzanian effort. I don't see how I can remove myself at this point.
Ideally I don't want people to look at this effort as "oh look at how good of people we are!". My hope is that people will assess their situation and the situation of the children in the village and feel compelled to give because it is fair and right.
I appreciate your skepticism and I think its totally fair. This post is really the first time I'm going public beyond my inner circle with this effort and any tips on how I can build trust are really appreciated.
Honestly I made my first social media account about 4 months ago just to prove I was a real person after I finished my PhD and was applying for the next steps. I've never been one to post on the internet or engage with social media. I don't really know the etiquette of any other social site so I figured I would reach out here first since it felt familiar.
keeping that in mind I believe you started at the right place as HN is probably more forgiving, especially when it turns out that the person in question is able to strike the right tone to fit in, which I believe you do.
I am in a similar position having created this account once I decided to move to Africa, and I am still trying to figure out how to promote my work. As part of that I try to engage on topics that are related to Africa to slowly develop my standing and share my experience.
(I think it's an unusual path, but it looks legit.)
> I don't really know the etiquette of any other social site so I figured I would reach out here first since it felt familiar.
I think your etiquete is fine, but asking for money always raise suspicion.
I actually spent 2 years in Córdoba Argentina studying medicine before covid threw a wrench in that. That's when I pivoted to come back to the US to pursue an idea for a medical imaging device I thought up.
My PhD was focused on building a proof of concept for a mobile and affordable medical imaging device. Honestly the concept certainly tied back to spending time in rural hospitals in Tanzania (for other people, I wasn't sick) and seeing the lack of imaging and resources in those places.
The lab I'm working in is "mathematical neuro-oncology" and it happens to be in the neurosurgery department of a major US hospital. We're essentially trying to use our computational skills to make progress in brain cancer research so they hired me for my background in computation and imaging and medicine.
It may be a nice submission for HN. (But wait a week or so before posting it.)
[Hi from Buenos Aires!]
I take your point. I have some things I could submit and I'll contribute more hacker related topics soon.
I think an important part is to figure out what is the best way to contribute. While it is good to let Tanzanians do as much as possible by themselves, they can't reach out to your friends. Only you can do that. When I tell my country mates about programmers in Africa, and I get a response like "They can do that?" with a big surprise impression on their face [1], I don't see how any African could do that by themselves. Bridges need to be built from both sides. If you remove yourself then you end up with half a bridge.
[1]: That was just one reaction I got when I told people about my work in Africa. Starkly contrasted by another reaction which was the opposite: "Oh cool, I am hiring devs in Ghana, they are awesome!". It's not all lost, but a lot of people simply still don't know. And that includes African-Americans.
That is sort of the light I see this in. Instead of people thinking "oh what a good person" I hope that they think "wow, look what a difference such a small amount of money can make. And look at all the untapped potential in these kids".
One thing that I feel is important, is that I do not believe charity, handouts in general are a good idea. they make people dependent or expectant of such charity instead of motivating them to solve problems.
Paying for education however is different. Education should be free. I come from a country where all education including university is free. So when I pay for a students education I am not being charitable, but I am correcting an error in the system.
Another way to look at it is to see going to school as the kids job. I literally got one kid off the streets by paying for their school and board, and all other personal expenses. The kid had already dropped out of school and ran away from home, and I offered to help only if and as long they would go back to school. That was their job. Their obligation.