Part 2: Santa Cruz COVID-19 Innovation—Direct Support
Last week we looked at two Santa Cruz companies taking on global solutions. Today we’re talking to two local tech companies working around the clock to provide local relief and support.
Cruz One Online Education Support
On Friday, March 13, a few days before the shelter-in-place order would turn lives upside down and the full impacts of COVID-19 would become clear to Californians, Chris Neklason of Cruzio reached out to a group of local tech innovators with an idea.
Schools were going to go online. Teachers and students were about to transition to virtual learning with little to no tech knowledge or support. Local school districts might have just a handful (or less) people in their IT support department, who were about to get very, very overwhelmed.
The idea: “What if we just set up a virtual tech support company and we staff it with volunteers?”
Chris Miller, CEO of Cloud Brigade and Launch Brigade, had made the decision that same day that his employees should work from home. Miller thought of all the people transitioning to remote work for their jobs, and knew teachers and students trying to go virtual were going to be struggling even more severely.
Since his own businesses were taken care of, thanks to the ever-refreshing nature of their work and an adaptable team, Miller saw that the “brightest burning fire” was the school assistance issue.
“There was this calling in the community,” he says. There was an urgent call to action that “this was like a wartime kind of situation.”
Miller started working on a platform on Friday night, and by the end of weekend had framed a website and help desk system where volunteers could register to help, students and teachers could ask for assistance, and everyone could communicate seamlessly. Cruz One was born.
But it wasn’t that “simple.” Not only did they need to recruit and process volunteers, they needed a functional framework that could ensure everyone’s safety. The Cruz One team worked closely with the Santa Cruz County Office of Education to build a platform of transparency—so SCCOE and Cruz One could properly vet, background check, and onboard volunteers.
Miller notes that it took a ton of collaboration, including help from Esther Yoon of Zoom with access to Zoom resources, Cruzio helping to get kids online, and Jason Borgen, the County Office of Education’s CTO (who was already building and advocating for a tech-focused plan for the County schools before the pandemic hit). Borgen advocated within each school district, getting superintendents on board.
“It’s very humbling to see the amount of support we’ve received,” Miller says.
He summed it up in a LinkedIn post:
“Over this past weekend we (members of the Santa Cruz tech community) spun up a community organization to provide help-desk support services to support our local schools. It was a lot of work, and we've had an amazing turnout from volunteers. Since this is a repeatable concept that other communities could embrace, I wanted to share how we built this: How We Built This.”
Miller reflects that he is seeing a multitude of local companies innovate as a direct result of this crisis—including Blume Distillation, which is now making hand sanitizer, and recruited Launch Brigade to help with go-to-market components, including packaging, e-commerce, and marketing.
“One of the great things about being part of the Santa Cruz community is seeing how the community is pulling together,” Miller says, “It’s keeping my faith in humanity.”
Advice for other companies during challenging times and “normal” times alike?
“You can’t be too risk-averse, you have to have some trust that things are going to be okay.”
Idea Fab Labs
At Idea Fab Labs, personal protective equipment is now an all-day, every-day project.
In collaboration with Catherine S. Forest, MD, MPH, FAAFP, Encompass Community Services, and the Santa Cruz County and Monterey County Medical Societies, Idea Fab Labs launched a massive effort to create and donate PPE to local people in need. They call it PPE 4 Central Coast.
Learn how you can help at: PPE4CC.org
Their goal is to provide safety equipment to healthcare workers and front line workers like janitors, bus drivers, grocery checkers, medical assistants, ambulance services, etc.
“We seek to innovate and utilize reusable, local materials and crafters. We are striving to provide the best available protection in the context of the global pandemic in the service of our community and in collaboration - radical interdependence,” the coalition writes on PPE4CC.
At Idea Fab Labs, that means a heck of a lot of creation! They’ve worked with designs from Parallel Flight and Joby Aviation for 3D-printable protective masks that can be printed in just one or two hours. These devices can be reused after washing and sanitizing.
They’ve even created a “face shield for your whole body”—essentially a little plastic booth with hand holes, intended for people who are administering COVID-19 tests. Again, since it’s made of washable and durable materials (in this case polycarbonate and aluminum), it can be reused again and again between sanitizing.
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Even more local companies are stepping up to bring their own support solutions to those in need. Check out how Santa Cruz Bikes is pivoting to produce PPE and how Blume Distillation is now producing hand sanitizer.