Diversity & Inclusion Strategy for Big Brothers Big Sisters

Our non-profit has all female employees with only one employee with a diverse background. We rely heavily on volunteers as mentors for young people either in the community or in school programs. We want to create a more inclusive organization where we can provide mentoring supports to a more diverse population as well as recruit volunteers from the same diverse population. We would like to collaborate with students to create a diversity and inclusion strategy. This will involve several different steps for the students, including: Identifying areas for improvement based on a diversity audit? Defining diversity goals and objectives for our non-profit. Considering new diversity and inclusion training initiatives. Recommending ways to communicate diversity and inclusion initiatives to a more doverse community. Bonus steps in the process would also include: Recommending a timeline for evaluating our diversity and inclusion strategy.

Cybersecurity Awareness

Our organization, Big Brothers Big Sisters of Saint John, is one of 91 agencys across Canada. Our Office 365 Accounts are provided and managed by our National Office's IT team. As a local BBBS agency, we are committed to protecting the personal information of the children, families, volunteers, and community partners we serve. As we grow and adapt our local operations to an increasingly digital environment, we recognize the need to strengthen our local agency's cybersecurity posture to ensure our information handling policies and practices compliment those that BBBS of Canada oversees/manages and are based upon best practices and standards. We are seeking support from Riipen Level UP students to audit our current local agency's cybersecurity and data handling procedures, help us to assess risks and vulnerabilities, and provide practical recommendations for a small non-profit to improve security, compliance, and operational efficiency. This project will involve the following steps: Conducting a cybersecurity needs assessment tailored to our small non-profit, considering our unique federated model of BBBS. Reviewing our current IT infrastructure and policies related to data storage, sharing, and access control. Identifying gaps or vulnerabilities in current practices. Researching cybersecurity best practices for a small non-profit and local agency within the BBBS of Canada structure. Recommending improvements to policies, practices, training, or tools. Proposing a basic implementation or awareness/training strategy for staff.

API Software Development

This project will engage students in integrating a variety of APIs to improve how our non-profit manages and uses data. The goal is to automate routine tasks, reduce manual work, and enhance overall workflow efficiency. Students will identify, integrate, and test APIs tailored to our operational needs—such as customer relationship management (CRM), marketing automation, and data analytics platforms. By connecting these systems, they will design and implement custom workflows that trigger actions based on specific events. Examples of automated actions may include: Sending notifications Collecting and syncing data across platforms Generating reports Managing CRM tasks (e.g., volunteer onboarding, approvals) Sending e-signature requests Updating contact information in multiple systems Managing leads and key milestones By streamlining these processes, the project will free up staff time for more strategic and creative work, while improving data accuracy and organizational responsiveness.