Organizing Solar Cooking Events
From Solar Cooking
One way to promote solar cooking is to organize a solar cooking event, to help get the message out to more people that this is an idea whose time has come. An event can be as simple as arranging to display a couple of cookers and hand out flyers at a Farmer's Market to a large organized event that puts dozens or hundreds of cookers on a Capitol lawn. People have organized cooker demonstrations, presentations, displays, solar cooking contests, youth projects, and more. Any such event can help to make more people more aware of this wonderful and effective technology.
If you have never organized an event, this page may give you help in getting started, and those of us who have already organized other events may find new ideas. If you have helped to organize events and can add advice or ideas, please feel free to do so.
[edit] Contacting the Press
If you are going to the trouble to organize an event, make sure you let your local/regional press know about it. Press releases should be clearly and simply written, never forgetting the famous four Ws— Who (who is sponsoring and who to contact for further information), What (details about what will take place), Where, and When.
[edit] Advertising Your Event
If you are organizing a solar cooking event, make sure you get the word out. Many newspapers and newsletters have community calendars that list community events, often at no charge (your press release may get reporters to interview you or attend your event, but will not necessarily put you on a community calendar, which is sometimes a separate department, so talk to the paper to make sure all your bases are covered). Many radio stations also announce community events at no charge. Posters are good, too. Vary the font size (biggest/boldest for the most important information), leave some blank spaces here and there to make it easier to read, and make sure you include the four W's! Include the name of the town where the event will be held. People in your town may know where "Riverside Park" or "Upside Hall" is, but word of your event can travel farther than you realize, and people a few towns away may not know what town the facility or park is in.
Email is another good way to network your event, if you have solar contacts in your area or know people who might be interested. You can generate a list of networkers by having people sign up at your events. Word of mouth is very important, too. Talk to people about your event every chance you get. If you can make small handouts that hit the highlights of the event (aim for six or eight to a page, which is reasonably economical) to give people when you talk to them, they will be more likely to remember to add your event to their calendar when they get home. And make sure you add it to our Calendar_of_events here at the Solar Cooking Archive Wiki!
[edit] Types of Events
[edit] Solar Cooker Construction Workshops
[edit] Solar Cooking Demonstrations
[edit] Indoor Presentations About Solar Cooking
Clubs, churches, and organizations that have a humanitarian or environmental focus are good possibilities for indoor presentations. Is there a church in your community that is looking for a new humanitarian focus? A Rotary Club that is not yet involved in promoting solar cooking? Some other service club that might want to follow Rotary's lead in promoting solar cooking to make a difference in the world? An environmental group that has not yet focused on this wonderful technology? These are all good possibilities for arranging presentations, but many of these presentations will be indoors.
Presenting solar cooking indoors is more challenging than presenting it out in the sunshine. Set up some cookers anyway, even though they won't be working, so people can see what they look like. If possible, include both commercial and homemade models, so people can see some of the various means by which it is possible to cook with sunshine. Try to include one of the ultra-easy homemade cookers, such as an SPC or ROB or Windshield Shade Cooker, so your audience can see that solar cooking can be accomplished very simply. Since you can't show food actually cooking, try to include video or slides that show cookers working and show solar cooked foods, and if your presentation is slanted towards the humanitarian or environmental aspects, make sure your visuals also include some pictures of women in deforested areas carrying big bundles of wood and pictures illustrating aspects such as indoor smoke. If at all possible, have some sort of solar food for people to sample, even if it is just small tastes of soup or small pieces of bread or cake. Make sure you have a handout telling people where they can go online to learn more. Try to find out what the standard of dress is for the organization's meetings and aim for the neat, clean middle. You want people to concentrate on your presentation, not your too-casual or too-dressy outfit.
[edit] Solar Cooking Contests
[edit] Plays, Skits, or Other Performance Arts Incorporating Solar Cooking
The Integrated Solar Cooking Method and Water Pasteurization Project Movie includes some marvelous footage of singing and dancing to honor solar cooking.
[edit] Visual Displays About Solar Cooking
Visual Displays can be great for piggy-backing onto another event. For example, you might easily get permission to set up a small display concerning solar cooking in the lobby of a theater showing an environmental film or documentary. A small table (or even a TV tray) can hold a presentation board with posters, fact sheets, graphics, etc, and you can have brochures or other information for people to take arranged on the table.
[edit] Selling Solar Cooked Foods as a Fundraiser for Solar Cooking
[edit] Youth Projects
![Members of a Roots & Shoots group learning to make EZ-3s]](/wiki/Image:Youth_Projects1.jpg)
The EZ-3 Solar Cooker is an ideal design for youth projects, since it is relatively easy to make and works very well. SharonID's Solar Project Soup, from the Soup section of Recipes was designed for youth projects with the EZ-3.
