Red Hat Gives Back

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Corporate citizenship and giving back to the communities where we work, live and play is a top priority for Red Hatters. Many of our customers and partners also share a similar interest and vision. The Red Hat Summit and JBoss World is one of the largest gathering of Red Hat’s extended ecosystem, and we thought it would serve as a great venue for attendees to join forces and give back to a few great causes. New this year, we’re excited to bring several volunteer opportunities to the 2011 Red Hat Summit and JBoss World.

Openness and transparency are very important to Red Hat’s culture, so we naturally wanted to incorporate these attributes into how we selected a beneficiary for our volunteer activities. We opened up voting across five charities nominated by Red Hat associates to the entire Red Hat Summit and JBoss World community through an open poll available on the Summit blog here.

The response rate was great and we’re pleased to announce the following three volunteer opportunities during the 2011 Red Hat Summit and JBoss World:

Cradles to Crayons

Wednesday, May 4, 2011

10:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m.

Boston is home to Red Hat’s worldwide engineering headquarters, based just outside of the city in Westford, Mass, and this is the third time the city will host the Red Hat Summit and JBoss World. We’re thrilled to give back to a city that has played an important role in Red Hat’s history and is home to so many of our associates by partnering with a local Boston-based non-profit, Cradles to Crayons, for our first volunteer activity. Cradles to Crayons strives to provide children up to age 12 living in homeless and low-income situations with the essentials they need to feel safe, warm, ready to learn, and valued. Red Hat will provide items for volunteers at Red Hat Summit and JBoss World to create care packages for children in need to be delivered through various partner groups and local shelters.

Stop Hunger Now

Thursday, May 5, 2011

10:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m.

While we love Boston, Red Hat is a global company with offices in nearly 30 countries. Our second volunteer opportunity is with a non-profit that assists people in need around the world. Stop Hunger Now is an international hunger relief organization that coordinates the distribution of food and other life-saving aid. The organization is driven by a vision of a world without hunger, and a mission to end hunger in our lifetime. They provide food and life-saving aid to the world’s most vulnerable and create a global commitment to mobilize the necessary resources. The packages are used in crisis situations and in school feeding programs for schools and orphanages in developing countries around the world.

During the Red Hat Summit and JBoss World, attendees will have the opportunity to help assemble packages of dehydrated, high protein, and highly nutritious meals for Stop Hunger Now.

Japan Relief

We’ve all been saddened by the recent events impacting Japan from the earthquakes, resulting tsunami, and nuclear crisis. We wanted to show the Red Hat community’s support for our friends in Japan during the 2011 Red Hat Summit and JBoss World and have several opportunities available for attendees.

• Each year we create a special Red Hat Summit and JBoss World event t-shirt available on-site only for attendees to purchase. This year, all proceeds from the sale of these t-shirts will go toward Japan relief efforts as the country moves forward to rebuild and recover from the recent tragic events.

• We have 13 sessions during the Red Hat Summit and JBoss World that will focus on Red Hat Enterprise Linux add-ons. A postcard will be available at registration for attendees to get stamped at each Red Hat Enterprise Linux add-on session they attend. After attending five sessions, they can turn in their postcard and the Red Hat Enterprise Linux team will donate $5.00 to Japan relief efforts for each stamped postcard.

• We’ll once again have our sponsor passport program where attendees can visit the Partner Pavilion throughout Red Hat Summit and JBoss World and get their “passport” stamped at a certain number of participating sponsor booths. For each completed passport, Red Hat and participating sponsors will donate $10.00 to Japan relief efforts.

We hope to see you at the 2011 Red Hat Summit and JBoss World and we look forward to joining together in support of several great causes during the event!