Today, the most interesting part of the day was a session called "Open Space", where some people wrote topics they were interested in discussing on a flipchart, and then everyone ticked the topic they were interested in discussing, so that we could divide up into different interest groups. It was like one of those crowd-sourced conferences.
I'd been dying to know the size of everyone else's organisations - how long they'd been doing it, their budgets, and whether they have any paid staff. So we went around the group and shared just that.
Robogals is so close to who I am, it was like I was shedding another layer of skin to the group and letting them see who I was.
What struck me the most about this exercise is that amount of amazing things this group has been able to achieve on the leanest of budgets.
Some of the amazing projects include:
These are just a sample of amazing projects that the under-30 year old, 2011 cohort of YAN Fellows spend tens of hours of week on, for no pay, because they are passionate about the cause.
So next time you think, "I don't have the money or resources to implement my idea", look to the YAN Fellows for inspiration. There's a whole database of them here. With a lot of heart, and a lot of hard work, you can achieve anything.
I'm the founder of Robogals, and the Young Australian of the Year for 2012. Currently working on robotics company, aubot. I sometimes give speeches around the country.
I tweet @maritacheng and I'm on Facebook.