Community Involvment at PADT, Inc.

Employee Involvement PADT’s management feels strongly that involvement in the community goes beyond donating money. We also understand that as a company, we can only do so much. To increase our impact on the community PADT encourages our employees to be involved in their local schools, churches, service organizations, arts organizations and other activities of general benefit.
Education Being a high-tech company, educational quality plays a very important role in our future success. Because of this PADT works directly with Universities and supports our employee’s efforts in primary and secondary education. Some specific examples are:
	Arizona State University		Arizona BioIndustry Association		ASU School of Engineering
	Partnership for Research In Spatial Modeling		University of Arizona		New Mexico Tech
	University of California

Arts Even though PADT is a technology company, we feel that art plays an important part in our community. As such, PADT has offered support for art and music events in our community when employees or close associates of the company are involved. Currently, PADT is a sponsor of the Sonoran Desert Chorale.
Professional
	Invest Southwest - PADT is an accredited investor attendee and, for 2008, an event sponsor for Invest Southwest. This annual gathering is the premier capital conference in Arizona and the Southwest connecting the region’s most promising ventures with knowledgeable investors. This is yet another way that PADT works to improve the technical business climate in Arizona. Learn more at www.investsouthwest.org.				The Arizona Technology Council is a non-profit trade association founded to connect, represent and support the state's expanding technology industry. To promote economic growth and professional development in Arizona's technology sector, the Council provides members networking opportunities, business support and access to educational forums. The Council strives to distinguish Arizona as a leader in the technology community and offer resources that are exclusive to its members. Visit www.aztechcouncil.org to learn more about the council.
			SME - PADT’s involvement with the Society of Manufacturing Engineers is very similar to the relationship with AIAA. Many employees were active student members and still participate in Phoenix Chapter events.
	The Arizona Technology Investor Forum (ATIF) is an investment community of accredited private equity investors, venture capitalists, corporate, and institutional investors. Forum members invest in high-quality, diverse investment opportunities. The community is strengthened through its involvement in Arizona State University’s Fulton School of Engineering. This focus provides a constant deal flow stream of early-stage technology ventures. PADT participates by investing and providing technical and business experience to funded companies. Visit atif.asu.edu to learn more about this important organization.		AIAA - While in college many of PADT's employees were active members in the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics. Their involvement has carried over into further participation. In fact, two employees were past Phoenix Chapter presidents. This is one of the strongest engineering organizations in Artizona.

 

 

User Organizations
		3DSUG - PADT is a long time participant in the 3D Systems User Group in its current and previous forms. This group is dedicated to providing information and feedback on Stereolithography (SLA) and Selective Laser Sintering (SLS) technologies developed by 3D Systems, Inc. In 2006 one of PADT's engineers, Brad Palumbo, was elected to serve as secretary for the group. The choice of a PADT employee by the users for this position highlights the leadership position that PADT holds within the community as well as Brad's recognized long time expertise in the area.
		XANSYS - PADT is the sole sponsor of XANSYS, a worldwide on-line user group for over 2,500 ANSYS users. The company provides the hardware, software and maintenance of www.xansys.org. In addition, PADT’s engineers are frequent contributors to the community.
Local Charities Each year PADT makes donations of time and funds to a variety of local charities that our employee’s or other business associates recommend. This includes small donations of time and funds as well as adopting families for Christmas. PADT helps out the local Boy Scouts of America Troop 17 from Ahwatukee.  We are proud to host their website www.aztroop17.org Continuing with a long term them of promoting science and engineering in the community, especially with groups that don’t traditionally go into those fields, PADT is proud to work with a local Girl Scout group in Ahwatukee, Arizona to support their First Annual Father-Daughter Rocket Launch.  PADT helped pay for the rockets and necessary insurance, and the girls and their Dads worked on making some awesome rockets.  For many, it was the first time they had built any kind of model or done a project with their dads.  In addition to the launch, they used the experience to earn science patches.  PADT hopes to sponsor similar events in the future. After the success of the 2008 event covered above, PADT was proud to sponsor the Second annual Daddy & Daughter Rocket Launch (they softened up the name a bit from Father & Daughter).  Good fun was had by all and the rockets improved compared to last year, building on what they learned then.  We hope to continue this support until one of these girls graduates from Engineering school.  Read more about the event from the local paper: http://www.ahwatukee.com/articles/packages-8192-care-female.html As part of PADT’s commitment to local charities that impact local people, the company recently gave financial support to a benefit event for the local food bank located in Maricopa, AZ, a growing community south of the Phoenix Metro area. The benefit was in support of F.O.R Maricopa (Food/Opportunism/Resources) which recently celebrated its one year anniversary. On a weekly basis over this past year, F.O.R. provided food for approximately 60 families. To learn more about F.O.R. Maricopa please visit www.formaricopa.org The event was held in June 11, 2008 in Maricopa and besides raising money and collection food for F.O.R. the benefit featured resources booths from the Pinal County Health Department, EMPACT-SPC, MASH Collation and various local churches and organizations. The event also included a live music concert. PADT is proud do be a sponsor of one of the largest underwater robotics competitions in the country: NURC. These competitions promote the involvement of High School and University students in hands-on engineering. Visit their web page to learn more h2orobots.org PADT strongly promotes greater diversity in the engineering community.  To help promote this the company helped sponsor the Women in Science and Engineering (WISE) Underwater Robotics team from ASU in 2007.  Somehow in between classes, finals and busy lives, this very talented group of women built and ran a robot that finished 2nd in their first competition. To read the full article on the ASU WISE team - Click Here. To read the ASU WISE teams competition report - Click Here National and International Charties PADT is dabbling in the Microcredit world by investing in entrepreneurs from developing countries through Kiva.org. Kiva lets you connect with and loan money to unique small businesses in the developing world. By choosing a business on Kiva.org, you can "sponsor a business" and help the world's working poor make great strides towards economic independence. Throughout the course of the loan (usually 6-12 months), you can receive email journal updates from the business you've sponsored. As loans are repaid, you get your loan money back. Click Here to see PADT's lender page: Learn more about Kiva at: Click Here After the Tsunami in Asia and Hurricanes in the United States, PADT has taken a more active role in supporting national and international charities that provide significant services to those who need it the most. Most recently, the company has made significant matching donations to the American Red Cross. When making sizeable contributions, PADT always checks with CharityNavigator.org. This is an invaluable resource that publishes how much of the money donated to a given charity actually ends up going to programs.

Last updated on July 9, 2010