Today is Earth Day; Devs can have an impact
Tags: environmentalism, opensource, discuss, earthday
Published: 2020-04-22 14:33:17

---
title: Today is Earth Day; Devs can have an impact
published: true
description: 
tags: environmentalism, opensource, discuss, earthday
cover_image: https://dev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/i/tptn001lj2yfqbzglzwp.png
---
The planet’s largest civic event was held on April 22, 1970 -- the very first Earth Day, kicking off the modern day environmental movement. In celebration of its 50th anniversary, we wanted to tell you all a bit about Sloan the sloth, our loving mascot.

Sloan has been with us since the Summer of 2017, working hard at moderating discussions and welcoming new users to the community. She has a pretty important job! On top of these responsibilities, Sloan also publishes posts for members who would like to remain anonymous while they seek advice from the community. You can check out some of her posts here:

{% user sloan %}

Clearly, Sloan is not a lazy sloth -- she’s just slow moving, and being slow has actually helped sloths survive on this planet for almost 64 million years! It’s an incredible tactical strategy that us humans could probably practice every now and then. For those of you curious, Sloan is part of the Bradypodidae family of sloths. The main distinction between her family and the other sloth family, Megalonychidae, is that Sloan is three-fingered instead of two-fingered. While this distinction may seem minor, these two families of sloths carry very different lifestyles! 

## **You can have an impact**

Due to the impact of COVID-19, there has been [an unprecedented decline in donations to animal conservation efforts](https://slothconservation.com/how-is-coronavirus-affecting-sloths/). While the virus has caused global hardships, we cannot totally disengage with the ongoing need to support environmental efforts. If you are in a situation, as a software developer, where your employment situation has not been upended by the pandemic, we ask that you consider donating to a conservation foundation.

If you’d like to learn more about sloths, today’s your lucky day. We invited Dr. Rebecca Cliffe, Founder and Executive Director at [The Sloth Conservatory Foundation](https://slothconservation.com/) to host a [#watercooler](https://dev.to/t/watercooler) AMA on DEV. Check it out here: 

{% link https://dev.to/slothcon/i-am-one-of-the-world-s-leading-experts-on-sloths-and-the-founder-of-the-sloth-conservation-foundation-ask-me-anything-3e3g %}

Here are some non-profit organizations to support: 

- [The Sloth Conservation Foundation](https://slothconservation.com/)
- [Turtle Survival Alliance](https://turtlesurvival.org/)
- [The Nature Conservancy](https://www.nature.org/)
- [Carolina Tiger Rescue](https://carolinatigerrescue.org/)
- [Integral Ecology Research Center](http://www.iercecology.org/)
- [Rainforest Action Network](https://www.ran.org/)
- [Earthjustice](https://earthjustice.org)
- [Jaguar Rescue Center](https://www.jaguarrescue.foundation/en-us/)

### **Software developers can also make an impact writing code.** 

*Here are some cool OSS projects to check out:* 

### Sheltermanager.com

[Sheltermanager.com](https://www.sheltermanager.com/site/en_oss.html) is an open source solution for animal shelter and rescue group management: 

{% github https://github.com/bobintetley/asm3 %}

### Public Lab

[Public Lab](https://publiclab.org/) is a community and a non-profit, democratizing science to address environmental issues that affect people:

{% github https://github.com/publiclab/plots2 %}

### Moja Global

Moja Global provides tools for estimating emissions and removals of greenhouse gases from the land sector:

{% github https://github.com/moja-global/About_moja_global %}

### Climatescape

Climatescape is an open database of organizations leading the fight against climate change.

{% github https://github.com/climatescape/climatescape.org %}

Are there other organizations and projects that the community should be supporting? Let us know in the comments!

Happy Earth Day and Happy Coding!