NOVEMBER 2019
BE YOUR OWN HERO By: Monique Ross As the creator of Home Safe hotline, Parker Nolan’s core passion is to positively affect the well being of others. With his unique passion and drive, Nolan admitted it’s hard to focus on one goal at a time. He found that working on one base idea and combining his resources and knowledge, he is able to move forward to bigger goals. A perfect example of this technique is the emergency text hotline he developed in the summer of 2019, which originally derived from his desire to help a friend get out of any uncomfortable or unsafe situation she encountered while living in Australia.
to his friend’s issue—a text system that automatically sends a customized message from a persona with an “emergency.” Once he realized the potential of his creation, he made it his next goal to add more value to its development and reach a larger Using his own audience that may laptop and previous experience the same knowledge on coding, issues by spreading Nolan successfully the word on social made his own solution media.
SIMPLY FOLLOW THESE STEPS: Save the number 1 (805) 250-4703 under someone’s name in your phone for quick access. Text your first name and a person (ex: friend, boss, mom) and you will receive a personalized text. Delete the text you sent and use the received text as an excuse to leave a situation.
This information and more is available on the @tryhomesafe Instagram page, or tryhomesafe.com. The hotline generates urgent messages that embody the characteristics of a friend or family member. Nolan finds it important to constantly update codes to improve the hotline’s performance. “I gave each person you could text one standard message it would send back to you, but I figured that would get old after a while, so I had to add in a message randomizer.” There is currently a wide variety of possible messages for the hotline to choose from to ensure that users do not experience repetition. The area code comes from the state of California, but the hotline supports text responses for most of North America, the UK, Australia, Ireland, Spain, Italy and India. As Nolan reflected about the recent success of the hotline, he said, “I don’t want to see the usage go way up because
then that means more people are in dangerous situations, but I want more people to be aware that it’s available if you do need it.”
that could enrich his knowledge of the world and, therefore, influence his steps to becoming a greater contributor.
In 2016, Nolan created Since he was a junior a profile on Medium, in high school, Nolan a popular online has used multiple publishing platform, technological where he wrote about platforms that enabled world issues, the him to connect with economy and other audiences big and interests and concerns small about topics he of his that he felt feels are important were worth sharing. to discuss. He is a Through this platform, firm believer in the he turned complex power of community news into easy-toand is not afraid to read articles for young make connections adults.
More recently, he shares simplified daily news bullets on his personal Instagram stories, which cite reliable sources. He humbly admitted that his current actions to help others don’t take much of his time, so he is in the process of developing his perspective on his impact. “With the
hotline, I knew I could solve it in fifteen hours so I did it… I’m trying to now take a step back and say, ‘Okay, I can hit a bigger audience if I take a lot more time and put a lot more effort in something that might take a longer time than I realize.’” With this mindset, Nolan hopes to focus
Stylists: Molly Harmon & Maria Vitale Photographer: Maria Leolani
more of his time and energy on major issues, starting with the student-lending market and food deserts. He chose to speak further about food deserts, which refers to an urban area where it is difficult to buy affordable or good-quality fresh food. These areas are more concentrated in the south, where people have to drive much further to purchase fresh food from a grocery store. Because of this issue, the rates of diabetes, obesity, cancer and heart issues skyrocket in these impoverished areas. Nolan explained that work has been done to improve this issue, but they are more directed towards an audience with higher incomes. In lower-income areas, activists and farmers have created short-term solutions to support their communities. With business knowledge, connections and years of hard work and dedication, Nolan hopes to develop longterm solutions for areas that are truly in need of attention.
on now with the studentlending market, I do think we could do better and that’s why we’re building it,” he said. “But with the food desert issue, the end goal with this is to take an established model, but provide it to more people.” Meeting with Nolan was inspiring because he preached about the importance of valuing experiences, community, passion and change. His actions as a college student are influenced by his own mindset of striving to gain experiences rather than resume builders.
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“The stuff that I’m working
I’m not gonna do something unless I’m going to be passionate about it and I’m going to learn something.
“I’m not gonna do something unless I’m going to be passionate about it and I’m going to learn something.” Nolan takes it upon himself to supplement his formal education with independent expeditions and applies what he learns in school to the bigger picture. He shamelessly shared, “I try to travel a lot more now, I try to do things that really interest me, so my GPA is not the greatest and it’s because when I probably could’ve been studying for exams I was networking in Chicago or visiting my friend at Cornell.” When asked what advice he would give to others who are looking to find their purpose, he responded, “If people are more focused and efficient with their time, they’ll see that the world opens up to them so they can do what they want to do… you will start to amalgamate your experiences that might not initially point you in any direction, but they’ll combine in new ways.” Nolan believes that most people have the same ambition inside of them, and that everyone is providing a service that helps others in some way at the end of the day. Once people recognize their abilities and the technological resources available, it will inspire hope as they are able to connect with others around the world and collaborate to create awareness of worldly issues and provide long-term solutions.
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