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I N S I D EGo Fiber what's hot
go fiberThe report on the future of broadband and supporting documents are available here. The City of Seattle’s Advanced Telecommunications Task Force has recommended that the city work towards fiber to the home and begin by establishing an office of broadband.
The Access to Justice Technology Principles are now available in ten languages and growing. The adoption of these principles by the State Supreme Court was recently feted at a forum at Seattle University Law School. Governor Gregoire endorsed these as Attorney General and had this to say in celebration of the principles’ coming to life: "Clearly, one of the ways in which we can make our state’s legal system more efficient, accountable, and transparent is through the wise use of technology. If we truly are to ensure justice for all, any technology used in our courts or other parts of our justice system must not inadvertently cause a 'digital divide,' one that creates, rather than reduces, barriers to our legal system.... The Access to Justice Technology Principles will serve as an authoritative guide in the use of technology in the justice system, so that the fundamental values of inclusion and equality are built into the technology and its planning, development and use from beginning to end." The Principles can be read here. The City has launched a portal page for its wireless projects here. The page describes the City’s wireless project and has pictures of the installation. In addition to the new pilot free WiFi at City Hall, in Columbia City, the University District and upcoming downtown parks, WiFi hunters will also find free service at Seattle Center’s Center House and in the downtown Seattle Public Library. And if you’re on jury duty in King County, you can also bring along your laptop and wireless card!
Even without the new city wifi, Seattle has earned the designation of most wireless city. See the article in the Seattle PI on June 6, and on CNN, here. free tutorialOpen Office Impress is a free multimedia presentation software product similar to Microsoft Powerpoint. Goodwill’s GCF Global Learning web site is now offering a free online tutorial for Impress. The tutorial takes you through locating, installing and using the Impress software from OpenOffice.org. rb saves
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Greg Nickels, Mayor Department of Information Technology BILL SCHRIER chief technology officer RONA ZEVIN director, office of electronic communications DAVID KEYES manager, community technology program staff  D.H. CASS MAGNUSKI editor |
2005 Tech Matching Fund recipients with staff at city council chambers.
2005 tmf recipients announced
Fourteen community-based organizations have been awarded grants from the City’s Bill Wright Technology Matching Fund. The Fund uses cable franchise revenue to support projects which increase technology literacy and access, apply technology to increase civic engagement and reach underserved residents. The fund is supported by cable system franchise revenue collected by the city. Applications are reviewed by the City's volunteer Citizens Telecommunications and Technology Advisory Board.
According to Mayor Greg Nickels, "These organizations understand the importance of applying technology to build economic opportunity and healthy, educated families." “The Technology Matching Fund projects will reach some of our neediest residents and will provide training and computer access to engage them in our civic and economic life."
The grantees are excited to get funding for their projects. According to Asfaha Lemlem of Yesler, "We will have 24 students learning English as a second language, so we are going to teach them English using computers. We will use these dollars to enhance their skills, for example, to learn to download job applications. We have some drivers license workshops and citizenship classes, too. This will be a nice class for immigrants from East Africa and Southeast Asia."
Young Pham of Rainier Beach said, "My project is to increase the number of home computers. We're giving away computers and we're also training families. We got 20 computers donated, so we're giving away 20 computers and they'll be Internet-ready."
Julie Lightfoot of Compass Center said, "Our project is called Teach the Teachers and its two-pronged. First of all, we're going to develop a curriculum that is useful to people who are otherwise homeless. The Compass Center specializes in shelters for homeless, and in case management to help them find their own homes and get jobs. So we're developing a curriculum with a workshop format and another with a typical course-type format for that particular population. We're going to teach it in multiple locations. We have 13 locations in the greater Seattle area. The second prong is the teaching of the teachers. We're going to recruit a lot of volunteers to become teachers, who will teach future teachers, and they can help us develop the curriculum and further modifiy it so that it really is effective in helping the homeless with their needs. We would be happy if we had clients who wanted to become a teacher and could commit to us a certain amount of time in doing that. We like to have our teachers commit at least a year just because of the investment in time that we put into it. That would be great because they would know the best suggestions and maybe even be real constant volunteers."
The Technology Matching Fund was established in 1997 to support the community’s efforts to close the digital divide and encourage a technology-healthy city. Funds for the Technology Matching Fund come from city collected cable television franchise fees. The City named the fund in memory of Bill Wright, a community leader who embodied the program’s goal of creating digital opportunity for all and using technology tools to build strong neighborhoods. Since the program began, the City has contributed over $1,161,000 to 91 projects with community contributions totaling more than $2,635,000. For more information on the grant program, visit www.seattle.gov/tech/tmf.
2005 Bill Wright Technology Matching Fund Awards
911 Media Arts Center
Young Producers Project Scholarship Program
Open up summer classes on media literacy to economically challenged youth and offer up-to-date computers for the young producers program.
Awarded: $5,000
Match: $24,104
Boys & Girls Clubs of King County
Technology Learning Center
Expand the North Seattle Technology Learning Center to accommodate 20 computers, projector and screen. Offer training to volunteers and staff to teach computer basics using the Club Tech curriculum.
Awarded: $10,000
Match: $17,406
Compass Center
Teach the Teachers Project
Develop a curriculum to teach basic life and computer skills to formerly homeless men and women. Recruit and train volunteers to become teachers. Assess student skills and track outcomes to measure curriculum effectiveness.
Awarded: $4,625
Match: $5,000
Digital Promise
STAR Rising: Increasing Self Sufficiency
Improve access to technology for disabled populations by upgrading hardware and software and developing trainings and a Training Guide primarily devoted to disabled users. The program will be delivered at the Special Technology Access Resource (STAR) center in collaboration with Seattle Housing Authority, and will increase levels of self sufficiency for Center House residents and the surrounding community.
Awarded: $9990
Match: $12,591
Ethiopian Community Mutual Association
Ethio-Techno Mobile Multimedia Project
Provide two three-month sessions of multi-media project training to Ethiopian/ Amharic youth with a cultural heritage content focus. Sessions will be held at three locations in north, central and south Seattle and efforts will be made to recruit low-income, disadvantaged Ethiopian youth.
Awarded: $10,000
Match: $10,000
Hate Free Zone Washington
Log On For Your Community
Develop a “New American Voters” webpage to facilitate registration of 2,000 new voters; develop a webpage for their Community Leadership Council to provide a forum for member participation; and provide up to 240 community members the opportunity to participate in a series of live online discussions with local elected officials.
Awarded: $9,400
Match: $9,675
Horn of Africa Services
Intermediate Computer Training
Develop and test a curriculum for intermediate level computer training class to better serve East African refugees and immigrants in the greater Seattle area.
Awarded: $5,000
Match: $11,725
Interconnection
Computers for Community
Donate one hundred Internet ready, refurbished computer sets to low-income clients of Fremont Public Association and FamilyWorks. Conduct a marketing campaign to gain computers and market computer hardware training and recycling opportunities.
Awarded: $7,400
Match: $16,877.6
Lao Community Services Office
Technology Improvement Program
Help Lao youth improve their computer skills, academic achievement, and knowledge about their cultural heritage through Internet research and computer training. Help Lao adults increase their computer skills so they are more self-sufficient.
Awarded: $3,600
Match: $11,600
Low Income Housing Institute
LIHI Technology Initiative
Develop a mobile laptop lab and three mini labs which will increase computer access and training opportunities for low-income and formerly homeless residents at three housing sites. Teach job search skills, resume writing, computers and financial literacy.
Awarded: $9,000
Match: $25,538
Neighborhood House
Rainier Vista Technology Center
Provide six computers, serving residents of all ages. Offer training modules specifically designed to meet the needs of the low-income residents in Rainier Vista, including children, adults, limited English proficient adults, seniors and people with disabilities.
Awarded: $6,180
Match: $71,985.32
Rainier Beach Community Technology Center
Family Tech Training & Computer Give-Away Program
Provide low-income, minority families training in computer hardware management, software installation and utilization and accessing online government and school district resources. Participants take home refurbished computers they build.
Awarded: $6,000
Match: $10,540
Salvation Army White Center Community Center
Seattle White Center Computer Lab
Hire two UW work study students to staff the lab for 20 hours per week. Students will teach basic computer and Internet classes to adults, seniors and youth and web page development to teens. They will also assist during open lab hours.
Awarded: $4,900
Match: $14,150
Yesler Community Center
Basic Computer Training Project
Teach poor working refugees and immigrants coming out of welfare and illiteracy basic computer skills in conjunction with English as a second language. Classes will use simple English words to fit the levels of the participants.
Awarded: $8,905
Match: $8,441.95
Ken Skraben leads students from the YMCA Digital Bridges program on a tour of the city’s data center. Students also visited the Seattle Channel.
city hall hosts
student mappers
Students from Nathan Hale and Cleveland High Schools learned about each others' neighborhoods at a Green Map Exchange Day held June 2 at City Hall. For most of them it was their first trip to City Hall. Councilmember Richard Conlin explained how the building is a sustainable green building. The students are learning to use ArcView GIS software and used Green Map lessons created by Homewaters Project.
This was the culminating event for their City of Seattle CommunityTechnology Matching Fund grant.
Seattle Greenmap launched: In conjunction with the student gathering, Councilmember Richard Conlin, TJ Moore, green product vendors and others launched the new online Seattle Greenmap. The map features a number of optional features (layers) that users can view. See it at seattlegreenmap.net.
new id library
The new International District/Chinatown Branch of The Seattle Public Library is now open. The library at 713 Eighth Avenue S. provides public access computers and is part of a five-story complex known as International District Village Square II.
On May 25, Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels and participants in Seattle Student Voices at Roosevelt High School participated in the city’s first-ever online meeting. Mayor Nickels discussed issues that the students had selected including the viaduct, monorail, downtown growth, affordable housing, and hiring more police officers. From City Hall, the Mayor led the meeting which included Power Point slides, visits to websites, poll questions, and a Q&A session while the students participated in the Mayor’s meeting on laptops at their desks. The meeting was coordinated by the Seattle Channel and made possible by Seattle Student Voices, a part of the National Student Voices Project which is an initiative of the Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania with funding from the Annenberg Foundation. Student Voices encourages the civic engagement of young people by bringing the study of local government and policy issues into the classroom. The meeting was run using Microsoft Office Live Meeting, which enabled participants at the remote locations to meet and collaborate on-line. The software is well suited to sharing documents, pictures, or visiting websites together but participants in the meeting found that it was difficult to have a discussion or chat using the software. While the Mayor was speaking to the students throughout the meeting, the students were limited to typing responses or questions back to him and were most engaged when they had the opportunity to voice their opinions using tools like real-time polls and a question submission box. To improve future online meetings, the focus should be on increasing the interactivity and enabling more dialogue. This was an exciting use of technology and opportunity for the students to interact with the Mayor. It made people think about what was possible with the internet and how the government can use it to connect citizens and students to their democracy. online kids virtually meet mayor
d.o.l.l.a.r.s
J.C. Penney After School Program
Deadline: Rolling
Grants up to $5000 for curriculum-based after school programs. Proposals and projects with a local scope should be sent to local JC Penney facility managers.
ADC Foundation Digital Divide Grants
Deadline: Reviewed Quarterly
Funding to close the digital divide with interest in 1) outreach programs of cultural institutions, 2) outreach to the disadvantaged 3) programs that bring artistic experiences to children and 4) use of broadband to enhance artistic expression and its dissemination or to link different arts groups in cooperative efforts. Economic self-sufficiency supports programs that provide technology training to unskilled job sekers. Education funds also include e-learning projects, after-school programs focused on math and science.
l.i.n.k.a.g.e
Latest Internet threat: Pharming. In pharming, crooks hack a DNS computer and introduce false IP addresses. This misinformation spreads when other DNS servers request information from the tainted computer. One hacked server can spread false numbers to numerous other computers. You could type in www.google.com but get a completely different site. Worse, you could end up giving information to a spoofed banking site. Get more info.
Check your Internet speed at dslreports.com.
Alternative online auction sites. eBay is the biggest, with auction sales reported at $1,000 per second. Other popular auction sites are Amazon and Yahoo!.
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