Community Networking area includes infrastructure or service projects, such as community ISPs or wireless community networks, and information focused projects such as community portals (websites that connect people with community resources and encourage civic participation). CTC VISTAs deal directly with how low-income Americans can learn to empower themselves through smart adoption of Internet knowledge-access, collaboration, and self-publishing tools and skills.
Community Network basics:
- A community network can be anything 2 or more people who do something with technology
- Technology is used in CN to gather and disburse content to meet local needs, a.k.a community knowledge networks. How is this better than more conventional methods (word of mouth, physical rallies)?
- CN has a physical infrastructure (providing internet access, email and web servers, blogs/wiki's) that enables an intellectual infrastructure with collaborative potential (need example here).
- Benefits to pooling collaborative capacity of community organizations using technology, such as avoiding recreating the wheel, incorporating different skill sets, and increasing empowerment overall
- Challenges to collaboration in community networking, such as ignorance of possibilities, information overload, or need for content to be too specific.
- Four levels of community networking: (1) create community portal webpage for community promotion, (2) create subsequent pages for local business and organizations, (3) build learning communities online, and (4) create effective collaborations, "communities of communities", with emphasis on the quality of online summative information.
- Community networks give citizens roles such as: infoscout, telementor, reference librarian, town crier, and discussion leader.
- Multimedia as a ICT tool to give individuals and communities a visual web presence or initial Cyber-identity
- Mentoring/volunteering and Civic participation as an essential elements of community networks
- Impact of ecommerce on community networking and best practices for e-citizenship and e-community.
- What new technologies are being used for community networking (such as cell phones for learning or ICT Advocacy Resources)? What are the challenges of staying current with technological advances (budget, skillsets)?
- What are the skill/practices of CN that need to be taught to community members to have beneficial products? How do we articulate and publicize these benefits?
- How can we connect existing CTC's better with communities to effectively share resources and best practices?
The following resource modules are provided to help new VISTAs and others quickly come up to speed understanding the potential for effective use of online tools for self-directed Internet learning and collaborative group learning. As you review the following resources, keep in mind the following three questions:
- What specific computer, Internet, and collaboration skills and tools do low-income folks really need to learn as a priority?
- How might low-income folks best share new knowledge and mutual support via Community Networking best practices?
- What specific skills training and best practices exist for poverty reduction?