database
Website and Database Building
Organization:
California Coalition for Rural Housing VISTA Name:
Rebecca White
Program Start:
9/2006
Program End:
9/2007
Project Description:
Goal 1: Increase the capacity of rural communities and the organizations that serve them to utlize new information technologies for community development endeavors.
Goal 2: Assist in maintaining and improving on organization’s technology capacity
Goal 3: Develop and maintain a housing policy clearinghouse and searchable database for communities and community based organizations that are looking to adopt policies that will increase the stock of decent affordable housing.
Project Outcome:
In February Cal Rural Housing completed working on a 3 month project with Fresno County Community Development Division in which we provided technical assistance in developing an electronic database to track their CDBG expenditures. The County had never tracked these expenditures other then in a word document. Rebecca inputted the information we obtained in a word document into Excel, analyzed, charted and developed maps for the department. We then provided maps for a presentation to the Board of Supervisors that shows expenditures by community and by district (attached). The County should now be able to more easily track Federal funding using this database and produce charts and map in a more timely fashion. Rebecca spent a majority of her time revamping our website and upgrading our Rural Toolbox. She upgraded our old site using Drupal and developed a searchable database of more than 130 California Inclusionary Housing programs, the first of its kind in the US. The database provides summaries of characteristics for each policy. Users are able to search for these summaries by jurisdiction name or by more than 30 other variables. Rebecca also developed an introductory tutorial on using open-source desktop GIS (MapWindow) that can be used as either a GIS viewer or an advanced should be live by August-September.
Volunteer Outreach and Program Development
Organization:
The EDGE Community Technology Center VISTA Name:
Craig Brown
Program Start:
8/2003
Program End:
8/2004
Project Description:
Goal 1. Recruit volunteers and establish an efficient volunteer system and training program.
Craig contacted various community organizations to recruit volunteers. He also succeeded in getting The EDGE approved as an off-site location with three new Universities for their Federal Work Study Programs. He submitted information to local organizations’ publications to recruit new volunteers and presented fliers at several organizations’ member meetings.
Craig helped recruit and train four regular volunteer instructors and five regular volunteer class assistants. Thirty-one classes were taught by volunteers. The EDGE has had in excess of 2700 hours of help from all volunteers.
During Craig’s year we revised, updated, and standardized curricula and handouts for all classes and made all handouts available on The EDGE website. (http://thelibrary.springfield.missouri.org/edge/techguides.cfm) Craig organized the new class schedule and worked with the volunteers on a training schedule and class instructor guidelines. (http://edge.sgcl.org).
Goal 2. Oversee trained volunteers in the maintenance of the participant and evaluation database, in the collection of follow-up surveys, and in the preparation and support of project courses and projects.
Craig assisted in modifying The EDGE database and implemented a detailed analysis reporting system to the Director for each class conducted including evaluation of attendance trends in core classes and tutorial topic use. He developed standard evaluations for each class and methods to better access the patrons’ response to curriculum and specific instructor impact.
Work-study students were trained to assist with receptionist duties, clerical support, and database data entry for registration, class participation and evaluations.
The EDGE has utilized several employees from the AARP Senior Community Service Employment program. Craig supervised and trained AARP employees working in various areas such as receptionist duties, clerical support, monitoring tutorial sessions, and data entry.
Craig oversaw the expansion of the self-help tutorial programs to include additional daytime sessions by opening of and securing staffing for a second room dedicated to tutorial sessions during these expanded sessions. 719 tutorial sessions were offered in the tutorial room.
Goal 3. Participate in grant writing and other forms of fundraising, develop media partners, and increase publicity to help ensure the success and sustainability of The EDGE.
Craig submitted articles for newsletters, created flyers for distribution at organizational meetings, and coordinated inclusion of our schedules and tutorial brochures at the Missouri Career Center.
He assisted in the development of numerous grant proposals, although no grants were awarded during his year of service.
Craig developed a comprehensive “Corporate” package that was presented to the Executive Director and the Library Board for consideration in the yearly budget process. Craig assisted in a developmental presentation made to the Library’s Board of Directors at a meeting held at The EDGE Community Technology Center.
Craig attended the “Business and Technology Expo” held in Springfield in October. It is the largest expo of its kind in southern Missouri. He was able to network with many local businesses and make initial contact for future development. All contact information received there has been submitted to the Project Director.
Project Outcome:
During the past year with Craig as a VISTA, we increased our attendance at the EDGE facility. Attendance at all classes and activities for the year was 3693.
Craig was responsible for insuring that The EDGE Community Technology Center continued to provide a much needed service to the community during his year of service as a VISTA member. He stepped forward to assist in instruction when needed and took the “Library Express” out for classes and special projects. He built a valuable pool of trained volunteers that will continue to serve. Craig stepped up in any situation to lend a hand or his expertise to solve a problem or enhance an opportunity. He worked well in supplying needed support and proposals to the Executive office and Board as warranted. The VISTA program has proven vital to The EDGE’s continued growth and success.
VISTA Leader
Organization:
U Mass Boston/College of Public & Community Service VISTA Name:
Saul Baizman
Program Start:
8/2004
Program End:
8/2006
Project Description:
Saul was the VISTA Leader for the 2004 - 2005 Program year and worked to manage, motivated, and connect all the Digital Arts Service Corps members out in the field. Saul also worked to redesign the DASC website and implement a better system for VISTAs to record and share their experiences online.
Project Outcome:
VISTAs have not had an easy time keeping in touch with each other, both during and after service. In some cases certain personal information wasn’t even kept on file, such as a home telephone number. I created a global addressbook last year and incorporated it into the redesigned VISTA website this year. Alumni and current VISTAs now have a simple facility on the Project website to share their information as well as access other VISTAs’ information. In enhancing VISTA alumni resources and communications the VISTA Leaders wrote a form letter to all past alumni announcing the creation of a new CTC VISTA alumni connections mailing list (January), which also served to connect alumni to the great CTC VISTA directory networking resource. We plan to use this addressbook to periodically send a newsletter to alumni and hold reunions.
Assistant Director Paul Hansen and I worked collaboratively to re-launch the VISTA website (http://www.cpcs.umb.edu/vista/), creating a mock-up on a development server before going live with the re-design. In addition to migrating the directory pages off the development server, I replaced the static roster listings (current VISTAs, alumni, all VISTAs, and organizations) with dynamic database- backed pages, laying the groundwork for a recruiting system in which potential supervisors can add and edit VISTA job descriptions directly on the website. (The rosters do not at present list who is a second- or third-year VISTA, and it does not indicate any special titles for people, like VISTA Leader, for example).
Developed enhanced VISTA resources. One of the biggest challenges any group of short-term workers faces is the loss of knowledge when the staff turns over. In an effort to combat the lack of knowledge retention between VISTA “classes,” Dan
Schackman and I erected a resource wiki on the Project website. A wiki is “a website that allows users to add content, as on an Internet forum, but also allows anyone to edit the content” (WikiPedia.org). The wiki technology is widely deployed across the Internet and was chosen for its ability to cater to both novice and advanced Internet users. Dan and I created a modest framework though which VISTAs and non-VISTAs alike can contribute to and maintain a database of resources exclusively targeted to CTC VISTAs. Dan and I fleshed it out with resources provided by VISTAs David Johnson and Michelle Rogers. I feel the wiki will serve as an effective tool enabling VISTAS to have greater participation
The Community Technology Review website (www.comtechreview.org) was beefed up and migrated from an obsolete web server to a server which hosts all other CPCS website properties (CPCS, VISTA, CBC, etc.). Of note are the new comment approval system and the PayPal order page. The comment page will ease the approval process for user-submitted comments, and the order page will streamline CTR hardcopy purchases which can now be handled with a credit card. I also trained Dan Schackman to use the administration interface and made some minor code changes for the Winter 2005 issue.
Finally, I became savvy with Final Cut Pro and edited a couple of small VISTA project videos for distribution on the web (http://www.cpcs.umb.edu/vista/video/). I massaged the swearing in footage for the 2004-05 crop of VISTAs originally shot on September 1 by former VISTA Leader James Fishwick, featuring US Representative Barney Frank and UMass/Boston Chancellor Keith Motley. A couple more projects have been added to the archives, including a Liz Cavano’s half-hour “What’s a VISTA” (2001) and Scott Hillier’s “CTC VISTAs: A Day in the Life” (2003).
The past few months haven’t been spent exclusively glued to a keyboard and monitor. I spoke at Faneuil Hall in October on AmeriCorps Opening Day, an ambassador of the CTC VISTA Project. A number of situations arose with a few VISTAs, some of whom I tried to help with varying degrees of success. For my part I served as a liaison with a VISTA in Minnesota, who ended up leaving the program after transferring from her first assignment and failing to make her second assignment work; I supported two VISTAs in Massachusetts, one in California, and one in North Carolina who had some conflicts with their supervisors and another experiencing some serious interpersonal conflicts with one of her co-workers. These situations have been very time and energy intensive, requiring frequent and detailed communication with VISTA support staff and the involved parties.
On a related front of Project responsibility, I assumed coordinating responsibilities for the monthly meetings among the Boston VISTAs, ensuring an agenda, chairperson, and minute-taker for every meeting as well as editing and posting the minutes
During the 05-06 project year, Saul’s supervisor said the following:
Saul has continued to lend his considerable technical skills to a number of projects– some to the benefit of the college others to the benefit of the Project. The addition of the reporting system to the Project’s ‘online application system’ has been an enormous help and was pulled-off pretty much without a hitch. Reports were submitted by participating organizations largely on-time! This was unheard of in the past and represents a huge leap forward in efficency. He continues to work on the application system. Currently he is revising it so that organizations can have and access more than one application– for multi-year projects. This revision is proceeding slowly however. In the role of VISTA Leader (and as the Leader of the other Leaders) Saul has performed well. Communication between the Leaders could be better (more frequent perhaps) but the improvement over previous years has been considerable largely due to his coordinating efforts which began well before the August 2005 PSO. Saul also plays a vital role as the person whom I bounce my ideas off of. As I often have bad ideas, the value of this cannot be underestimated.
CTC Outreach and Research
Organization:
Community Technology Organizing Consortium (CTOC) VISTA Name:
Michael Eagle
Program Start:
9/2004
Program End:
5/2005
Project Description:
Goal 1: Increase attendance at CTOC events by 30%.
Goal 2: Help to coordinate a minimum of six CTOC events.
Goal 3: Assist in the development of training curriculum for Train the Trainer events.
Goal 4: Assist in the evaluation of CTOC’s project activities.
Goal 5: CTOC will leverage national, regional and local resources, including AmeriCorp*VISTA members to ascertain funding and enable the growth of the project.
Project Outcome:
Mike has updated CTOC’s current database and is 70% complete with updating the information on CTOC members of organizations. Our VISTA has gained considerable knowledge of the organizations listed in our membership database and will be able to easily consolidate both databases into one main database. With the consolidation of both databases that total over six hundred (600) CTC’s, CTOC will be able to significantly improve our outreach efforts.
As part of the updating procedures we have contacted each organization to establish a contact person for each non-profit organization that provides technology services. Mike has completed updating 70% of the organizations’ contact information and has been able to find a designated person for each organization and updating their email addresses. His efforts to gain the correct contact information for these organizations has provided CTOC with a face and voice in the community and increased our visibility with CTCs in Los Angeles. With the increased visibility in the CTC community we have been able to increase the attendance of CTOC members and Non-Member to event workshops by at least 30%.
Mike has designed and developed promotional materials for at least three of CTOC’s events over the past three months.
Mike reviewed materials on evaluation methods and was instrumental in assisting CTOC’s staff in the development of a survey instrument that we are using to collect data on the CTCs in the Los Angeles region. Mike completed 24 CTC site visits in Los Angeles. Not only have these site visits given us a chance to collect information on the local CTC, it has given him an opportunity to get first hand knowledge of the types of programs that are offered by the various CTCs around Los Angeles. We have collected data on 61 CTCs in the Los Angeles region including San Bernardino County. Over the past six (6) months he has enter the 60% of the data that will be used of evaluation. Over the next six (6) months he will assist the staff with data evaluation.
Mike has provided us with information on funding resources that are available via the CTCnet listserv. He has participated and given input in our discussions on being a CTCnet chapter affiliate. He will be doing some research and grant writing for demonstration project that we will undertake.
CTC Outreach
Organization:
Community Computer Access Network (C-CAN) VISTA Name:
Jeff Streier
Program Start:
6/2001
Program End:
6/2003
Project Description:
C-CAN is a network of partner CTCs that was designed to provide resources and assistance to each other: Jeff’s job has been to organize these CTCs and provide start-up resources to seed the development of this collaborative. The success of Jeff’s work has resulted in increased activity and the development of formal collaborations between partners, and Jeff will report on this activity in the coming months.
Goal 1: Help local CTCs build capacity and increase usership through increased volunteer recruitment and better staff management of volunteers.
Goal 2: Increase community participation at CTC networking activities and at workshops.
Goal 3: : Ensure that the work of the C-CAN will continue after the AmeriCorps*VISTA members leave.
Project Outcome:
Goal 1: The project has accomplished its major goals for 2002 already, in the recruitment of over 170 local volunteers for CTCs in our network and setting up CompuMentor volunteer management training for CTC staff.
Goal 2: Increased attendance at Quarterly meetings and annual conference from last years’ numbers, signed up 20+ attendees for CompuMentor training.
Goal 3: Working with members from local CTCs to encourage committee work and leadership within the C-CAN.
C-CAN’s AmeriCorps/ VISTA members have finished work on development of our main project: The Volunteer Hub. This project required finalizing the database of local CTCs, contracting them to review their data, and training them in use of the online volunteer database and volunteer opportunities directory
Jeff Streier has concentrated on working with organizations to prepare them for using the Hub, Heidi Marshall has focused on recruitment of volunteers. Both Members staffed a booth at the MN State Fair in late August of 2002 for 10 days.
In addition to work on the volunteer management and recruitment projects, both Members helped to organize the second annual Twin Cities Community Technology Conference, which attracted over 75 participants. The Mayor of Minneapolis, R.T. Ryback, was on hand to deliver the keynote speech, and was so impressed by what the community is doing in terms of CTC activity that C-CAN was invited to a series of meetings at the Mayors’ Office.
These meetings have resulted in the development of a new Community Technology Task Force, featuring participation by local government, industry, and non-profit technology providers. The focus of this task force is to develop a City agenda for improving “Digital Opportunity” for residents of the City of Minneapolis. Another outcome of this partnership is that C-CAN and the City of Minneapolis have just submitted a proposal for a cluster of 25 new AmeriCorps members to serve in local CTC projects.
Development Specialist and Teaching Assistant
Organization:
Street Level Youth Media VISTA Name:
Kristen Wernicke
Program Start:
6/2002
Program End:
6/2003
Project Description:
Major responsibilities:
• Assisting in maintaining two media lab facilities, computer equipment, and software.
• Instructing youth in computer and media arts literacy.
• Assisting in the preliminary creation and maintenance of a searchable youth video database.
• Creating, updating and maintaining a festival and screening database.
• Developing relationships with the local community: youth, parents, neighbors, and other community and youth organizations.
• Meeting regularly with direct supervisor for assignments and review.
• Attending monthly all-staff meetings, and weekly Drop-In Program staff meetings.
• Assisting in maintaining records for on-going internal and external program assessment.
Kristin has been instrumental in stabilizing Street-Level’s staff support of summer and after school program activities, as well as conducting research on resource opportunities (both human and monetary) and possible venues for exhibition of youth work. Kristin has greatly assisted with program activities, including youth supervision, record keeping, community public relations, and volunteer recruitment and management. Her daily duties have consisted of, but have not been limited to, computer literacy and media arts instruction, resource database creation, and assisting with the development and support of programming for young women and teens.
Kristin has also served as a liaison for Street-Level in the local technology community and neighborhood, representing the organization and promoting its philosophy by attending local CTCNet Chicago events and forums, participating in a six-week Media Activism Institute sponsored by a local media arts organization, and staffing youth outreach events at local festivals and universities.
Project Outcome:
In August 2002, Kristin assisted the organization and youth in preparation for its Street-to-Street block party/media installation event by co-designing an installation with Street-Level’s Girls Group participants, and co-producing two video pieces for Street-Level’s outdoor public broadcast/performance of youth media work in September 2002.
During the fall of 2002, Kristin accompanied staff and youth representatives to the National Alliance for Media Arts and Culture conference in Seattle, WA, and worked with staff to develop a searchable database for our collection of youth videos, as well as create a system for the management and tracking of videos distributed to film festivals and screenings.
Impact Quote:
We are quite happy that we selected Kristin as our VISTA, because she is a well-rounded worker with multiple abilities and interests, and because of this, the organization has been able to maintain some semblance of a productive and meaningful media lab program.
Website and Database Development
Organization:
Lowell Telecommunications Corporation VISTA Name:
Kevin Loechner
Program Start:
11/2001
Program End:
11/2002
Project Description:
The goals Kevin has been working on are:
1.Creating a strong network infrastructure that is affordable, stable and easy to manage for non-tech people.
2.Developing a website presence and plan for 3 local nonprofits.
3.Contributing to the development of a Computer Training book to teach Microsoft Office programs to adult learners. Progress has been made toward completing the Excel training.
Project Outcome:
In terms of capacity building, we have had the greatest success with goal 1. Kevin has been leading the project to transfer our network from a Windows to a Linux operating system, while training two staff members to be able to take on the technical duties when he leaves.
With regard to goal 2, the Boys and Girls Club of Greater Lowell site is essentially complete, although has not been launched due to decisions still to be made on the part of the club. Unfortunately, we fell short on this goal, which was to complete three sites by the end of Kevin’s term. . We hope to have Kevin create a template that can be used by other nonprofits that would like a website.
As a result of Kevin’s work on goal 3, we have a rough draft of the first part of a project based Excel training near completion, and hope to have the beta version done by Kevin’s departure.
We had two other goals Kevin was going to work on that we did not pursue. One was helping with the development of an information-interviewing library; the other was working on developing a volunteer program for the Lowell Community Technology Consortium.
CTC Program Building
Organization:
Bruce Wall Ministries/Prep Community Computer Center VISTA Name:
Katie Peterson
Program Start:
4/2002
Program End:
4/2003
Project Description:
She has done a significant amount of development on our database and system for tracking participants and volunteers. She has also helped coordinate our curriculum development for our classes.
Project Outcome:
Katie has now organized and put curriculum materials for over 20 classes on the Web. These classes range from Introduction to Computer to Certification classes. Katie has also developed a system for us to track donations and give receipts to individuals. She has also been helping to set up accounting for TechMission, Inc. In all of this, Katie has done an outstanding job of documenting her processes for others to take over.
Katie has also finished development on our database and system for tracking participants and volunteers. She developed reports which allow us to monitor how participants are progressing through programs. In addition, she has developed over 20 pages of documentation for her position for someone else to take over. She has been training another staff person to take over many of her duties.
Katie has also helped coordinate our curriculum development for our classes. She has now organized and put curriculum materials for over 20 classes on the Web. These classes range from Introduction to Computer to Certification classes. Katie has also developed a system for us to track donations and give receipts to individuals. She has also been helping to set up accounting for TechMission, Inc. In all of this, Katie has done an outstanding job of documenting her processes for others to take over.
Program Development
Organization:
Bruce Wall Ministries/Prep Community Computer Center VISTA Name:
Matthew Frank
Program Start:
8/2002
Program End:
8/2003
Project Description:
Matt has been working on development both for the PREP Program of Bruce Wall Ministries and for TechMission, Inc.
Project Outcome:
Matt has developed a database of hundreds of potential funding sources for BWM and TechMission. He has narrowed down that database to a list of the top 20 prospects. We have used that database and research to provide information on grant opportunities to hundreds of other CTC’s through our E-mail list. Matthew has developed template grants for both PREP and TechMission that follow the Associated Grantmakers format and other standard formats. We have made available some of these templates to hundreds of other CTC’s through our E-mail list and on our website to assist them in developing resources and grantwriting.
Matthew has also been working with us in our partnerships with organizations to help provide resources to CTC’s. Matthew has provided feedback to other CTC’s on their grant applications for free computers to the Beaumont Foundation. In addition, he has assisted in the review process with the Beaumont Foundation and the Connections for Tomorrow consortium.
Matt has also been involved in many of the strategy discussions for sustainability for TechMission Inc. He has assisted us in applying for an AmeriCorps state application and an AmeriCorps national application. In addition, he has worked with us to secure resources from the Boston Foundation and is assisting us in developing other resources. He has also assisted us in applying for the Department of Education CTC grant, which we were awarded.
We plan to hire Matthew to work for TechMission after completion of his VISTA year.
CTC Support
Organization:
Lowell Telecommunications Corporation VISTA Name:
Charlotte Crockford
Program Start:
8/2002
Program End:
8/2003
Project Description:
• Provide supported open access to computer technology to a broad spectrum of the Lowell community (youth, seniors, immigrants)
• Provide training and tutoring to youth, senior citizens, and immigrant populations focussed on project-based, media-oriented uses of technology
• Provide technical support and help build the capacity of host sites to implement technology
• Assist in building, expanding and advocating for community uses of technology within the host site, particular and the larger Lowell community, in general
Project Outcome:
One of the most successful procedures that I implemented was to have all members and staff wear picture ID’s while in the facility. Since I had a little knowledge of digital photography it was easy for me to make the adjustments in our new database.
The second success story for me was to learn Facil database for non-profits and help teach the rest of the staff the functions of the database.This program is really great for the members because they now can reserve things in an orderly fashion and they get the feeling of being a greater part of the whole process. The community as a whole benefits from the installation of Facil.
My other accomplishments include mail server. I learned how to maintain the accounts on the e-mail server service and recently on our new list-server. I am now certified in Field Production. Who would have guessed.
I have managed to put up a web site, sparse as it may be, and to shoot and edit a thirty minute video for airing. The web site sort of took a back seat when I became involved in running a camera on a television show. My interest really peaked when staff members told me that I could do a show of my own. The patience and help of my co-workers enabled me to increase my knowledgeable in non linear editing. And with practice I am sure I’ll become proficient.