Case Studies

In the South End of Boston, Massachusetts, Emilio Flores believes strongly in the power of community. Last year, Castle Square Tenants Organization (CSTO) embarked on a wireless internet project to provide FREE high speed internet access throughout their 500-unit affordable housing community, using MIT’s open source Roofnet mesh networking software.

Emilio’s participation as a VISTA volunteer became essential when the entire budget granted to the project—research, equipment, and training—equaled about the one-year salary of a qualified tech support employee. A former research assistant on a community technology initiative, Emilio wanted an opportunity to get out from behind a desk. His first weeks of service not only included physically setting up the wireless routers and antennae on the roofs of the apartment buildings, but building a support network of youth resident staff and work study students from the nearby Benjamin Franklin Institute of Technology.

Emilio developed a technology support system where youth and volunteers refurbish donated computers for residents and visit households. Now the CSTO wireless network supports significantly more households than they expected in their first year. Emilio and the CSTO have even expanded their community wireless efforts beyond the walls of Castle Square and into the greater South End community. “If CSTO hadn’t been able to get a CTC VISTA, this project wouldn’t exist in the way it does today. I have a office to sit in now, but I had to build it.”

For a small nonprofit, creating positive impact is difficult enough; building the technology infrastructure to support that work can be even harder. The Community Software Lab (CSL), housed at the University of Massachusetts, Lowell, supports nonprofit organizations by providing access to technology resources, software and server-space. In addition to web services, such as web hosting, domain registration, email lists, anti-virus and spam filtering, the CSL offers low-cost technology consulting and custom software, such as membership and attendance trackers (MembershipTrack) and a searchable, online directory of nonprofit organizations throughout the nation (The Hub). By focusing on under-served nonprofits, the CSL works to close the “digital divide” that prevents low-income communities from utilizing new technology and media tools.

CTC VISTAs have been instrumental in improving the CSL’s ability to provide valuable training and experience in system administration and software development to organizations throughout the Merrimack Valley. The three CTC VISTA volunteers who currently serve at the CSL have helped the organization to grow in ways never thought possible. CTC VISTAs help the CSL reach its goals through various software projects using PHP, HTML, and SCUL, tutoring nonprofit leaders in web design, setting up their first DNS server, and even fund raising for and promoting the CSL’s unique products. They make and connect resources to expand horizons, for both CSL and the community it serves.

In the heart of San Francisco, California, Homeless Prenatal Program (HPP) seizes the motivating opportunity created by pregnancy and parenthood to teach local families how to help themselves, giving them the self-sufficiency and skills they need to break the cycle of homelessness and poverty. Through HPP, families can receive counseling, education, housing assistance, childcare, and advocacy. At HPP’s Technology Center, family members can learn the practical uses of technology, like word processing, and how to use the Internet to research health questions and find jobs and housing.

Because the HPP Technology Center is operated exclusively by volunteers, CTC VISTAs use their technical skills to support both the organization’s infrastructure and day-to-day programs using new media and technology tools. CTC VISTAs have not only built a technology infrastructure to facilitate access to resources, they continue to provide tech support for the entire program. Interacting with women who may never have touched a com- puter before, CTC VISTAs witness the excitement that grows when the mothers make something that is totally their own. By developing curricula and facilitating computer literacy workshops, CTC VISTAs help build the confidence of the partici- pants, making each woman a role model for her family and community.

Jessica knows every person has a voice and a story to tell, but every story doesn’t necessarily make it into the mainstream. At the Center for Digital Storytelling (CDS) in Berkeley, California, young and old are given the tools of digital media to craft, record and share their stories of individuals and communities.

Working at CDS is the first step for Jess towards reaching her longer term goals of publicizing alternative media. Utilizing her journalism education is very important to her, and serving at a rapidly growing non-profit is teaching her how to do that. “I’m gaining skills I never could have learned in the classroom, like time management, interpersonal dynamics, and project coordination.”

Jessica strives to streamline the often intimidating video production process so that anyone from foster youth to survivors of violence to NASA research scientists, techno-savvy or techno-phobic, can easily create a video that will not only inspire audiences, but also cultivate understanding. Working side-by side with community members and storytellers, Jess is creating multiple tutorials on audio recording, photo manipulation, and video editing to make the story production process more easily facilitated and understood. She is also coordinating the construction of a web portal for community digital storytellers across the nation to connect online with one another to share methods and experiences in recording these living memories.