Project Title:
Hope Digital Literacy Project
Funding Program:
Connecting Minority Communities Program
Project Purpose/Type:
Eastern University's Hope Digital Literacy project will leverage educational, institutional, and relational assets in the area and deepen neighborhood level trust to forge a digital opportunity community in the heart of North Philadelphia by resourcing, educating, equipping, and empowering Latinos and other low-income individuals to utilize digital tools to accomplish practical workforce, education and health-related goals.
City/Town/Service Area:
State(s):
-
$2,011,405.13Funding Amount$2,011,405.13Total Project Cost0.00Non-Federal Cost Share
The activities identified for this pilot project will ensure that the community is: 1) aware of the benefits of internet access for accomplishing their academic, career, and other goals; 2) effectively connected to internet resources, trained with digital skills, and provided with meaningful opportunities for engagement; and 3) actively engaged in utilizing the internet to accomplish their education, workforce, and health goals. The Project Director and Project Evaluator will work to design a survey tool based on community outreach and consortium member feedback which will then be used to refine the digital literacy project in year 2. The next activity will include outreach to the community by publishing ads in the local Spanish newspaper delivered door to door for the Hope Digital Literacy Project and feature a regular news series on broadband access. The third activity will embed the project into the network of services that exist within the Hunting Park neighborhood in order to provide multiple opportunities to apply digital literacy skills. Fourth, a digital literacy hub will be developed at Esperanza College of Eastern University (ECEU) to act as a community drop-in site where participants in the project may access regular one-on-one support in person or via a trusted call-in number for technical assistance. Laptops and mobile hotspots will be distributed with some participants receiving additional one-on-one training. Finally, ECEU's capacity for online learning will be enhanced. Curriculum design specialists will be hired to package courses for areas with high growth potential, workforce tie-ins and an online learning IT specialist will be hired to build IT workforce capacity, provide training to faculty and staff, and provide tech support.
The project seeks to 1) increase the number of low-income people who are connected to and actively utilizing the internet to pursue their education, workforce and health related goals; and 2) build the IT, broadband, data and program infrastructure of Esperanza College of Eastern University (ECEU) and extend those benefits throughout the community. As a result of project implementation, broadband users will be connected or retained; community residents will be informed about the benefits of digital literacy, resulting in an increase in the percentage of residents using the internet; and students will be prepared for careers via online learning programs.
This project would benefit the college, students, and the neighboring Philadelphia communities by improving the campus-community relationship, increasing the college’s capacity to deliver quality instruction, providing additional accelerated programs for students and community members to learn, and increasing entrepreneurial pathways in the community.
Nueva Esperanza, Inc (Esperanza) will be focused on community organizing and outreach to inform design of the survey tool. Esperanza will gather input for the design and rollout the survey via call center and newspaper
The applicant does fund a consortia. The applicant’s activities do occur in the surrounding anchor communities. Details of community involvement are described below.