Citywide information-sharing

JUST GETTING STARTED

Documenters: please use these categories to organize your documentation. Please see the drafted Parent connector network page for explanation of each category. See Vision for OneVille documentation for more discussion of what we hope the final wiki will look like and accomplish!

Summary

(Note to documenters: In this summary, quickly tell the reader a, b, and c:

a. Communication we set forth to improve. (What aspect of communication did we set forth to improve, so that more people in Somerville could collaborate in young people's success?)

b. Main communication improvement(s). (What is the main communication improvement we made? What new support for young people may have resulted?)

c. Main communication realization. (What's your main realization about needed improvements to the communication infrastructure of public education? Who needs to communicate what information to whom, through which media, in order to support youth in a diverse community? Which barriers are in the way of such communication, and how might these barriers be overcome?)

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In July 2010, we had a meeting of "mediamakers" from Somerville and brainstormed some citywide problems of communication. After a group brainstorm, energy was for a community calendaring project of some kind, for event-sharing.

From there, we attempted to assist community calendaring by supporting the district's communications director, since they were furthest along as a possible "hub" for community calendaring (they also use Twitter actively!). In the end, she spiffed up her the district's calendar on her own!

We supported a multilingual video made by Consuelo Perez at Somerville Community Access Television, on services for young children available at several community organizations.

We still feel that some sort of curated calendaring project or other form of citywide info-sharing on opportunities related to youth and families would be much more exciting and, we think, important for young people in the city. We're exploring this for a Phase 2, with the Center for Future Civic Media at MIT. We might also support an Open Cities initiative in Somerville, where young bloggers participate in circulating events.

So, we now know a lot of people in the community who are interested in pieces of citywide info-sharing. We just haven't engaged them in a robust project to date because in the months since this meeting, our capacity got sucked up into our 5 other Working Groups. So, it's a great time to come back to that "layer" of our work in Somerville, esp. because our PI will also be exploring that layer (citywide info sharing) in San Diego.

We also believe that tools/strategies for citywide info-sharing can be utilized for schoolwide info-sharing as well, and so we're interested in exploring those two "layers" simultaneously in Phase 2 (while continuing our work on info-sharing around individual youth).

Communication we set forth to improve

Say more. What aspect of communication did we want to improve, so that more people in Somerville could collaborate in young people's success?

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Process

How we realized and redirected things, over time.

Basic History

The groundwork needed to support the current work.

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Communication ahas, implementation ahas, and turning points!

Over the course of the project, we had the following communication and implementation ahas, and project turning points. To read the full accounting, see main article: Texting/ahas

Findings/Endpoints

Please describe final outcomes and share examples of final products, with discussion!

Concrete communication improvements

What is the main communication improvement we made? What new support for young people may have resulted?

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Main communication realizations and implementation realizations

What is your main realization about needed improvements to the communication infrastructure of public education? (Who needs to communicate what information to whom, through which media, in order to support youth in a diverse community? Which barriers are in the way of such communication, and how might these barriers be overcome?)

What is your main realization about implementing these innovations in education?

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Technological how-tos

Describe "how to" use every tool you used, so that others could do the same. Describe "how to" make every tool you made!

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Things we’d expand/do differently

If you wanted to replicate any of this, what would you need to think about? Contact us to learn/talk more!

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