Eastern University

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.