In my real world job, I work in advertising. I’m active in my professional organization, the local chapter of the AAF [1]. I’ve been in since day one of the planning of an annual event called summitup [2]– where we bring social media gurus to talk in Dayton and try to school the masses on what social media can do.
This year- it’s going to be huge. so huge, that we should have a bunch of leftover money. What to do? Yes, we could split it up among the 7 or 8 participating organizations- or we could try to make a difference with a bit of it.
We’re wondering if anyone knows anyone doing the following:
Access to the Internet is becoming a crucial part of being part of out knowledge based economy. However, the costs of a computer and internet access can cause a widening of the digital divide. The easy solution is mobile- smart phones with data access. The problem is almost all smart phones, also come with a much larger bill if they have data access. Yes, free wi-fi could solve some of these problems- but, many base level phones don’t utilize wifi as a possibility.
We’re wondering if there are organizations, funds, programs- to provide inexpensive data plans and devices for low income people. We know the library has become the internet point of use for many- however, that still requires some computer literacy- whereas phones- just work.
If you know of options that are out there- or programs, please help our organizations with the connection. If not, we may work on setting up some pilot programs.
Any info on wifi enabled phones- without additional data costs- would be appreciated as well.
Thanks in advance.
Please tweet this call for help.
The Salvation Army’s new Kroc Center has some potential…
They have the equipment & the outreach. They just need to beef up their programs…
http://www.use.salvationarmy.org/use/www_use_daytonkroc.nsf/vw-text-dynamic-arrays/BD1F63AC46BAAE7B85257745005501CE?openDocument