SI 597/697 Community Information: Project Corps
Fall 1999
Revised 9/9/99 (PR).
Meets Thursdays 5-6:30PM in 311 West Hall
Class
home page
Class Syllabus
Projects Page
Some potential projects you can get involved with this fall:
How to Sign Up for a Project
All project work assignments result from a process of negotiation between
you and a project manager, who may be a professor or a client from an outside
organization.You contact the project manager, provide information about
your own background and interests, and find out as much as you can about
the project. If both you and the project manager agree that there is a
good match, then you will draft a project agreement stating the project
objectives, planned timeline, and responsibilities of the various parties
involved. There will often be several students who are interested in a
project, and they will form a team to work on it. There should be one project
agreement per team, not one per student.
It is perfectly acceptable to negotiate simultaneously with several
project managers. You and the project manager should be explicit about
when you are committing to work with each other. Once that has happened,
you should not back out simply because you found a more exciting project
opportunity.
If the project manager is not an SI professor, I will review the agreement
and make suggestions for modifications.
Ideally, you should complete your negotiations and bring a draft of
the project agreement to class next Thursday (9/16). Please contact me
or come to office hours if you are having trouble arranging a suitable
project.
Your project agreement will normally be about 2 pages long and should
contain the following sections:
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Project summary
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Current status
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Objectives (deliverables)
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Planned ending date
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Contact information for all relevant parties (e.g., students on the team;
project liaison at client; me)
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Summary of responsibilities of each party. You can commit me to meeting
with your team twice per semester and additional consultation as needed.
Here are some examples of things you might want your project liaison to
commit to:
-
providing an orientation and tour of the partner organization
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spending time being interviewed as part of your needs assessment
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providing timely feedback on prototypes
-
paying certain costs that you can anticipate (e.g., additional phone line,
if needed)
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maintaining what you build after you complete the project
-
sending an evaluation report to me at the end of the project
Project Listings
CHICO:
Cultural Heritage Initiatives
Over the past several years, students have completed a number of interesting
projects capturing cultural heritage materials and making them accessible
in electronic formats. Check out the CHICO
web site for some examples.
Planning is underway for a new series of projects with local arts organizations.
UM CHICO students would develop web-based and print background materials
to assist youth audiences in preparing for performances given by local
community arts organizations. The basic idea is to use the virtual medium
of the web to enhance appreciation for the real world performance and to
stimulate further study on this and related topics at the library, at museums,
on the web, etc.
There may also be an opportunity in the longer term, but not this semester,
to plan and prototype interactive participatory features for the Hallelujah
Dance Project of the Liz Lerman Dance Exchange.
Contact Dean Olivia Frost if you're
interested.
The Community Connector
web site is a portal for information about community networking, community
technology centers, and other related activities. It includes an extensive
Reading Room with links to articles, books, and Web sites. It also includes
profiles and news stories. Students are needed to manage the existing information
collections (find new materials, cull outdated materials), create new content
(e.g., profiles of interesting people projects around the country), and
develop new interactive features on the site. Contact Profs. Joan
Durrance or Paul Resnick if
you're interested.
HeadStart Data Tracking
In Detroit, there are six agencies that operate approximately 120 HeadStart
sites. Professor Mike Spencer from the School of Social Work is working
with two of the agencies to develop a new database system to track service
delivery. This fall, the major effort will be needs assessment and exploration
of different design alternatives. Some paid positions may be available.
Contact Prof. Spencer if you're
interested.
Who's That?
Photo Directories and email Lists
As our lives become ever more privatized, neighbors are becoming strangers.
The mission of the ‘Who’s That?’ project
is to encourage individuals to get to know the people around them, in order
to provide mutual support and engage in collective action. In the winter
of 1999, several of us created photo directories and email lists for the
blocks we live on. See for more details.
This year, I'm planning to do a careful empirical evaluation of the
impacts of these tools on social networks (who people know), activities
(voting, having people over for dinner, attending club meetings), and attitudes
("do you like living here?"). I'll be recruiting block captains to create
directories for their blocks, and conducting surveys before and after they
do their work. I need a student to help conduct the surveys and provide
assistance to the block captains in using a digital camera and the database
software that we've already created.
Contact Prof. Resnick if you're
interested.
FreshOnline: On-line Grocery Ordering
So far, entrepeneurs have focused their on-line grocery service efforts
on the well-to-do (e.g., www.netgrocer.com). This service may actually
work well in low-income, inner-city neighborhoods because:
-
population density can reduce delivery cost
-
residents do not have convenient access to large supermarkets
So far, a prototype database application has been built in FileMaker. In
preparation for a pilot test at a public housing site in Detroit, some
local residents have been trained as grocery staff. The full-scale pilot
test is awaiting funding; several grant proposals are pending. Students
can get involved in this project in one of three ways:
-
maintain and upgrade the database application
-
install a LAN at the pilot test site
-
continue training the staff and help train residents to use the grocery
ordering system when the pilot begins.
Contact Professor Warren Whatley
if you are interested.
Knowledge Management System for Global Telecenter
Operators, Researchers, and Funders
In many developing countries, and some parts of the developed world, access
to even basic telecommunications is often lacking, or primarily limited
to urban areas. Although currently defined imprecisely, the multi-purpose,
community information center (MPCIC) (or telecenter) is seen
by many international development agencies and private sector enterprises
as a vehicle to both provide access to the needed information infrastructure
and to deliver the services of the Information Age.
One of the key problems with the global development of MPCICs is the
tremendous isolation faced by many of these projects. A knowledge management
system is required that can promote the development of a global virtual
community of interest for community information centers. This project
will contribute to this process by building a global, web-based, three-tired
knowledge management portal for community information center activity.
The first tier is a network of MPCIC operators (and of local networks).
The second tier is for a network of researchers, interested in evaluating
the impact of telecenters and MPCICs. Finally, the third tier is
for donor agencies and private sector actors interested in promoting and
investing in MPCICS.
Contact Professor Derrick Cogburn if
you are interested. See his project
writeup for more details.
Arbor Hospice Web Site
Hospice is a comprehensive set of services designed to address the physical,
emotional and spiritual needs of individuals and
their families who face a life-threatening illness. Everyone I know
who has experienced hospice care for a loved one at the end of life has
come away raving about it.
Arbor Hospice offers both in-patient and outpatient services. It previously
had a Web site, but it offered only one-way communication (brochureware)
and has not been kept up to date. In this project, you would work with
staff members at Arbor Hospice to identify needs and opportunities for
a more interactive Web site, research options for who would be a good Web
hosting service for them, and then design and implement a site that would
be maintainable by Arbor Hospice volunteers in the future.
For more information, see the flyers and handouts in class, then contact
Christia
West (ext. 112) and Bev Spicknall
(ext. 122) at Arbor Hospice, 662-5999.
Inventory of Venture Philanthropy and
e-Philanthropy Efforts
Two new trends are taking shape in the world of philanthropy. One is venture
philanthropy, analogous to venture capital. Venture philanthropy is an
effort to identify and nurture new ventures that are aimed at social
goals and which have strong opportunities for growth. The other trend is
e-Philanthropy, which includes various efforts to create electronically
mediated
opportunities for people to give money, volunteer their time,
and even directly perform services for charitable organizations.
Tom Reis of the Kellogg Foundation has been tracking and influencing
these trends. He would like a student to maintain an annotated inventory
of the efforts underways in these areas.
This opportunity is available because of the Alliance
for Community Technology, a cooperative venture between the School
of Information and the Kellogg Foundation. Contact Professor Dan
Atkins and Tom Reis if you are interested.
Information Technology in Southern Africa
The Kellogg Foundation has extensive projects in Southern Africa and is
especially interested in the role that information technologies can play
there. There is not yet a well-defined project for a student in this area,
but if you are especially interested in exploring this, you may be able
to define a project serving as research assistant to a Kellogg program
officers.
This opportunity is available because of the Alliance
for Community Technology, a cooperative venture between the School
of Information and the Kellogg Foundation. Contact Professor Dan
Atkins if you are interested.
Community Information Organizer Training
This fall and winter, we will be training low-income teens as "Community
Information Organizers". We are working at two sites, the community center
at the North Maple Estates public housing in Ann Arbor, and the Flint Public
Library. In the fall, the teenagers will learn about information technologies
and be introduced to local civic, political, and business leaders. Their
job for the fall is to to define projects that the will carry out in the
winter. The projects will involve organizing and publishing information
for the benefit of some community that they are part of.
We have already hired ten master's students as "coaches", but other
students may also want to get involved. Contact Kelly
Garrett, the PhD student who is managing the project, if you are interested.
Self-defined Projects
It is legitimate to define your own project. In general, the project must
meet these criteria:
-
there should be a well-defined outcome that you are trying for in the allotted
time
-
it should be doable given your skills and other available resources
-
it should fit broadly within the scope of the community information corps,
meaning it should:
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involve organizing information or information flows AND
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either have some collective purpose or create broad opportunities for public
participation in the process, or both.
-
there should be an identifiable project liaison at a partner organization
who has a vested interest in what you produce and a willingness to supervise
the project. The partner liaison need not be an information expert; you'll
provide that.
-
it should be sustainable by someone at the partner organization once you
complete your work
Some exceptions to the last two requirements may be made for projects where
you explore entrepeneurial options and you are considering staying with
the project indefinitely if you succeed in starting it.
Directed Field Experiences
Please explore the Directed
Field Experience listings. In the fall 1999 listings, I found several
that might be appropriate, including the UM Center for Community Service
and Learning, Focus: HOPE, Michigan Neighborhood Partnership, Non-profit
Enterprise at Work (NEW), and the UM School of Education. The same criteria
apply for DFEs as for self-defined projects, although typically 1, 2, 4,
and 5 should be met automatically for all DFE projects.