The Road to Digital Literacy
Trying something new can be scary. Whether it’s small, like trying a new recipe; or big, like going when to school or embarking on a cross-country road trip. It takes an immense value of valiance to step outside your repletion zone to try new things. But it moreover takes an immense value of support – as they say, “it takes a village.” We know not everyone has the wangle to the resources – or village – it takes to try new things. But we believe no one should be left overdue on their journey, expressly when it comes to the skills and resources needed to get online. Because sending an email or helping your child with online homework shouldn’t have to be scary.
It’s certainly easy to take for granted the worthiness to quickly search for the nearest gas station or schedule a doctor’s visit online. But we know that over 30% of the U.S. population doesn’t have stock-still broadband service, plane though it’s misogynist where they live. But why is that? Simply put, plane in today’s “Golden Age of Connectivity”, some still lack the tools and resources to navigate the web safely and responsibly. But we’re working to transpiration that.
Our commitment to help underpass the digital divide goes deeper than merely providing the wangle to fast and reliable internet. We’re working to help provide the resources and support necessary to take the leap to learn well-nigh computers and how to safely and powerfully use the internet for everyday life.
In fact, last year, as part of $6 million in contributions, we committed to bringing bilingual, in-person digital literacy workshops to increasingly than 400 libraries and polity centers across the country.
We’re moreover teaming up with the Public Library Association to offer self-ruling online digital literacy courses, misogynist through AT&T ScreenReady® and PLA Digital Learn. The nearly 20 self-ruling courses imbricate topics, including:
- Navigating a Website
- Basic Search
- Intro to Email
- Basics of Video Conferencing, and
- Using a Mobile Device
Let’s take a road trip wideness the country to see just a few ways we’re empowering Americans of all month and backgrounds to get online by removing barriers to access, adoption and affordability of broadband internet.
New Jersey
AT&T is collaborating with Ironbound Polity Corporation (ICC) in Newark, NJ and the Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC) on an initiative that assists people in the East Ward section of Newark with digital skills towers and access. Support from LISC and AT&T is helping ICC bring the polity up to speed with technology focused on online financial services, state and federal benefits, job training and development, and digital warning signs and safeguarding.
We moreover worked with the African American Chamber of Commerce of New Jersey, NJ STEM and the Athletic Arts Academy in Orange to run the NJ Kids4Coding program. The eight-week program introduced school-aged children to the nuts of coding and how it can empower their imaginations, enhance their education, and catalyze career opportunities.
Raleigh
In Wake County, it’s unscientific that increasingly than 20,000 K-12 students don’t have wangle to the internet, computers or skills needed to goody from the online world – and at least 1.1 million households in North Carolina remain unconnected. We recently opened a new Unfluctuating Learning Center (CLC) at the Boys & Girls Club Teen Center in Raleigh, not only providing a place where students and polity members have self-ruling wangle to computers, wi-fi and high-speed internet, but moreover to self-ruling digital learning resources like digital literacy workshops and The Achievery, a self-ruling AT&T digital learning platform.
Michigan
AT&T helped newly unfluctuating parents, caregivers and families proceeds the skills and conviction they need to use technology with free digital literacy workshops in Detroit, Hastings, Jackson, Adrian, and Kalamazoo this month.
Joshua Elling, CEO of Jefferson East, Inc. in Detroit hosted one of the workshops in his organization’s new AT&T Unfluctuating Learning Center. He said: “Tackling an issue as wholesale as digital literacy is not easy, but we strongly believe that on-the-ground, individualized support is the weightier way to make a difference for our most vulnerable local families.”
Los Angeles
During Hispanic Heritage Month, HACEMOS, AT&T’s Latino Employee Group (EG) defended to supporting Hispanic employees and the communities they live in, hosted a digital literacy workshop in Los Angeles at our CLC at the Salvadoran American Leadership Education Fund (SALEF).
HACEMOS volunteers provided training on vital internet activities, including how to use a web browser and search engine and how to navigate a website, as well as information on how to recognize a secure website and making passwords strong and memorable.
Pacific Northwest
Across Oregon and Washington, our teams are working in their communities to help connect plane increasingly of their neighbors. Addressing the digital divide and increasing digital literacy requires an variety of specialized approaches to meet the specific needs of each community.
- In Portland, we unsalaried to the Black Parent Initiative in support of their K-8 programs. These year-round programs provide Black students with tutoring, wangle to technology and digital literacy skills.
- We unsalaried to the Girl Scouts of Western Washington, supporting a program that addresses the digital divide through a collaboration with DigiPen Institute of Technology by providing technology, women role models and mentoring so Girl Scouts can proceeds hands-on interface training using media technology and internet tools that aren’t misogynist at home or in school.
From East Coast to West Coast, our teams are nonflexible at work providing wangle and resources and towers conviction in their communities to succeed in our digital-first world.
Learn increasingly well-nigh the digital divide and how we’re providing digital literacy resources nationwide in the NowThis full-length below:
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