2nd Annual Symposium a Great Success

Mar 16, 2011

Austin Connects held our second annual Community Technology Symposium on March 1st at AMD’s Lonestar Campus.  It was attended by over 100 participants from a variety of fields including nonprofit, government, education, human services and technology.

Keynote speaker Kami Griffiths (pictured above) took the audience through some of the amazing collaborative work she is doing in the bay area with the Community Technology Network.  Her presentation slides and other materials may be found on the 2011 Symposium Page.

Alexander Cavalli, PhD closed the symposium with his insights into the future of technology and digital inclusion.

Austin Connects Wants YOU

Dec 15, 2010

Austin Connects wants YOU to give us your opinion! We are in the planning stages for the second annual Community Technology Symposium and we’d like to know your thoughts on what we should include on the agenda. What do you want to learn? Do you have something you can teach that would be of interest to the group?

Take the survey today!

The survey is now closed. Thank you to everyone who participated!

Austin Connects Workshop: Focus on Seniors

Oct 08, 2010

A big thank you to Austin Groups for the Elderly for hosting the Austin Connects Workshop: Focus on Seniors on November 4, 2010. The workshop was very well attended! On the agenda was SeniorNet Director Roberta Przybylski discussing how to motivate seniors to learn, a tour of the SeniorNet facilities, a fun networking activity and finally a session on digital storytelling from film expert Weston Norton.

Presentations (pdf):

Community Technology Directory/Map Focus Groups

Jul 29, 2010

Austin Connects invited Austin area professionals with an interest in Community Technology to participate in two focus groups on August 16th, 2010. The morning session focused on community technology providers while the afternoon group was for those working in human/social services.

Austin Connects has received a grant to build a web-based community technology service directory with mapping capability.  This powerful tool has the potential to be a great resource for community technology and human services providers. The feedback received will shape the design and implementation of the online service directory and the future of Austin Connects.

Click here to download a pdf of the presentation.

If you would like to stay informed of progress on the directory/mapping project please join our yahoo group by sending a blank email to austinconnects-subscribe@yahoogroups.com.

Resource Map In Planning Stages

Jul 29, 2010

Austin Connects recently received a grant from the One Star Foundation to build a fully integrated, searchable, dynamic community technology services map and database on our website.

In 2010 Austin Connects received a grant from the One Star Foundation to build a fully integrated, searchable, dynamic community technology services map and database on our website.

The resource map is currently being built. The vision is to create a searchable database that will display results in list format and on a dynamically generated map tool such as google maps. The database will be searchable by factors important to community technology clients such as location, accessibility options, cost, language, and target audience.

Youth Technology Engagement Workshop

Apr 15, 2010

Thanks to the participants of the Community Technology Symposium, Austin Connects has identified areas of interest to community technology professionals. On Tuesday, May 4th we addressed the first: Youth Engagement.  Austin Connects held an exciting morning workshop at American YouthWorks which allowed participants to learn more about what other organizations in Austin are doing to get young people excited and involved with technology.  Topics included creative professions, computer refurbishment, technology and learning plus networking activities.

Founder and Executive Director of the Media Diversity Council, Carl Settles Jr, spoke about how he leverages social media and technology through Media Xperiments to engage hard to reach youth. To view a video of his presentation click here.

computercorps-150x150.jpgMatt Stawicki of American YouthWorks took the group on a tour of their computer refurbishment lab and introduced us to students in the program. He explained the details of the program, showed a short video created by students and walked us through a typical day.

Also included was a yummy breakfast from Sweetish Hill and a networking game called “Human Bingo” in which participants found out fun and interesting things about each other while filling out a score card to win prizes. Many thanks to Bat City Awards and Apparel for providing some of our prizes!