This week at the Aspen Institute, there is a robust discussion exploring recommendations of the Knight Commission on Information Needs of Communities. The 2010 FOCAS, News Cities: The Next Generation of Healthy Informed Communities forum, will take place through August 18 and aims to arrive at specific action steps to help communities "improve their information health." The livestream is broadcasting now and the twitter stream, #FOCAS10, has been a great reflection of the discussion. Be sure to follow this important debate and join in the conversation.

Complete agenda:

Monday, August 16, 2010 (all times Mountain Standard Time) 8:30 a.m. ' 8:45 a.m.'''''''''' Opening of Forum ' Introductory Remarks 8:45 a.m. ' 10:15 a.m.'''''''' Plenary Roundtable I:' Local Journalism 2010 10:45 a.m. ' 12:15 p.m.'''''' Plenary Roundtable II:' Public Media Reform

Tuesday, August 17, 2010 8:45 a.m. ' 9:45 a.m.'' ''' ' ' Plenary Roundtable III:' Universal Broadband Access 9:45 a.m. ' 10:45 a.m.'''''''' Plenary Roundtable IV:' The New Literacies 11:15 a.m. ' 12:15 p.m.'''''' Plenary Roundtable V:' Public Engagement

Wednesday, August 18, 2010 8:45 a.m. ' 10:15 a.m.'' ''' ' Plenary Roundtable VI.' Recommendations from the Working Groups 10:30 a.m. ' 12:00 p.m.'' ' ' Plenary Roundtable VII.' Moving Forward: Synthesis of Action Steps

View the opening remarks of Knight Foundaiton CEO, Alberto Ibarügen below.

This entry was written by James E. Osteen, Jr. executive director of the Miami-Dade Broadband Coalition.

The Miami-Dade Broadband Coalition officially opened its doors with a ribbon cutting ceremony on Aug. 11.

The launch was the result of more than three years of planning with stakeholders in education, healthcare, government, non-profits and the private sector. The task has been challenging but immensely rewarding.

Our goal is to increase the "technology quota" of our community, in order'to attract new industries and provide economic and educational opportunities for Miami-Dade County residents.' By banding together, the coalition's anchor members have already begun to increase the availability of 'high-speed Internet access across our community while at the same time lowering its cost.

A portion of the realized savings will be reinvested in the community through the coalition's sponsorship of training and Internet connectivity for our underserved neighborhoods. 'The coalition is funded by a grant from Knight Foundation, as part of its efforts to ensure communities have access to information through universal broadband.

While our goal is ambitious, our success will provide a more resilient, diverse and self-sustaining local economy. 'We invite you to watch our progress through our website, and hope that you will join us in 'Connecting our community for a brighter future!!'

- 'James E. Osteen, Jr.

 

 

When Allissa Richardson's students began to plan a website for their community news stories, they insisted on one element: it needed to be easily viewable on cellphones. That way, if they were in the grocery store and ran into someone they had interviewed, they could show them the story.

The Morgan State University students will be covering a Baltimore community that is largely urban and African-American, a demographic with a higher rate of accessing the Internet via smart phones.

The project is one of two that aim to use mobile-friendly sites and applications to reach minority communities with $17,000 in New Voices grants. Administered by J-Lab and funded by Knight Foundation, the program seeds innovative community news ventures.

The second project, out of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, involves covering refugee communities in and around the city, which has been designated by the federal government and the Catholic and Lutheran churches as a receiving community for refugees from Sudan, Iraq and the countries of the former Soviet Union.

'Another professor and I were experimenting in a web journalism class with restricting our students to covering immigrant communities to get them out there reporting,' Professor Tim Anderson explained. 'Our students found some really rich stories, what people had gone through to get here and make new lives.'

That formed the impetus for a new project to get students not just finding stories in those communities, but to get them working to figure out the information those communities need, involving members of the communities in the formation of a partner relationship.

Many members of the refugee communities have access to the Internet, and are pretty comfortable with it, through their refugee centers and libraries, Anderson said. He plans to explore mobile applications to see if that will help reach deeper into the community, while using some of the grant money for mobile devices to make it easier for his students to report in the field.

Richardson's students, meanwhile, will also use mobile devices in reporting, heading into the community with iPhones and iPads. They'll report stories, shoot video, edit it on their mobile devices and send it to be posted ' all from the field.

'A lot of my students are scared to go into these communities with a big, clunky video camera,' Richardson explained. 'I thought, 'what can I give them that doesn't make them feel like such an outsider?' And I'd already seen them taking notes in my classes with their thumbs. They're completely comfortable using their cell phones.'

Their stories will run on the website of the 'local African-American newspaper and in their own student newspaper.