National Digital Education Extension Team: Bridging the Digital Divide & ECOP Broadband Program Action Team Fellow: Rachel Wellborn, Mississippi State University Roadmap Fellow Report: The NDEET team is continuing to support the pilot states that completed the Advancing Digital Access workshop in May 2022 through monthly cohort calls. Attendance has stayed high with most teams represented each month. Teams are now beginning to organize their own trainings and events within their respective states. Efforts vary by state depending on the maturity of the team’s efforts. Some states are beginning with professional development training for county and state Extension staff to help them orient to the potential of broadband efforts in their state. Other states are working to identify and train agents to become digital literacy educators. A few states are already working within communities that have expressed interest in developing broadband plans. The teams are continually providing feedback to the pilot materials on what could make them even better. The NDEET research team has identified a draft set of metrics and is working to refine the list for use in states so that the LGU system can begin adopting common measures. Additionally, a series of issue briefs is being finalized that will provide quick synopsis of key issues related to this work. These will be available late fall 2022.
Advancing Digital Access: Building Extension Capacity to Serve: http://srdc.msstate.edu/ecommerce/advancing-digital-access.html Connect Extension site: https://connect.extension.org/g/broadband-access-and-digital-skills
Experience(s) working with your Catalysts and Key Informants: The catalyst has met with us on many of the monthly team calls, offering advice to the team. A conversation with Extension Foundation staff has started around helping to find future funding to launch new state teams and to design a new component, a “master gardener” type structure for digital literacy education volunteers.
Does your project work with diverse, under-served, or underrepresented audiences? Yes
Please explain briefly how your project works with these audiences.
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