Forty-three Math, Engineering, Science, Achievement (MESA) students received fully equipped laptops March 7-9 as part of their commitment to close the technology divide throughout the community by serving as Digital Literacy Outreach Interns.
These student interns are in their first year of a three-year program through MESA. The project is dedicated to sharing information technology with underserved people in Sonoma County communities. The interns will teach people in the community who lack access or knowledge of the internet. In the next three years, interns will learn and pass on tech skills such as how to find employment, use social networks, explore opportunities for higher education and research health and finance information.
Darci Rosales, SRJC coordinator of MESA programs, is enthusiastic for the rookie year of the program, and she is still exploring the possibilities and potential for digital literacy interns. Rosales envisions this first year to be about helping faculty, family and friends and anticipates seeing a ripple effect as they find their footing. From there, interns will expand to help others on campus and in the community because, she said, science is taking what you know and sharing it to best serve the people.
Each intern will offer 12 hours of tutorial service, for a combined total of more than 500 hours spreading digital knowledge. Students gain not only practical experience, but also hone social skills that are indispensable in the workplace.
“There was a time when anyone with an engineering degree had doors thrown open for them and they could hold out their resume and ask, ‘Who wants me?'” Rosales said. But times have changed in such a way that prospective employees need to have technical skills and people skills. In addition, interns earn Microsoft Certification, which creates a highly marketable graduate. Accompanied by their laptops, interns will be able to share what they learn and increase digital literacy rates throughout the area.
California Connects, which funds the MESA project, specifically targets digital literacy outreach in populations with significant need and a widening digital divide. While the divide has narrowed significantly among some demographic groups, a gap remains for Latinos, especially those from Spanish-speaking and economically disadvantaged households, according to an August 2010 study by the Public Policy Institute of California.
SRJC is one of 32 community colleges in California participating in the California Connects project. This project is funded by a $10.9 million Broadband Technology Opportunities Program grant from the U.S. Department of Commerce’s National Telecommunications and Information Administration.
Free technology assistance by Digital Literacy interns will be available to students, faculty and staff between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. each Friday in April. Assistance will be available in a variety of computer and internet skills, including tax reporting, Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel, creating an e-mail account, managing files and e-mails and computer-based instruction to learn English and Spanish and to prepare for the California High School Exit Exam.
For more information about MESA or the Digital Literacy Internship, visit MESA offices on the 3rd Floor of Bertolini Student Center, call (707) 524-1859 or check out www.santarosa.edu/mesa/.
