Building an e-engagement manifesto
Participants coming to the first meeting of yesterday's E-Engagement strand were met with the site of 100 blank index cards, one sitting on each chair. Now, just under 24 hours later, many of those cards have ideas for the Digital Engagement Manifesto scribbled upon them - and in this last session we've got five panellists sharing their reflections
Local authorities
Theme leader: Stephen Hilton, Connecting Bristol
Most good ideas are borrowed from other people. There are great opportunities for local authorities to explore what other sectors are doing and to learn from them
Three sub themes and sets of ideas were shared for local authorities:
Other notes
There are Digital Inclusion advisors recruited by I&DEA and supported by CLG. Any authority can request their support - so Stephen challenged everyone to go back and write to their directors to ask them to invite the input of the Digital Inclusion Advisors. (You can commission input through the Regional Improvement Partnership suggested one of the advisors who was in the room...)
How do we get strategic leads convinced? "Simply do things"; "Don't involve too many people too early"; "Trial things - with a sensible risk assessment - but just try it. Once it's there people can see the benefits"; "It's easier to beg forgiveness than ask permission"; "Corporate ICT teams tend to be conservative and focussed on internal process - so create another place for people to go to talk about their new ideas."
Mapping is a strong idea. E.g. BristolStreets.co.uk; Green Mapping;
It's good to find ways of making sure people outside the room can input into meetings (e.g. adding to local government webcasting projects).
Chosen idea
There is no new money for this - so we need to focus on raising awareness so that mainstream projects are supporting digital engagement work.
Technology Theme leader: Tom Steinburg, MySociety
Tom shared his take on digital inclusion:
"I'm here to bury e-inclusion not to praise it. Change the language: stop putting 'e' on the front of everything. There is no excuse for using strange language the public don't understand. When you put it this way: 'We're all here because we believe it's good to get people online' then it makes a lot more sense."
1) When Entrepreneurs (private or social) go to government and say 'We need something from you to make good stuff to go online' - help them!
2) Build better services yourself.
(2) is going to take a lot more central funding to achieve.
Tom shared two representative ideas from the technology theme & provided his commentary on it:
"If someone comes to you asking to use some new thing - ask yourself 'Have we used pre-existing technologies to their best yet? Have we squeezed the best out of Web 1.0 and e-mail yet?' If you're not focussing here, you're not fighting e-exclusion, you're creating it."
Chosen idea
Focus on the technologies already around.
Ethnicity Theme leader: Michael Lewis, Aston
Is there a direct connection between ethnicity and digital inclusion? There are many shared needs between BME communities and non-BME communities.
One of the big barriers to digital engagement can be literacy.
We have to look at grassroots-up approaches. Working directly, or through fora, to engage with grassroots when developing national indicators or policies.
Developing English language training at pre-entry level, hooking groups in with Diabetes Awareness content. Through the health-learning the group gain their English skills. (A DC10 project)
Four ideas had been brought together under the ethnicity theme:
General discussion
Volunteers need revenue funding to be supported and directed. A lot of technology investment is capital - but we need to make sure we're switching to revenue and employing people.
Instead of setting up a new ICT / e-democracy advice group - let's find champions in the already engaged communities.
E-campaigns can change behaviour. Providing information such as 'feed your family for a fiver' and providing ways for people to share recipes. Hook for e-engagement. Or sharing information about how littering in a
Digital storytelling has been used in Aston. Had some really significant responses - with videos from young children from Somalia speaking about their experiences; Mothers talking about their experiences of taking drugs using images from the web.
Chosen idea
Michael chose: 'Having a forum of citizens from local communities who can be consulted on e-democracy issues' as the key issue to go forward into the manifesto.
The individual who suggested this manifesto point shared how working with people who have been on a personal development journey through 12 or 18 month projects could be ideal people to consult. People who started digitally excluded, and who have moved towards inclusion.
Disadvantaged communities Theme leader: Catherine Howe, public-i
People get engaged when they're making stuff. When they have an issue or a passion and they're sharing it. Digital inclusion is about finding a way for people to express what they want to say.
We know what disadvantaged communities are: disadvantaged communities are the ones with poor health, where people don't achieve at school, where people don't do what the council wants them to do. But the people in those communities have a lot of knowledge, a lot of passion, and a lot of things they want to do. There may be low literacy, and low motivation to be part of the rest of the society. What does digital engagement look like here?
General notes
Let's think about informal learning: not telling people what they should know - but recognising that the knowledge is in the community.
Chosen idea
Catherine's chosen idea put the focus on supporting people to be producers of content, not just consumers.
Disability Theme leader: David Banes: AbilityNet
Only one index card covered Disability access and that mostly suggested we should be talking about it more. So David Bane's asked delegates why.
"One of the challenges is that people don't feel confident in this area. We often don't feel we have enough expertise of knowledge to put forward constructive ideas. So - if you don't know where to start - come and talk to AbilityNet"
David shared three ideas that have emerged in putting together his presentation and in other conversations around the conference:
General discussion
Q: We need an advice services not only for ageing and disabled users - but also for staff.
A: An advice service should be there for supporting people who support people also.
Mandate 376 says that 'Public funding must be spent on accessible IT systems'.
But for all the technical standards
Bit issue around disability awareness training for IT & Technical developers. There is nothing in current IT or Design Technology Curriculum for young people about design-for-all.
The agenda on accessibility can be forwarded through recruitment policies: you should only recruit programmers who have skills to promote accessibility. Once you have those people with the skills and passion for accessibility in your organisations then you can make a difference.
Web Access for dummies: how can we put accessiblity into terms anyone could understand.
Chosen idea
From discussion a focus on support emerged as the chosen idea.
The chosen ideas will go forward to a plenary feedback session at 2pm, being combined with ideas emerging from the other workstreams to create a draft digital engagement manifesto.
Watch this space.
Local authorities
Theme leader: Stephen Hilton, Connecting Bristol
Most good ideas are borrowed from other people. There are great opportunities for local authorities to explore what other sectors are doing and to learn from them
Three sub themes and sets of ideas were shared for local authorities:
- Entitlement: individuals entitled to be digitally included
- "An entitlement to support for developing basic digital skills."
Should be be entitled to expect support? - "Employ community ICT champions to engage with practitioners"
- "Use personalised budgets" - to allow individuals to choose the sorts of support they want;
- "An entitlement to support for developing basic digital skills."
- Raising awareness:
- "Develop awareness of use of technology and how it can be used to take policy and strategy forward in local services. There are too many heads of services not aware of how technology can be used."
- "Digital inclusion should be included in National Indicators."
- "Raise awareness by having an e-engagement module as part of the MyGuide product."
- Applications and content:
- "Develop a map which lets people to report problems & to record other comments, questions, experience on the local area." - A living place map.
- "Use twitter for interactive voting"
- "Develop a map which lets people to report problems & to record other comments, questions, experience on the local area." - A living place map.
Other notes
There are Digital Inclusion advisors recruited by I&DEA and supported by CLG. Any authority can request their support - so Stephen challenged everyone to go back and write to their directors to ask them to invite the input of the Digital Inclusion Advisors. (You can commission input through the Regional Improvement Partnership suggested one of the advisors who was in the room...)
How do we get strategic leads convinced? "Simply do things"; "Don't involve too many people too early"; "Trial things - with a sensible risk assessment - but just try it. Once it's there people can see the benefits"; "It's easier to beg forgiveness than ask permission"; "Corporate ICT teams tend to be conservative and focussed on internal process - so create another place for people to go to talk about their new ideas."
Mapping is a strong idea. E.g. BristolStreets.co.uk; Green Mapping;
It's good to find ways of making sure people outside the room can input into meetings (e.g. adding to local government webcasting projects).
Chosen idea
There is no new money for this - so we need to focus on raising awareness so that mainstream projects are supporting digital engagement work.
Technology Theme leader: Tom Steinburg, MySociety
Tom shared his take on digital inclusion:
"I'm here to bury e-inclusion not to praise it. Change the language: stop putting 'e' on the front of everything. There is no excuse for using strange language the public don't understand. When you put it this way: 'We're all here because we believe it's good to get people online' then it makes a lot more sense."
1) When Entrepreneurs (private or social) go to government and say 'We need something from you to make good stuff to go online' - help them!
2) Build better services yourself.
(2) is going to take a lot more central funding to achieve.
Tom shared two representative ideas from the technology theme & provided his commentary on it:
- Bad idea: Run a pilot around 100 homes
The private sector run national pilots. Experiments from government must stop being hyper local and tiny. FixMyStreet was a £6K pilot. Local authorities need to work together rather than alone.
- Good idea: Lessons from Africa - forget laptops, concentrate on mobiles
Taking the lesson from this. Go with the technology that is already there and make the post of it. E-mail was invited in 1971. The Obama campaign had 100x more e-mail addresses than Twitter friends.
"If someone comes to you asking to use some new thing - ask yourself 'Have we used pre-existing technologies to their best yet? Have we squeezed the best out of Web 1.0 and e-mail yet?' If you're not focussing here, you're not fighting e-exclusion, you're creating it."
Chosen idea
Focus on the technologies already around.
Ethnicity Theme leader: Michael Lewis, Aston
Is there a direct connection between ethnicity and digital inclusion? There are many shared needs between BME communities and non-BME communities.
One of the big barriers to digital engagement can be literacy.
We have to look at grassroots-up approaches. Working directly, or through fora, to engage with grassroots when developing national indicators or policies.
Developing English language training at pre-entry level, hooking groups in with Diabetes Awareness content. Through the health-learning the group gain their English skills. (A DC10 project)
Four ideas had been brought together under the ethnicity theme:
- Using volunteers to champion E-engagement
- Better content providing services and information for people
- Devising beneficiary led citizens-panels to advice regionally on e-democracy;
- Motivate those who have no desire to access the internet by engaging them in programmes to create content on issues that affect them and their lives;
General discussion
Volunteers need revenue funding to be supported and directed. A lot of technology investment is capital - but we need to make sure we're switching to revenue and employing people.
Instead of setting up a new ICT / e-democracy advice group - let's find champions in the already engaged communities.
E-campaigns can change behaviour. Providing information such as 'feed your family for a fiver' and providing ways for people to share recipes. Hook for e-engagement. Or sharing information about how littering in a
Digital storytelling has been used in Aston. Had some really significant responses - with videos from young children from Somalia speaking about their experiences; Mothers talking about their experiences of taking drugs using images from the web.
Chosen idea
Michael chose: 'Having a forum of citizens from local communities who can be consulted on e-democracy issues' as the key issue to go forward into the manifesto.
The individual who suggested this manifesto point shared how working with people who have been on a personal development journey through 12 or 18 month projects could be ideal people to consult. People who started digitally excluded, and who have moved towards inclusion.
Disadvantaged communities Theme leader: Catherine Howe, public-i
People get engaged when they're making stuff. When they have an issue or a passion and they're sharing it. Digital inclusion is about finding a way for people to express what they want to say.
We know what disadvantaged communities are: disadvantaged communities are the ones with poor health, where people don't achieve at school, where people don't do what the council wants them to do. But the people in those communities have a lot of knowledge, a lot of passion, and a lot of things they want to do. There may be low literacy, and low motivation to be part of the rest of the society. What does digital engagement look like here?
- "Fundamental policy issues should be centred around the individual able to be the master of their own destiny";
- "We should be doing more with older people";
- "There should be more focus on supporting people to produce content, rather than seeing people simply as consumers";
General notes
Let's think about informal learning: not telling people what they should know - but recognising that the knowledge is in the community.
Chosen idea
Catherine's chosen idea put the focus on supporting people to be producers of content, not just consumers.
Disability Theme leader: David Banes: AbilityNet
Only one index card covered Disability access and that mostly suggested we should be talking about it more. So David Bane's asked delegates why.
"One of the challenges is that people don't feel confident in this area. We often don't feel we have enough expertise of knowledge to put forward constructive ideas. So - if you don't know where to start - come and talk to AbilityNet"
David shared three ideas that have emerged in putting together his presentation and in other conversations around the conference:
- Legal issues: amend copyright law to facilitate the presentation of media in different formats (third-party e-books, closed caption etc.). And Government should release public information under Creative Commons licence.
- Technology issues: integrate pervasive and ubiquitous assistive technologies with digitalTV and IPTV platforms: allowing people to engage with DigitalTV through touch, gestures, braille etc.
- Support issues: create a national digital inclusion advice service for ageing and disabled users. A first port-of call for advice and information, acting as a gatekeeper to the services that can provide support and which can match needs to solutions. And which can support organisations, developers and vendors to deliver on digital inclusion.
General discussion
Q: We need an advice services not only for ageing and disabled users - but also for staff.
A: An advice service should be there for supporting people who support people also.
Mandate 376 says that 'Public funding must be spent on accessible IT systems'.
But for all the technical standards
Bit issue around disability awareness training for IT & Technical developers. There is nothing in current IT or Design Technology Curriculum for young people about design-for-all.
The agenda on accessibility can be forwarded through recruitment policies: you should only recruit programmers who have skills to promote accessibility. Once you have those people with the skills and passion for accessibility in your organisations then you can make a difference.
Web Access for dummies: how can we put accessiblity into terms anyone could understand.
Chosen idea
From discussion a focus on support emerged as the chosen idea.
The chosen ideas will go forward to a plenary feedback session at 2pm, being combined with ideas emerging from the other workstreams to create a draft digital engagement manifesto.
Watch this space.
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Created by David Wilcox Jul 23, 2009 at 3:54pm. Last updated by David Wilcox Jul. 23, 2009.
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Created by David Wilcox Jul 23, 2009 at 3:51pm. Last updated by Dave Briggs Jul. 23, 2009.
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