“Bright House Networks has supported thousands of Net Literacy student volunteers increase Internet safety awareness and provide almost 10,000 computers to Indianapolis and the City of Marion’s children, schools, and nonprofits,” said Net Literacy Executive Director Dan Kent.

“Bright House Networks was the first company that took a chance on Net Literacy’s team of high school student volunteers that asked them for their support and advocacy in 2005. Since then, Bright House Networks’ leadership has joined our Board of Directors to provide students their vision, insights, advocacy and mentoring. This year, Bright House Networks will help us produce our 25th Safe Connects Internet safety public service announcement and our partnership has increased online safety awareness to hundreds of thousands of Hoosiers. Bright House Networks, we just couldn’t be doing this without you!”

Please contact Daniel Kent at danielkent@netliteracy.org for more information.

Russia, just like the United States, is working to increase digital literacy and online safety in their country. According to a recent survey, Internet penetration increased by 10% in the last year alone and exceeds 50%! Speaking at a digital literacy conference conducted by the Russian Association of Electronic Communications (above), Net Literacy discussed how digital inclusion and online safety education can be impacted by student-empowered programs. Net Literacy also presented at a Safer Internet Day in Russia conducted by the Public Chamber. During these presentations, Net Literacy supported Russian initiatives to increase online safety via education rather than regulation and filtering. Net Literacy also supported industry self-regulation (over government regulation) and discussed how students can become engaged in promoting online safety and digital literacy.

Net Literacy was also a guest lecturer at Moscow State University’s Department of Journalism, talking to and meeting with 200 very Net savvy students and Dr. Elena Vartanova (Dean & Professor, Faculty of Journalism) and Dr. Victor Naumov (Head of Russian IP/IT/Telecom Practice). How social networking literate are the Department of Journalism’s students? Out of approximately 200 students, only one was not using social media – a figure that compares favorably to the United States. Moscow State University students were knowledgeable about current events in the United States, including industry efforts to stop the COPA bill from progressing.

Moscow State University and Net Literacy plan to announce a joint initiative within the next sixty days, which may include the use of Moscow State University’s new “world class” television production facility.

For additional information, please email danielkent@netliteracy.org

The company said it will also launch a community program in Hong Kong to provide annual grants ranging from US$5000 to US$50,000 to organizations that focus on the issues such as technology literacy and innovation, renewable energy innovation, and new economy entrepreneurship.

To get this effort started, Google is making a grant of USD50,000 to Hong Kong-based NGO WebOrganic to support their efforts in providing affordable laptops and digital literacy programs to underprivileged children in Hong Kong, the company added.

WebOrganic’s main focus is to promote eLearning to the underprivileged and give those people that were formerly without access to the internet.  The company regularly teams up with organizations in the Hong Kong area to further these goals.  It also provides technical support for internet problems for the Hong Kong Family Welfare Society and supports training and mentorship programs for the YMCA and other groups.  The company supports an impressive 150,000 students from lower income families.

Google launched a website on the facility at www.google.com/datacenter/hongkong, where people can ask the firm questions and find more information on the project, and job opportunities, the firm noted.

See the original article:  http://www.pcworld.com/article/245982/google_invests_300_million_in_hong_kong_datacenter.html

Read more about WebOrganic:  http://www.weborganic.hk/EN/node/6

2011 – 5,242
2010 – 2,976
2009 – 4,508
2008 – 3,057

For additional information, please contact danielkent@netliteracy.org

At Board meetings, students discuss their computer repurposing progress

DK 1/2/2012

Imaging A Computer Using The RPK Imaging Software

1. Inspect physical hardware for obvious defects that could create the computer to not work.

2. Plug all wires and cables into the computer (Power, monitor, keyboard, mouse).

Note: You will need to use either: both a ps2 (circular plug) mouse and ps2 keyboard, a ps2 mouse and USB (rectangular plug) keyboard, or a USB mouse and ps2 keyboard.

You cannot use both a USB mouse and USB keyboard! At least one of them has to be ps2!

3. Connect the Ethernet cable from the server into the switch and then connect all computers that are being imaged into the switch as well.

4. Power on the server and all computers being imaged, and insert the RPK imaging disc into each of the computers.

5. Boot up each computer to the CD (You may have to bring up the one time boot menu and select the CD drive).

Note: The computer may boot to the CD automatically, or a message may appear that asks if you want to boot to the cd, press any key.

6. Computer will begin booting to the CD and the Windows is loading files progress bar will appear.

7. The Starting Windows screen with the Windows logo will appear.

8. A Command Prompt box will appear.

9. From here the Command Prompt will automatically continue to scroll through a lot of windows, as the following screenshots show…

Note: If a network error occurs at the end of the screen above, this means the computer cannot connect to your server and you should check all connections from the computer to the server and the server’s settings.

10. Once the Command Prompt “Applying Progress” screen shown above reaches 100%, it will display very fast moving lines of file locations. Once this code stops scrolling the computer will restart.

Note: At this point you will need to remove the CD from the computer so that it does not boot from the CD again.

11. Once the computer has restarted, the Windows XP boot screen will appear.

12. Next, the “Please wait while Windows prepares to start…” and Windows XP Setup screens appear.

13. Eventually, the “Welcome to the Windows XP Setup Wizard” window will come up.

Note: At this point, if either your mouse or keyboard is USB, that device will not work. As stated above, either your mouse or keyboard or both must be ps2. For the next few steps, you will only be able to use the device that is ps2.

14. To get to the next window…

1. If your keyboard is ps2: Press the enter key on the keyboard.
   
2. If your mouse is ps2: Click the next button.
   
3. If both your mouse and keyboard are ps2: Either click the next button with your mouse or press enter on the keyboard.
   

15. On the next screen…

a. If your keyboard is ps2: Press tab, space bar, tab, tab, enter to go to the next screen.

b. If your mouse is ps2: Select the “I accept” bubble and click the next button.

c. If both your mouse and keyboard are ps2: Select the “I accept” bubble and click the next button.

16. Wait for the computer to detect and install devices on the next screen.

Note: After this screen has finished, your USB mouse or keyboard should now work.

17. When the “Regional and Language Options” screen appears, click next.

18. At the next screen, type User into the “Name” box, leave the organization blank, and click next.

19. Next, the product key screen will appear.

1. If you have your product key available and would like to enter it now: Enter your product key in the boxes and click next.
   
2. If you do not have your product key available and/or would like to enter it later: Click next, then click no.
   

    

20. Now the “Computer Name and Administrator Password” screen appears. Leave the name as what it says automatically in the box and leave the password boxes blank so that there is no password and click next.

21. The “Date and Time Settings” window appears. Change the date, time, and time zone to the correct settings for your area and click next.

22. When the “Network Settings” screen appears, keep the typical settings bubble selected and click next.

24. At the “Workgroup or Computer Domain” screen, leave the settings as they are and click next.

24. The “Performing Final Tasks” screen will appear. Wait for it to load through the 4 steps, some of which are shown below.

25. After these steps have completed, the computer will restart.

26. When the logon screen appears, click on the Administrator account to login.

27. Once the desktop has come up, you will need to activate the computer.

28. Click on the start menu, go to all programs, and click on “Activate Windows” towards the top of the programs list.

29. When the “Activate Windows” screen comes up, If you have not already entered your product key, it will ask you to do so.

30. Once you have entered your product key, or if you entered it earlier during the setup process, the “let’s activate windows” screen appears. Select “Yes, let’s activate Windows over the internet now” and click next.

31. Now the “Do you want to register” window appears. Select “No, I don’t want to register now; let’s just activate Windows” and click next.

32. If the “configure your network settings” window comes up, fill in any settings your network requires (if there are any) and click next, or if not click skip.

33. The “You have successfully activated your copy of Windows” screen will come up if your computer was successfully activated; click ok.

Note: If the activation fails, retry it again, make sure your computer is connected to the internet by opening internet explorer and trying to load a webpage, check to be sure you Ethernet drivers are installed in device manager, or try restarting the computer. If it still doesn’t work try using the activate over the telephone option.

34. You may also need to adjust a few minor settings such as the screen resolution, checking device manager to make sure all drivers have installed and installing driver software if there are any missing, and updating any software such as the Microsoft Security Essentials and Java.

Special thanks to Levi Kiser

Additional details are forthcoming.

For more information, contact Dan at danielkent@netliteracy.org

Regionally, Brazil is slightly above the Latin American average in terms of penetration, but behind Chile, Argentina, and Uruguay. Speed of access follows a similar pattern – Brazil is better than the regional average, but below US or European levels. Likewise, Brazil has relatively good international fiber connectivity, although it is not as well connected as some of its neighbors. Similarly, prices for telecommunication and broadband access are lower than other countries in the region yet still relatively high compared to North America and Europe, especially outside the major cities. Phones, computer and telecommunication equipment are also significantly higher in cost, partly due to import duties on IT equipment, further reducing affordability of access among the lower-income groups.

In an effort to help to improve coverage and reduce the cost of broadband access, the government has begun a major broadband infrastructure development initiative which has set ambitious targets to triple broadband uptake by 2014. The largest ICT infrastructure project ever carried out in Brazil, called the National Broadband Plan (PNBL), it aims to ensure that broadband access is available to low-income households, especially in areas that have so far been poorly served.

Read the report (pdf): http://www.infodev.org/en/Document.1128.pdf

Read more: http://www.infodev.org/en/Publication.1128.html

Working with numerous partners, the organization successfully launched its pilot program in DC in August.  In 2012 CodeNow will expand to four cities.

As founder Ryan Seashore says, “coding is the new literacy, it gives youth the ability to create and innovate.” This fantastic program gives high school students the tools to Win the Future.

To learn more about their program, go to CodeNow.org or follow them on twitter @CodeNowOrg.

Read more: http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2011/10/28/codenow-champion-non-profit

Experts who met at a just concluded third edition of the Africa Public-Private Partnership Conference in Nairobi hailed the potential of structured collaboration between the public and private sectors to transform Africa into an ICT hub. Zaki Khoury, the Regional Manager, Global Strategic Accounts, Middle East, North, West, and Central Africa as well as Pakistan and Turkey at Microsoft, underscored the potential of public-private partnerships to promote universal access to ICT services in Africa.

Khoury noted that Africa is a frontier market that has attracted investments in ICT sector as the GDP of many countries expand. “We have ICT hubs in Kenya, Nigeria and South Africa. This calls for a revaluation of our business model to engage more with governments and private companies and leverage these partnerships to accelerate connectivity,” says Khoury.

He continued “Microsoft adopts public-private partnerships to maximize on the resources, leverage our technology and scale up our execution together with governments and other companies.” Khoury stressed that structured public private partnerships are critical in addressing social challenges such as provision of quality education and health services.

“These partnerships have boosted quality and competitiveness of the education system. They have increased collaboration among students alongside connectivity with teachers to create greater knowledge forums”, remarked Khoury.  Mainstreaming ICT in the education sector in Africa will boost skills and competitiveness of the youth in the job market.

Khoury vouched for digital learning in schools to prepare students for a knowledge based economy. Microsoft has partnered with Kenya’s Ministry of education under a “Partnership in Learning” project to develop digital curriculum for schools.

“We will in the next three years help Kenya progress towards digital literacy,” says Khoury. He cited the “Microsoft Digital Literacy” initiative that has helped streamline technology enhanced learning in schools.

Read more: http://www.africasciencenews.org/en/index.php/technology/45-hitech/245-public-private-partnerships-to-bridge-africas-digital-divide-says-microsoft

Users earn badges for lessons completed and can track success and progress. Characters greet users as they enter and complete lessons. A job aggregator lets users know of the latest jobs available in their area that meet their interests. A resume builder function enables users to create a resume and print it to submit. A variety of resources for job hunting are contained in one database, streamlining the job seeking process.

The basics of the Internet that are second nature to some are thoroughly covered: Opening and using email, submitting a query on a search engine and using Facebook and LinkedIn to create profiles and find job opportunities. While the content is geared towards users finding, applying to and acquiring jobs, the lessons teach skills that reach far beyond their immediate goal.

The system’s do-it-yourself methodology and technology that learns with the users as they use it will provide an educational experience parallel to other platforms that have proven successful online. A variety of online initiatives, whether Khan Academy for math and sciences or Code Academy for the advanced Internet user who wants to pick up programming skills, have proven that self-paced and enjoyable online learning experiences are the future of education, regardless of the subject.

True access includes the appropriate infrastructure, access points, hardware and digital literacy skills to be a participant in our online community. In an era of development and companies focusing on “social,” inclusion is critical.

The platform launches this Wednesday with a live demonstration online and can be found at jobscout.caltrail.com.

Read more: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/christina-gagnier/digital-literacy-internet-access_b_1129884.html