Project Profile
The Digital Bridge
Date Submitted: 10/07/2009 - 12:27
Submitted By: Dima
Category: Education
Target Region: - Western Asia
Project Participant's Name: Dima Epstein
Team: Part of a team
Role: One of the three co-founders / coordinators
Country: Israel
Description: The Digital Bridge" is a young social enterprise aiming to narrow the digital divide through educational activities in socio-economically challenged areas. The basic idea is using the existing ICT infrastructure for development of human resources in the challenged areas. As a result, "The Digital Bridge" concentrates on educational projects with kids giving them basic skills in computer and Internet utilization. The uniqueness of "The Digital Bridge" is in approaching kids in their own environment, entering their schools, and not taking the children to a third party's facilities. The project ran in the academic year 2003-2004 in two elementary schools in Jaffa, a suburb with mixed Jewish-Arab population. The two schools were: Hassan Arafe (Arab) Elementary School in the Ajami neighborhood and Hashmonaim (mostly Jewish) Elementary School in the Jaffa C neighborhood. Although the two neighborhoods are within 7 minutes drive of each other, there is almost no interaction between the population and between the students from both schools. The decision to concentrate on these schools based on a deep belief that wise use of computer mediated communication bears tremendous potential for intercultural dialogue and promotion of tolerance. Starting "The Digital Bridge" was possible thanks to the generous support of ITU, which donated the needed funds for tutors in the project. Since this was the first youth-led initiative as a result of the ITU Youth Fora, the support shown by ITU demonstrated great foresight and commitment to the development of future leaders in the ICT industry. The project was conducted in cooperation with the "Price Brodie Initiative in Jaffa" of Tel-Aviv University. "The Digital Bridge" was greatly appreciated by the participating children. In the midterm evaluation it received an "excellent" mark from the participants in aspects of interest and satisfaction. The students created their own websites, participated in forum discussions and exchanged e-mails with peers in the other school. The communication component was extremely important for it allowed first contact between Arab and Jewish kids to be free of expression of prejudges and stereotypes, thus building mutual trust, which is a basic component of constructive dialogue and true friendship.
Website: http://www.thinkmacro.org/DB/html/eng/index.html
Contact Email:
How can The Human Network Help?: At the moment the project is no longer active in Jaffa, however we are willing to share the knowledge and the experience we gained while working on it, with the rest of the Human Network community. Please let us know if you want to build a Digital Bridge in your community.
Submitted By: Dima
Category: Education
Target Region: - Western Asia
Project Participant's Name: Dima Epstein
Team: Part of a team
Role: One of the three co-founders / coordinators
Country: Israel
Description: The Digital Bridge" is a young social enterprise aiming to narrow the digital divide through educational activities in socio-economically challenged areas. The basic idea is using the existing ICT infrastructure for development of human resources in the challenged areas. As a result, "The Digital Bridge" concentrates on educational projects with kids giving them basic skills in computer and Internet utilization. The uniqueness of "The Digital Bridge" is in approaching kids in their own environment, entering their schools, and not taking the children to a third party's facilities. The project ran in the academic year 2003-2004 in two elementary schools in Jaffa, a suburb with mixed Jewish-Arab population. The two schools were: Hassan Arafe (Arab) Elementary School in the Ajami neighborhood and Hashmonaim (mostly Jewish) Elementary School in the Jaffa C neighborhood. Although the two neighborhoods are within 7 minutes drive of each other, there is almost no interaction between the population and between the students from both schools. The decision to concentrate on these schools based on a deep belief that wise use of computer mediated communication bears tremendous potential for intercultural dialogue and promotion of tolerance. Starting "The Digital Bridge" was possible thanks to the generous support of ITU, which donated the needed funds for tutors in the project. Since this was the first youth-led initiative as a result of the ITU Youth Fora, the support shown by ITU demonstrated great foresight and commitment to the development of future leaders in the ICT industry. The project was conducted in cooperation with the "Price Brodie Initiative in Jaffa" of Tel-Aviv University. "The Digital Bridge" was greatly appreciated by the participating children. In the midterm evaluation it received an "excellent" mark from the participants in aspects of interest and satisfaction. The students created their own websites, participated in forum discussions and exchanged e-mails with peers in the other school. The communication component was extremely important for it allowed first contact between Arab and Jewish kids to be free of expression of prejudges and stereotypes, thus building mutual trust, which is a basic component of constructive dialogue and true friendship.
Website: http://www.thinkmacro.org/DB/html/eng/index.html
Contact Email:
How can The Human Network Help?: At the moment the project is no longer active in Jaffa, however we are willing to share the knowledge and the experience we gained while working on it, with the rest of the Human Network community. Please let us know if you want to build a Digital Bridge in your community.
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