New Grant Will Advance Massachusetts Community Action Agencies’ Efforts to Assist Low-Income People Gain Digital Age Skills
MASSCAP, the association of Massachusetts’ 25 community action agencies, has received a grant from the Boston Foundation’s New Economy Initiative to strengthen and expand efforts to aid low-income people that these agencies serve gain services and skills needed to survive in the state’s technology-driven “New Economy.”
“Obviously, the nation now is in a troubling economic slump,” observed Alan Sax, chair of MASSCAP’s Information Technology (IT) Committee, “and in this hi-tech state, we are seeing many very skilled workers lose their jobs. But when the economy eventually recovers, even entry-level jobs that will be created in Massachusetts will likely demand literacy and at least basic computer skills. This trend was becoming clear well before the recent downturn.
“Many of the 350,000 low-income people that our community action agencies serve statewide each year through our different programs,” Sax continued, “are transitioning from welfare to work and lack the necessary education and skills to get jobs that would help them become economically self-sufficient, even in better times. And many lack access to the Internet and do not have basic computer skills.”
Many Massachusetts community action agencies have education, training, and workforce development programs, in addition to the many other services they offer, such as Head Start, child care, fuel assistance, housing, health care, nutrition, and other programs. In the past few years, nearly half of them have also begun projects to help bridge the digital divide, by offering low-income people access to computers and the Internet along with basic computer training. Many of these new projects also have involved partnerships with an array of other community-based organizations.
“This generous grant will help the state’s community action agencies connect the dots,” said Joe Diamond, MASSCAP’s Executive Director. “We have new IT access projects that are attracting many low-income people in communities across the state who want to use computers and the Internet to find jobs and services, and to get more education. And they want to learn computer basics. We want to build on this participation—to develop ways that participants can easily move not only into other services they need at our agencies, but also into opportunities within the state education system and businesses where they can get more training.
“Meanwhile,” Diamond pointed out, “community action agencies have other programs, such as adult education and workforce training, where.the participants need and want to gain IT skills. This grant will allow us to develop ways to better link all these efforts together, strengthen our partnerships with other statewide and community organizations, and to help close the digital divide as well as assist more low-income people in getting the services and skills they need to stay afloat in the state’s changing economy.”
The grant will help MASSCAP engage in a one-year planning process. It will have tangible results: a written blueprint to guide community action agencies as they develop their programs and new initiatives over the next five years to adapt to changing economic realities; and new partnerships with other state and local institutions and groups that will participate in this planning process.
“MASSCAP is undertaking this process because we face some critical issues,” noted Alan Sax. “Times are changing, the Massachusetts economy is changing, and the prospects for low-income people obtaining jobs that can sustain them and their families are diminishing. We need to craft new strategies. This process will help our state’s 25 community action agencies adapt our current efforts to address new needs.”
The new project will be undertaken by a new MASSCAP task force, drawing on the recent experience and expertise of MASSCAP’s IT Committee, chaired by Sax, as well as that of MASSCAP’s Education, Training and Workforce Development Committee. It will also draw from other organizations and institutions involved in such efforts across the state. Its first formal planning sessions will begin in the fall.
Begun in 2001, the Boston Foundation's New Economy Initiative is a response to the impact of technology on the communities and organizations the Boston Foundation serves. This five-year, multi-million dollar initiative supports the use of technology to increase digital equity and increase opportunities for people and organizations in Greater Boston to participate, advance, and succeed in the new economy. The Initiative provides grants, support networking, and offers constituency-building opportunities to Greater Boston's nonprofit organizations working to increase the digital capacity of individuals and nonprofits to compete effectively in the 21st Century.
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