Deep Dive

Mode #2: Use Existing Tech Infrastructure

Laurenellen McCann

This is the second piece in a five-part series exploring how to develop civic technology with, not for communities. Each entry in this series reviews a different strategy (“mode”) of civic engagement in civic tech along with common tactics for implementation that have been effectively utilized in the field by a variety of practitioners. The modes were identified based on research I conducted with Smart Chicago as part of the Knight Community Information Challenge. You can read more about the criteria used and review all of the 5 modes identified here.

MODE: Utilize Existing Tech Skills and Infrastructure

“Innovations” and technologies don’t have to be brand new in order to be leveraged for civic impact. Some successful tools are the product of simply using or encouraging the use of tools that communities have ready access to or already rely on in new ways.

It’s important to note that here, when we talk about “technical infrastructure” we’re talking about both physical elements, like wireless network nodes, radio towers, and computers, as well as digital elements, like social media platforms, email, and blogs — the tech tools a community uses to support everyday activity and public life.

Remix, Don’t Reinvent

Jersey Shore Hurricane News is a collaborative news “platform” built on a standard-feature Facebook Page. The site is run by Justin Auciello who co-founded it with friends in 2011 during Hurricane Irene. Seeing the need to share hyperlocal info during the hurricane and curious about ways to use tech to spur civic engagement, as the storm took hold, Auciello decided to start a hub for emergency information that anyone could contribute to. Rather than create a separate blog or media site, Auciello went where New Jerseyans were already gathering to learn and share info: Facebook.

JerseyShoreHurricaneNews

Over time, the platform has expanded both in terms of the content (it now covers real-time daily news), the role it plays in the community, and the network of volunteer contributors involved in reporting and sharing. But the tool remains the same.

This is the art of the remix: the recombination of familiar, ordinary elements to create something extraordinary.

As part of their ELECTricity project, the Center for Technology and Civic Life (CTCL) recombined familiar elements of free website templates (using Google Blogger) to help local election administrations modernize and share information. The idea of working with Google Blogger and creating a new template (rather than developing an entirely new tool) was the result of a listening tour: for nearly 7 months, the ELECTricity team discussed points of pride and pain with local election administrators around the country. After the tour, CTCL realized that, in order to support administrators’ needs, the ideal online platform would need to be (almost) free and require minimal amounts of technical knowledge to get up and running while still enabling opportunities for more complex technical developments in the future. Blogger templates fit the bill.

Use One Tech To Teach Another

Free Geek is a non-profit organization model that was started in Portland, Oregon in 2000 and has been implemented in 12 other cities in the US and Canada. Free Geek takes old computer parts and works with communities in underserved areas (particularly those with low access to digital technology) to use this e-waste to build new computers and electronics. These electronics are then made available for free plus community service time.

Although the Free Geek system is ultimately about making computers available to those in need, Free Geek has built out programs that leverage this tech to teach and develop additional tech skills. For example…

  1. Along with supplying free hardware, Free Geek also supplies software and offers basic digital skills training.
  2. Along with supplying free software, some Free Geeks also offer training in code and web design and development at a variety of different skill levels.
  3. Since community members “buy” their free computers through volunteer time, Free Geeks offer the chance to “pay” for computers by volunteering to build new electronics and trains interested community members in a variety of hardware, wiring, and refurbishing skills.

By focusing on the lifecycle of technology use, Free Geeks feeds into and strengthens the basic technical infrastructure of the communities they inhabit and provide platforms for partnerships and individual incentives (see Mode #1) that support public goods, like job training.

Portland volunteers at work. Image by Free Geek.

Portland volunteers at work. Image by Free Geek.

This is kin to the structure that the Red Hook Initiative (RHI) in Red Hook, Brooklyn, New York uses to manage Red Hook Wifi, a community wireless network. Red Hook Wifi is maintained through a youth program, Digital Stewards, which trains residents age 19-24 to install and maintain a wireless network that serves neighborhood homes and businesses. On top of that skill base, Digital Stewards are also taught how to do software and hardware troubleshooting as well as community organizing and public relations — skills necessary to keep the network up and running both technically and socially. Like Free Geek, the Digital Stewards program focuses on technology from an ecosystem perspective, stacking the development of new tools so that they can sustainably integrate into existing community structures.

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Up next is Mode #3: Create Two-Way Educational Environments

Mode #1: Use Existing Social Structures

Laurenellen McCann

This is the first of a five-part series exploring how to develop civic technology with, not for communities. Each entry in this series reviews a different mode, or strategy, of civic engagement in civic tech along with common tactics for implementation that have been effectively utilized in the field by a variety of practitioners. The modes were identified based on research I conducted with Smart Chicago as part of the Knight Community Information Challenge. Read more about the criteria here.

MODE: Utilize existing social infrastructure

Social infrastructure refers to the ecosystem of relationships and formal and informal organizations in a community. Structures can be physical (such as institutions with actual storefronts, like a daycare center) or purely relational (like a parents’ meet-up group), and most are organized by some element of place (neighborhood, school district, city district, city, etc).

Although structures can be shared across communities (a daycare center can draw people from multiple neighborhoods), the particular social infrastructure of a community is always unique. One may rely heavily on the daycare center while another nearby may prefer informal babysitting co-ops or church programs. Outsiders aren’t likely to spot these more informal and relational structures,  making it hard to discover the structures that really matter in a given social context.

To address this knowledge gap, literally meet people where they are — work with (or as part of) the social structures that you can identify that already play a role in the context you hope to affect and work together to customize the best community approach.

Here are three specific tactics, each with concrete examples of real-world use, that can help you think about using existing social infrastructure in civic tech:

Pay for Organizing Capacity in Existing Community Structures

Whether you’re trying to catalyze new tech activity or create general opportunities for communal self-direction in tech, investing money where a community is already investing social capital is a one method of working with existing social infrastructure.

Investing in the capacity of organizers to expand their work and seek opportunities to leverage technology is a direct way of ensuring that tech is both is situated in a communal context and won’t be made an afterthought to competing priorities.

The Chicago Large Lots program has gained a lot attention for its tech platform LargeLots.org, which lets residents of particular neighborhoods purchase city-owned vacant lots for $1. This online platform originated not within Chicago’s civic hacking community but thanks to the coordination of various neighborhood associations and community groups at the helm of the policy response to this issue. As the policy developed in coordination with the City, these groups eventually leveraged social connections to craft civic tech to help execute the policy.

These social connections existed in part due to a previous investment in organizing capacity from the federally-funded Broadband Technology Opportunities Program (BTOP). In Chicago, some BTOP money was directed towards helping local organizations hire tech organizers and digital literacy instructors to “expand digital education and training for individuals, families, and businesses”.

Demond Drummer, former tech organizer at Teamwork Englewood, presents on LargeLots.org. Photo by Chris Whitaker.

Demond Drummer, former tech organizer at Teamwork Englewood, presents on LargeLots.org. Photo by Chris Whitaker.

One of those organizations was Teamwork Englewood, a community organization that would later play a role in the creation of the Large Lots Program. As part of the larger Program, Teamwork Englewood was able to steward the creation of LargeLots.org because, thanks to BTOP, Teamwork had existing paid staff whose responsibility it was to both invest in local digital skills and seek context-relevant opportunities to leverage those skills for neighborhood change.

Paid capacity can express itself in a far more localized ways, too. For example, the student-run Hidden Valley Nature Lab, which enables teachers to modify their curricula for place-based learning using QR codes, is the product of general paid support (at both the teacher and student-level) for digital educational programming within the communal social infrastructure that is New Fairfield High School, a public school in Western Connecticut.

Partner with Hyperlocal Groups with Intersecting Interests

Red_Hook

Digital Stewards settling up the Red Hook Wifi network. Image via DigitalStewards.org.

Red Hook Wifi, a community-designed and stewarded wireless Internet network in Red Hook, Brooklyn, New York, is the product of a layered series of partnerships:

  • A national organization (the Open Technology Institute (OTI), with expertise in community wireless networks)
  • A hyperlocal organization (the Red Hook Initiative (RHI), a community center devoted to social justice and restoration of local public life through youth-led approaches)
  • A variety of educational, residential, and local business relationships that not only utilize the network, but help expand the capacity available to keep the network alive through another RHI program, the Digital Stewards.

This deep meshing of missions, skills, and structures enabled the national organization (OTI) to support hyperlocal work in a way that genuinely allowed the local organization (RHI) to not only drive, but ultimately (literally) steward the ongoing success of both the wifi network and the social infrastructure needed to keep the network relevant and present within the community.

Offer Context-Sensitive Incentives for Participation

Although most of the examples above focus on organizational relationships, to catalyze the participation of individuals, explore the use of specific incentives.

For example, the Civic User Testing Group (CUTGroup) is a model of user experience testing run by the Smart Chicago Collaborative that enables “regular residents” to explore and critique so-called civic apps. To date, most participants are given a $20 VISA gift card for their engagement, although Smart Chicago is exploring the use of more contextually relevant awards, such as money for groceries for testing apps related to food access.

Sometimes getting to play specific role in the activity can be its own currency. DiscoTechs (short for “Discovering Technology”) are an open event format for teaching and sharing digital skills in a communal context) and operate utilizing social capital incentives. Although some DiscoTechs cater to specialized skills, many give neighbors, peers, and local organizations the chance to demonstrate a variety of personal technical expertise (such as photography, digital storytelling, music-making, coding, fabrication, you name it) and gain new community credibility alongside new contracts and other opportunities in the process.

DiscoTech stations can range from mapping and coding how-tos to digital storytelling to...Scrabble. Photo by Maureen McCann.

DiscoTech stations can range from mapping and coding how-tos to digital storytelling to…Scrabble., each offering unique incentives to participate for both teachers and attendees. Photo by Maureen McCann.

 

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Up next: Mode #2: Utilizing Existing Tech Skills and Infrastructure.

**Disclaimer: I receive funding for my research from both the Smart Chicago Collaborative as well as the Open Technology Institute at New America. However, any projects covered by these organizations in the course of my research have been subjected to the same evaluation criteria that all projects in the Experimental Modes Initiative are subject to. More details about these criteria and my methodology can be found here.

5 Modes of Civic Engagement in Civic Tech

Laurenellen McCann

Over the last several months, I’ve been researching community-driven processes for the creation of public interest technology.

What distinguishes community-driven civic tech from “civic tech” more generally is the extent to which the humans that a tool is intended to serve literally guide the lifecycle of that tool. In other words, community-driven civic technologies are built at the speed of inclusion — the pace necessary not just to create a tool but to do so with in-depth communal input and stewardship — and directly respond to the needs, ideas, and wants of those they’re intended to benefit.

In order to guide discovery and analysis of projects that follow this “build with, not for” approach, I developed a series of Criteria for People First Civic Tech to determine the degree to which tools, projects, and programs prioritize people and real world application above production. You can read more about the criteria here.

PeopleUsing this criteria, I analyzed dozens of “civic technology” projects, mostly, but not exclusively within the US. I disregarded whether or not the projects or creators identified with “civic tech,” looking instead at whether or not the “tech” in question was created to serve public good. (Our interest, after all, is to explore the “civic” in “civic tech.”)

Those projects that fit the People First Criteria were diverse in terms of the technologies developed, the benefits yielded, and the communities that were (and, in some cases, still are) in the driver’s seat. But there are a great number of similarities, too — consistent, proven strategies and tactics that other practitioners of (and investors in) civic tech can learn from.

Over the next two months we’ll dig deeper into these approaches, which I’ve rounded up below as the “5 Modes of Civic Engagement in Civic Tech,” a series of engagement strategies listed along with common tactics for implementation, that I encountered in my research. We’ll also jump into case studies of some of the civic tech projects that have successfully implemented community-driven processes wielding these modes and hear from leading practitioners on the forefront of “bottom-up innovation.”

We know the landscape of existing community-driven work is far more expansive than we can discover on our own, so I encourage you: If you’ve got a project that fits the People First Criteria, don’t hesitate to .

5 Modes of Civic Engagement in Civic Tech

  1. Utilize Existing Social Infrastructure
    • Pay for Organizing Capacity in Existing Community Structures
    • Partner With Hyperlocal Groups With Intersecting Interests
    • Offer Context-Sensitive Incentives for Participation
  2. Utilize Existing Tech Skills & Infrastructure
    • Remix, Don’t Reinvent
    • Use One Tech to Teach Another
  3. Create Two-Way Educational Environments
    • Start with Digital/Media Skills Trainings
    • Co-Construct New Infrastructure
  4. Lead From Shared Spaces
    • Leverage Existing Knowledge Bases
    • Leverage Common Physical Spaces
  5. Distribute Power
    • Treat Volunteers as Members
    • Train Students to Become Teachers
    • White-label Your Approach
    • Be a Participant

Continue reading →

Criteria: People First, Tech Second

Laurenellen McCann

What does it look like to build civic tech with, not for? What’s the difference between sentiment and action?

That’s the thrust of Experimental Modes in Civic Engagement for Civic Tech — a special initiative that I’m leading for Smart Chicago as part of their Community Information Deep Dive. The scope of this work is guided by the “civic” in “civic technology”, the idea that people need to be prioritized above production.

The project has three parts: (1) a scan of the field, identifying practitioners of needs-responsive, community-driven tech and the basic characteristics, best practices, and models that define their work, (2) a convening of practitioners at the Chicago Community Trust in April 2015, and (3) a book, documenting our investigation of the space and civic tech tactics and strategies that refocus the work on people.

Criteria

In order to inform the scan of the field, I developed a series of criteria for evaluating whether a project meets the standard of being needs-responsive and community-driven. To prioritize people and build with them is to:

  1. Start with people: Work with the real people and real communities you are part of, represent, and/or are trying to serve
  2. Cater to context: Leverage and operate with an informed understanding of the existing social infrastructure and sociopolitical contexts that affect your work
  3. Respond to need: Let expressed community ideas, needs, wants, and opportunities drive problem-identification and problem-solving
  4. Build for best fit: Develop solutions and tools that are the most useful to the community and most effectively support outcomes and meet needs
  5. Prove it: Demonstrate and document that community needs, ideas, skills, and other contributions are substantially integrated into — and drive — the lifecycle of the project 

Beyond direct application to the Experimental Modes initiative, my goal in creating these criteria was to define the leanest standard possible for translating the idea of “with” to a series of identifiable practices that can be used for further investigation, accountability, and guidance outside of this project.

Some of the principles defined above have been long mirrored in (and championed by!) the design community, but their expression has yet to become part of the primary approach to creating civic technology as commonly talked about today. Nor has there been much dialogue about what it means to do more than just design with a community, but to literally build and evaluate these civic tools together — to let community drive the whole process.

As we push this conversation — and active experimentation — forward, our next steps focus on sharing modes of existing community co-construction with high-value lessons and patternable best practices. We’re also organizing a convening of practitioners, so if your work/projects you know of meet the criteria above.

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Dig this inspiring stock image of collaboration? Learn more about it here.

Preface: Experimental Modes of Civic Engagement in Civic Tech

Smart Chicago

Today we’re launching a new project— Experimental Modes of Civic Engagement in Civic Tech. This is a project led by Laurenellen McCann that deepens her work in needs-responsive, community-driven processes for creating technology with real people and real communities for public good. See our project page for complete details.

I’m excited about this project because it supports so many important nodes for Smart Chicago:

  • Keeping the focus on people and communities rather than technology. We are leading creators of civic tech, and we publish a lot of software. It’s people and impact we care about
  • Driving toward a shared language around the work. There is a lot of enthusiasm for “people” in our space right now. This project sharpens pencils and will put definition to the work
  • Highlighting the workers: communities are doing this work and doing it right. We seek to lift them up and spread their methods

Au Natur-Elle #latergramSmart Chicago is utterly devoted to being of impact here in Chicago. As our work progresses, we see that we have opportunity to have influence all over. This project, rooted in the Chicago Community Trust, funded by them and the Knight Foundation, executed by a leading thinker in the field, is one way we’re doing just that.

 

Smart Chicago Awarded Community Information Challenge Grant from the Knight Foundation and The Chicago Community Trust

Smart Chicago

knight-foundation-logoToday the Knight Foundation announced an award to Smart Chicago, through their longtime partner and our founder & fiscal agent, The Chicago Community Trust, to “continue to design, build and demonstrate the power of digital tools to the community and empower residents to use news and information to improve their quality of life.”

This grant builds off of previous work among The Trust, Knight, and Smart Chicago— the Kick-Starting Civic Innovation grant, which we have used to fund the CivicWorks project.

The Trust and the Knight Foundation have a long relationship in the Community Information Challenge, including the Community Media Matters program funded by both parties.