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Inspiring Wireless Innovation

Funded by:  AT&T Wireless (now Cingular Wireless)

Project Details

In 2004, NPower partnered with AT&T Wireless (now Cingular Wireless) to present the AT&T Wireless Community Connections Program, a capacity-building effort to provide nonprofits with access to the knowledge, tools, and resources needed to effectively integrate wireless technology into their service delivery.
 
Exploring the Potential of Wireless Workshops
Through this program, NPower developed a workshop on how to apply wireless technology to nonprofit work.  This workshop was offered for free to nonprofits in Seattle, New York, and Los Angeles and continues to be offered by NPower Affiliate offices in other areas.  The workshop materials are available for download below.
 
Community Connections Award
NPower also helped launch the AT&T Wireless Community Connections Award, a program that awarded over $140,000 in funds and equipment to support innovative uses of wireless technology in 6 nonprofits across the country.  The Award recipients in 2004 were:
 
Valle del Sol, Inc. (Phoenix, AZ) - A provider of behavioral health and social services, Valle del Sol staff members will use wireless Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs) during home and school visits to   access real-time patient data and resource referral information.

Child Care Resource Center (Van Nuys, CA) - To help overcome the challenge it faces in getting parents within its 3,000 square mile jurisdiction to travel to one of only two offices, Child Care Resource Center used laptops with wireless modems to go out into the community and provide parents with critical child care resource information such as health insurance, food programs, and childcare subsidies for eligible families.

Catholic Charities of the Archdiocese of Miami, Inc. (Miami, FL) - A leading nonprofit provider of social services, this organization plans to use web-enabled Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs) to improve the tracking of undocumented immigrant children who are at high risk of flight or abduction. House parents will log the status of the children in their care into a central database system via the wireless PDAs. Additionally, wireless phones will provide counselors with easily accessible language translation services.

Detroit Parent Network (Detroit, MI) - An organization focused on improving parenting and family communication, members of this nonprofit's Parent Leadership program will use 25 wireless Blackberry handheld devices to access parenting tips, web sites, and data while counseling other parents in community settings.

Asian Community Development Corporation (Boston, MA) - A goal of the Asian Community Development Corporation is to provide access to social services and economic resources for linguistic minority communities. The nonprofit will use its grant for a program that enables bilingual community members to provide on-demand interpretation services via wireless phones to limited-English speaking community members.

National Capital Area Chapter of the American Red Cross (Washington, D.C.) - In its efforts to help people prevent, prepare and respond to emergencies, this humanitarian nonprofit will provide members of its Disaster Action Team with wireless laptops to deliver essential disaster services on-site and in real-time and improve service to disaster victims. Additionally, the use of wireless technology will help the chapter increase client response time.

Due to AT&T Wireless' merger with Cingular, the AT&T Wireless Community Connections Award did not continue after 2004.

 

Downloads

Exploring the Potential of Wireless Workshop Presentation
Exploring the Potential of Wireless Workshop Handouts

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