Revisiting the Name Issue

Here were the names that we cam up in class yesterday, in descending order of votes. What do you think?

Boston Area Service and Engagement Network (BASEN)
Boston ACTS (advancing Community through Service)
BLinks
OurBlock.org
Boston NOW (Neighborhood Organizing Web)

Somerville Community Corporation

Like some other people in the class, I haven't had any relative success contacting community organizations. I've emailed some people, and called but it's hard to get a hold of them through both channels, especially since through phone-calls it has to be between 9-4/5pm and at some points, I got directed through a channel of people because nobody knew who the right person would be to speak with.

Regardless, like Honey, I would like to target an interesting group in Somerville since I didn't have much success with the other groups I was supposed to contact. The SOmerville Community Corporation works with Somerville residents who are at risk of homelessness due to rent or utility arrears, high costs of housing, substandard housing, and other reasons. The program's primary goal is to stabilize families by helping them maintain their current housing. If the client needs to move, SCC helps them find new housing.

LIFT (formerly NSP)

LIFT (formerly National Student Partnerships) is a growing movement to combat poverty and expand opportunity for all people in the United States. LIFT encourages people to try to be able to achieve economic security and pursue their aspirations. LIFT clients and volunteers work one-on-one to find jobs, secure safe and stable housing, make ends meet through public benefits and tax credits, and obtain quality referrals for services like childcare and healthcare. Simultaneously, the LIFT experience pushes volunteers to grapple with our country's most challenging issues related to poverty, race, inequality, and policy. Since LIFT's founding, over 5,000 volunteers have served more than 30,000 individuals and families. LIFT works with families in Somerville to do many things, including the following:

• Employment: Assessing needs and strengths; providing personalized job coaching and job search assistance; creating and distributing resumes and cover letters; providing computer, Internet and telephone access; identifying employment opportunities, and job training and educational programs.
• Housing: Locating affordable permanent housing, as well as short-term shelter.
• Child care: Identifying affordable child care options.
• Health care: Identifying affordable health care options, including mental health services and substance abuse treatment.
• Legal aid: Locating low-cost or free legal assistance.
• Transportation: Determining transportation options.
• Other services: Other services may include tax counseling and filing assistance; language and citizenship resources; listening, support, advocacy and mentorship.

Thinking Spatially

In a portion of The Rise of Personalized Networking, Barry Wellman makes a point about how everything does not have to be spatial anymore, even though we still think that way. This point really struck me because it reminded me of a conversation, I participated in, in another class. In my class, we were talking about various election reforms, and a teacher posed a question asking why we elect representatives geographically; instead, she suggested, now that we have the Internet to make it plausible, why are we not organizing the country by beliefs, race, or another important category? This question was shocking to me because I never even considered organizing our political system any other way than by geography. However, even though the idea of reorganizing representation sounded interesting, I ended up defending our geographical method of choosing representatives, emphasizing that certain parts of the country and their specific issues might get overlooked with a new system. Nonetheless, it made me think. Bringing that lesson, and Barry Wellman's point back to our class, I wonder now that we have the potential to organize in a non-spatial manner how useful a tool that is. Our social network is organized geographically. We are not looking past the Boston area right now. On the other hand, how useful would it instead be to create a world wide social network map for hunger or for homelessness? There are positives and negatives to each method, and I am curious about other opinions on the issue.

Incentivizing Cyber Participation

In his piece The Internet and Virtual Civil Society, Kittilson claims that “interactions on the internet build cyberskills that lead to online participation, but not traditional forms of participation.” Project PERIS, however, hopes to accomplish exactly the opposite: use interactions on the internet to facilitate and increase traditional forms of participation or service. As I see it, users of the map may virtually participate in one of two ways: either passively, simply providing contact information and waiting to be presented with an opportunity, or actively, using the map as an advanced tool to mobilize. In order to encourage the latter usage, it is important that users truly view the map as a valuable resource so they virtually participate on a regular basis. To achieve this, we should incentivize active usage by providing access to advanced tools for community organizing. As an example, organizations joining the network could opt in to including a “service” component on their window. This component would then add some kind of pop-up or page that appears when an individual links to the organization, asking them if they would be interested in being added to the equivalent of an ‘activist’ elist for that group. Individuals could further specify what types of activities they would be interested in participating in. Then, when the organization is in need of volunteers or is hosting an event, they would be able to send out a message to all those who opted in, either on the website or directly to their email. This is just one example of a community organizing tool the map could provide to organizations to incentivize them using the map (requesting volunteers, posting events, etc.), but it is something we may want to explore because this map will be most functional only if all parties are actively participating.

Boys and Girls Club of Somerville

The Boys and Girls Club of Somerville is located on Washington St., directly off of McGrath Highway. They are part of the great Middlesex County Boys and Girls Clubs, but house the main offices in this building. They primarily work with kids from k-6th grade and 7th-12th grade. Almost all who attend are from Somerville. They are a staple within the community, as many kids use them on a daily basis. Their programs for younger kids are much more popular and more highly attended than their teen programs, but both ages come to the Club.

While the B and G Club may not seem like they are directly helping with the economic recovery of Somerville, they work in more indirect ways. They allow for parents to spend a bit more time at work by giving their kids a place to use computers and get homework help for free. They also offer different programs for the teens such as how to deal with finances and decision making. Both these things can have ripple effects into the greater Somerville community in helping slowly build back up what may have been shaken down.

This Club also has worked with numerous other organizations throughout Somerville in the past and present. They obviously have a fairly strong tie with the different schools throughout Somerville, and have to work with many on a weekly basis. In fact, they rent out part of their building to the Somerville School's Superintendent's office. They have also worked with several non-profits that focus on youth services such as SCAT, CAAS, and Teen Empowerment Somerville.

BUILD

I have been extremely sick for quite a while now. Therefore, I couldn't have a chance to interview anybody. I did send out the emails to the community in Somerville organizations. However, they said they've been busy and couldn't get back to me with the answers just yet.

Although I do not have a progress, I saw this one organization at TUFTS that looks really interesting and will be really awesome to add on to our map. They are Understanding through International Learning and Development (BUILD.) I read about them on Tufts Daily today.

In the near future, I hope to have a chance to talk to them because I think it will be a good idea to add them in to our map.

Somerville Mathematics Fund

The Somerville Mathematics Fund was founded in 2000 by Erica Voolich. The program is an affiliate of the organization "Dollars for Scholars". The Somerville Mathematics Fund assists the community in 3 main ways: by providing scholarships to local students, offering grants to area schools for mathematics instruction, and by hosting community-wide events that engage members in mathematical activities.

The program is particularly beneficial to the community during difficult economic times for two reasons. One, SMF is providing scholarships for students to go to college at a time when money is scarce, and two, they are providing grants and programming so that students can receive additional or enriched mathematical education. Many school programs have been cut as a result of a loss of funding, so these contributions are particularly beneficial. The Somerville Mathematics Fund is closely tied with the Somerville School District.