Summer-Fall 2001

At the press conference announcing the State Street grant at the United South End Settlements (USES) in Boston: George A. Russell, Jr., Executive Vice President and Director of Community Affairs for State Street; Kate Snow, Codman Square Health Center and CTCNet Board President; John Fiore, Chief Information Officer of State Street, Frieda Garcia, Executive Director of USES.

Thanks to a grant from State Street's Global Philanthropy Program, CTCNet is excited to begin implementing a new initiative to support CTCs in the Boston Metropolitan area - a pilot for a Floating Help Desk, an on-call technical support service exclusively for CTCs.

The program has goals to: identify strategies and test approaches for improving the operation and service provision capabilities of CTCs; address centers' day-to-day technical problems in real or near-real time; reduce the learning/development curve of centers and center staff; and assist with the sustainability activities of centers and center facilities (e.g. technology planning and grant research).

The pilot will target 10-12 CTCNet affiliate centers in the Boston area to undertake a three-fold program:

1. Do a Needs Assessment - to determine what specific issues should be addressed by the State Street project. Surveys, interviews and site visits will help assess and prioritize issues to be addressed such as funding, staffing, training, locating available resources, and planning successful activities/programs/curricula. Currently, CTCNet is considering a combination of several techniques for the needs assessment. Additionally, CTCNet will create a module for a needs assessment procedure based on this identifying process, to allow centers or other groups to perform them efficiently and regularly.
   
   
2. Establish a Floating Help Desk - to provide on-call, continuous technical support to the pilot centers with the expertise to troubleshoot hardware and software problems, instruct staff on tips for improved equipment maintenance, and advise centers in other technical matters, such as network options and hardware purchases. The Help Desk will be staffed by volunteers including corporate volunteers and technology interns (e.g., college students, high school students, VISTAs, and CTC graduates) and paid technicians.
   
   
3. Design a Technology Internship & Corporate Volunteers Program - to complement the paid staff of the pilot centers by providing diverse skill sets for centers and to help operate the Floating Help Desk.

CTCNet hopes to complete the pilot stage of the project over the next year, with the intention of expanding its services beyond the initial participants to include all CTCNet affiliates in the Metropolitan Boston area. Through its participation in the Greater Boston Broadband Network CTCNet plans to expand the multi-media components and resources of the project.