End of Year Wrap-Up

It has been a great year for us and neat to finish up having more families with computers at home than allowed for under our Community Partnership Fund agreement.

Our graduation of 6 families at Aberfeldy School last week has brought our project total to 158 families.

Our plans for next year are to obtain more Community Partnership funding to expand the project for another 150 families. We plan to include families with pre-school children without computers at home, and also the elderly who are key caregivers. We will be continuing to collaborate widely and link up with other local education providers, community organisations and agencies to do our best to see ICT uptake in Wanganui is maximised.

Thanks to everyone involved with the Wanganui Computers in Homes - our project has been a privilege to coordinate and our success has only been possible because of all the enthusiasm, wisdom and commitment we have received from the steering group, trainers’ technicians and service providers.

Please take time to share awareness of our project:

Visit our 23 on-line photo albums with photos from throughout the project
Download our latest PowerPoint presentation about our project, with great images.
Download a Word version of our project evaluation prepared for the Community Partnership Fund

CIH Family Rejuvenations Surveys Show Project is Working

Here is our latest project report to the Wanganui Distict Council's Community Development Committee:

One hundred and thirty five families have now graduated to date. This is 90% of the NZ Government's Digital Strategy Community Partnership Fund’s (CPF) project agreement deliverables for 150 families.

Final classes to complete the CPF agreement have started for 17 families at Wanganui East School and 6 at Aberfeldy School. Graduation celebrations for these classes will be in October/November (Wanganui East School’s is 28 October). After these, families with computers at home will total 158.

Surveys of CIH families have been undertaken with 41 surveys obtained from the 107 families who had graduated up to the end of July 2008, this is 38%. A comprehensive knowledgebase has been obtained, individual responses have been consolidated and summarised identifying outcomes of the families’ experiences.

Wanganui CIH Mums completing Rejuvenation surveys at Castlecliff School on 10 September 2008


Donna Ngatai is thrilled to be the lucky draw winner for the Castlecliff session.

Key findings identified so far are 39% of families reporting they have undertaken other training and education since becoming a CIH family. This is 4 times the assumed level for tertiary uptake and will considerably increase the in-kind contribution estimations to match and better CPF cash funding. Another positive result of the survey is that 29% of the families reported having a computer at home helped them find work.

Strong evidence that the project has reached its objectives has been obtained. 90% of the respondents reported using email and the internet. This is a good indication that ongoing family uptake of the first 6 months free internet cost is perceived to be worthwhile by them.

The Wanganui Computers in Homes Project will be submitting an expression of interest (EOI) to the CPF for operating more Wanganui CIH initiatives in 2009/10. The EOI is due to be submitted by 10 November 2008.

Final CPF agreement requirements to complete the project by 31 December 2008 are a project completion report due on 30 September, and a project evaluation report on 30 November. The outstanding issue to be resolved is agreement with the CPF to carry-forward project funds in 2009 to cover on-going project costs for support.

Sample comments from CIH family rejuvenation surveys:

“In my eyes thee is nothing that I would want to improve. This was an awesome course that built my confidence up.”

“I don't think there is much more CIH could do. Having the opportunity of a computer in the home is really fantastic. Without CIH we would not have a computer at all. Thanks”

“I felt the programme was run very well. Doing the 20 hours a couple of hours at a time was great as it worked in well with working and the kids. When I contacted the virus I was contacted back quickly and the computer was back in the home just over a week later, we were all very pleased and grateful.”

“The computer is mainly used for my 6 year old who has verbal apraxia. It has taught him to concentrate and try to use his speech.”

“Child helps parents!”

“Confidence using a computer. My teenage son has learnt heaps and has used these skills to help other kids on his course. My 7 year old daughter loves to Google all topics and has learnt a lot as a result”

“We got connected with Watchdog Net at a very cheap rate and it has all the basics we require. Very happy and have been still with them for the last year.”

Wanganui's Digital Strategies Exciting Concepts That Lift the Spirit

Congratulations to the Wanganui District Council for getting in behind the Digital Strategy and ensuring we have our digital connectivity enabled. Here is Wanganui Deputy Mayor, Dot McKinnon's Council Comment publised in the River City Press on 11 September 2008. Thanks for your leadership Dot and here's to us making the most of the ICT juggernaught.

Wanganui River City Press - Good News for CIH

Here is a summary of Wanganui Computers in Homes progress published by the River City Press on 28 August 2008. Thanks to the River City Press for all your support enabling us to get our messages out there.

"Awesome" CIH Tuition received at Wanganui East

Our 15th Graduation at Wanganui East School on 31 July 2008 was described as "Awsome" by Tracey Rapana. Here she is with her whanau at the celebration in a scan of the Wanganui Chronicle's story on 2 August




Click here for more photos by Ian Jones from Maxilabs and photos by Alistair Fraser

Wanganui East School Graduation Today Our Biggest So Far

We are taking a big huge step forward today with a graduation celebration for 28 students from our latest classes. These classes have been running on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday nights at Wanganui East School during June and July. Our students were from families with children at various schools around Wanganui. We will be featuring photographs and stories from this milestone event next week.

This is our 15th graduation and it will take us to a total of 135 families who have computers in homes. This leaves 15 families to engage to complete our funding agreement allocation of 150. They have been identified and will be starting classes at Wanganui East and Aberfeldy Schools in August.

It is sad that we have finished recruiting and prepare to complete the final reporting requirements for our agreement with the Digital Strategy Community Partnership Fund to run the project.

On the other hand, it is fantastic that we will be evaluating the impacts of the project through our Rejuvenation Programme which includes a family survey and a computer WOF. As we collect this information we are already discovering CIH has made a very big positive difference to the participation families. As well as helping the children, parents are benefiting too. Around a quarter of surveys completed so far identify a parent or caregiver who has undertaken more training or education since graduation and a quarter of the surveys found a parent or caregiver had got a job or undertaken a volunteer role.

Our project is worth continuing beyond its existing commitments. We have accumulated a lot of experience and capability in Wanganui. We are looking forward to the release of the new Digital Strategy 2 when it released in August and will be using this as our springboard to move forward. We are also pleased to have established strong collaborations and working relationships in Wanganui so far and we will be leveraging these to generate new initiatives to grow the project.

Computers in homes make big difference, says group

During May we have had graduations for families from Wanganui Intermediate Schhool and Wanganui Girls College. It was fantastic to share their enthusiasm and achievents and I am looking forward to Computers in Homes helping to achieve their dreams.

Here are the Wanganui Intermediate group:

More photos at this link
http://picasaweb.google.com/wanganuicih/WanganuiIntermediateSchool7May2008

Here are the Wanganui Girls College group:

More photos at this link

http://picasaweb.google.com/wanganuicih/WanganuiGirlsCollege15May2008

Merania Karauria from the Wanganui Chronicle has followed up one of the families and published this article about the benefits of Computers in Homes for the Potaka-Gardiner whanau:

Cranking Up the Benefits of ICT and Digital Capability

Wanganui CIH is completing recruiting and training for families to be assisted under its seeding funding from the Community partnership Fund.

During May, we will be graduating 10 families from our new partners: Wanganui Intermediate School, Wanganui East School and Wanganui Girls College. Our recruitment and family uptakes have been slower than expected. We are turning this problem into an opportunity to strengthen our project as we know there are plenty of families in Wanganui who don’t have computers at home and connect to the internet and use email from there. StatisticsNZ said 41.6% of Wanganui’s households did not connect to the internet in December 2006. This is 7,092 households.

As we move towards completing our current targeted family numbers we are working on strategies to continue and grow CIH in Wanganui in the future. We are stepping up our collaboration with local organisations to strengthen our advocacy and obtain support to sustain our benefits.

We are pleased to see the release of the draft Digital Strategy 2. It is open for submission until 12 May. This is a great blueprint for a prosperous future and we will be letting them know we support it. We will be recommending the adoption of the Digital communities Action Plan Framework which includes Whole of Town Computers in Homes schemes.

Here is a link to the draft Digital Strategy 2 - We urge you to peruse it and support it by making your own submission
http://www.digitalstrategy.govt.nz/digital-strategy-2/

Kura Kokohuia and Ngamatapouri School Graduations

Our latest graduations were at Kura Kokohuia and Ngamatapouri Schools.

Here is Kokohuia "Champion" Shane Mathews talking to graduates and whanau on 3 December 2007.

More photos here http://picasaweb.google.com/wanganuicih/KuraKokohuiaCIHGraduation

Christmas was extra special for Computers in Homes families at Ngamatapouri School who graduated on 22 December. School principal Raena Mead has worked hard to get the programme established and we look forward to CIH making a big difference.

More photos here http://picasaweb.google.com/wanganuicih/NgamatapouriSchoolPrizegivingCIHGraduation