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Building a Neighborhood Information Infrastructure through acCEss

by Jamie McClelland
Libraries for the Future

CPSR News Volume 15, Number 3: Summer 1997

I think Newark has a lot of crime because some people who live in buildings like on 7th and 8th street -they get shot sometimes by things they have gotten involved in like fighting and guns and drugs and stuff. I don't think people should get shot over stupid stuff. -Christina, Age 10, Newark, NJ

At the Springfield branch of the Newark Public Library, an innovative program called acCEss is experimenting with how computers and Internet access can help address some of the real problems in the neighborhood. A partnership between Children's Express (hence the capital CE in acCEss), Libraries for the Future, and the Newark Public Library, acCEss takes advantage of six high-end Pentium computers and an ISDN connection to the Internet provided by a National Telecommunications Information Administration grant. The project also greatly benefits from two other library-sponsored activities, the Homework Assistance Program and an electronic neighborhood network program called Making Healthy MUSIC. In addition, acCEss is a component of Libraries for the Future's Community Library Information Collaborative (CLIC), which builds community support for the public library through outreach and the development of programming that promotes community ownership of the library.

Children's Express adapted its oral journalism program into the acCEss program to fit the public library and to take advantage of the Internet connection. Through acCEss, young people determine the most important issues facing youth in their community, gather research and ideas on those issues, and create opportunities to have a variety of young voices heard throughout their neighborhood. These voices are captured on tape recorders, transcribed, edited and disseminated electronically and in print to the community. This article's epigraph came from one such transcription. The purpose of acCEss is to provide leadership and communications skills to young people, create a forum for the issues they find important, and strengthen the public library as a vital community center.

So how does "cyberspace" contribute to the program? The most obvious ways include the use of the World Wide Web for research and dissemination of finished articles. Also, email is used for communicating with both Libraries for the Future and the New York Children's Express bureau, to garner feedback from national staff and from young people in other communities.

In addition, however, the program uniquely benefits from working with a separate network that preceded it in the neighborhood. The Making Healthy MUSIC project uses a software program called Multi User Sessions in Community (MUSIC), which was developed by Alan Shaw and is specifically designed for non-computer users. It allows users to talk about local concerns with their neighbors through bulletin boards, discussion areas, resource areas for information about community institutions (such as the library, University Hospital, and elementary school), and free email accounts for participants. Through MUSIC, kids in the acCEss program have an ideal electronic forum for discussing issues with the neighborhood.

Despite the presence of this technology, acCEss is committed to helping develop youth skills and strengthen the community by strengthening the library. To accomplish these goals, technology is considered a tool, not an end in itself. For example, AcCEss takes care to use the World Wide Web as just one among many library resources, including books and magazines, in addition to the librarians themselves. Furthermore, like the other media, technology is used critically. Part of the curriculum involves learning how to judge and evaluate information, comprehending the limits of different information sources, and understanding how information and images are manipulated by the editing process.

In the end, acCEss is not primarily a technology program, but a youth leadership and community development program that uses technology and cyberspace to accomplish its goals. Alan Shaw, who developed the software for MUSIC, slightly altered the term National Information Infrastructure to characterize the acCEss program. In his words, we are creating a Neighborhood Information Infrastructure.

Relevant Websites:
The acCEss program web site: www.lff.org/demo/access.html
Libraries for the Future: www.lff.org
Children's Express: www.ce.org
Newark Public Library: www.npl.org
Making Healthy Music: music.umdnj.edu

Jamie McClelland is the Technology and Policy Specialist for Libraries for the Future, a national nonprofit organization of public library advocates, and the project coordinator for acCEss. In addition, as a member of the Paper Tiger Television Collective, he is an independent video producer and conducts video production and media literacy workshops.

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