September 2001 — Features
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New Jersey's Solution to the Digital Divide
In one after-school project, participants learned word processing skills by writing a letter to Mayor Brian P. Stack of Union City. Participants wrote of their experiences in the ACE Center program and discussed various neighborhood issues that concerned them. Upon receiving the letters, Stack sent each student a thank-you note and made time to visit every participant at their homes to address their concerns.Virtual Reality
Students from the Phillipsburg School District in Warren County are planning to apply the skills they learned at their local ACE Center, located at the Phillipsburg Housing Authority Center. The center plans to run a Sim City project during the summer. Using a software program, students plan to build an exact model of Phillipsburg as it exists today. Once built, they expect to spend time with members of the town government to learn how the town is run and how changes are made. Those changes and the results of simulated natural disasters will be incorporated into the computer-generated models in an attempt to forecast the results. The students then plan to report their findings to the town's government officials for their evaluation and comments.
The ACE Center in Phillipsburg also allows students and their families to meet regularly with school district staff to focus on activities that will help them achieve state standards. "We need to bridge the void of those people in our community who need skills but who are still afraid of schooling," says Larry McKenna, ACE program director. "If we can attract parents, we can probably better attract their kids, and that will result in a win-win situation for our community."
Learning Side By Side
Participants at the Lakewood ACE Center, located in the Lakewood School District in Ocean County, have had great success with the senior citizen component of the grant program, Side By Side. The center was established in the library of Lakewood High School to provide access to computer labs and workshops at no cost to Lakewood families during weeknights and weekends. Every day, about 10 seniors come into the ACE Center for one-on-one computer tutoring with a student. After tutoring, seniors are given the opportunity to visit a class of their choice at the high school.
"It's great to watch our senior citizens reconnect with the world of education," says Toni Lee Ponti, a program coordinator. "Learning never stops. The students love having the senior citizens in their classes and enjoy the relationships they have fostered during computer tutoring."
Practical Applications
In Salem County, ACE Centers have been established within the Salem City School District and at two Salem City Housing Authority community centers. Each community center has six computers and two cameras purchased with grant funds. The housing authority plans to use the equipment to take pictures of housing programs and on field trips for youngsters. In the future, the authority plans to use the equipment to produce an agency newsletter.
With that in mind, Edith Crews, a housing authority coordinator, visited one of the centers to learn how to operate a digital camera. Thanks to John Simons, technology facilitator with the school district, Crews learned all aspects of using a digital camera. Crews says she plans to use the knowledge she gained to teach others involved in housing authority projects.
