GFiber announces ‘digital literacy’ partnership with Chandler

Two people spoke enthusiastically about a city-corporate partnership to the Chandler City Council at its Aug. 11 regular meeting.

Will Novak of GFiber, or Google Fiber,and Dr. Erin Carr-Jordan of the Institute for Digital Inclusion Acceleration spoke briefly to council about what they call the “groundbreaking partnership to improve digital access and literacy across Arizona.”

Novak said even though one of Google’s main partnerships with the city involves connecting the city with fiberoptic Internet cabling, digital literacy and “STEM skills and getting as many people as possible to have 21st-century digital skills” is something that his team is passionate about.

Carr-Jordan is the president and CEO of the IDIA and executive director of Digital Equity and Social Impact at Arizona State University. She said IDIA has a “hive” located at San Marcos Elementary School, located near downtown Chandler.

“Our mobile hives really lets us get out to folks who can’t make it to one of our hives (at fixed locations,” Carr-Jordan said. “Everything we do is always free (at hives) and we bring 21st-century skills from education, workforce development, access to health care, access to community building wherever we go, and we’ll try to get to wherever Chandler needs us to be.”

The pair also invited council members outside City Hall to view IDIA’s Mobile Hive. Resembling a high-tech bookmobile or science lab, the technology hub is a van “designed to deliver digital access and literacy across the state.”

GFiber’s single largest donation to a nonprofit in Arizona, according to a news release.

IDIA has reached 22,069 with the Mobile Hive and pop-up Hives in underserved areas, the release states, and as of Aug. 11, IDIA’s Chandler Hive has served more than 3,122 people.

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Jason W. Brooks
Associate Editor

Jason W. Brooks is a News editor for the Daily Independent and the Chandler Independent.

He covers the Chandler area for both yourvalley.net and the monthly print edition while writing for and assisting in the production of the Daily Independent.

Brooks is a well-traveled journalist who has documented life in small American communities in nearly all U.S. time zones.

Born in Washington, D.C. and raised there and in suburban Los Angeles, he has covered community news in California, New Mexico, Arkansas, Iowa, Nebraska and northern Arizona.