Tech learners celebrate library’s hands-on training
After two cohorts of digital learners, the Forest Park Library hosted a Digital Resilience Celebration on a recent Sunday afternoon. Not only was this an opportunity to reconnect learners, it was a way to share the powerful impact it had with community leaders from Forest Park’s village hall and the library.
The Cook County Digital Equity IMPACTS Small Grants Program has concluded and 25 learners in Forest Park benefited from the partnership between Growing Community Media, publisher of the Review, the Forest Park Public Library, and Wright to Learn which enabled people to “learn and earn” laptops by the end of the course. Along the way, the Forest Park Review reported on the progress and told the stories of the adult learners.
The effort to build up digital access, confidence, safety and the infrastructure to sustain inclusion is prioritized throughout Cook County. To encourage community participation and ‘micro-plans’ for growth for county wide equitable digital growth, this small grant program encouraged the network of resources and ecosystems that already are available in neighborhoods to collectively tackle some of these challenges.
These inaugural year grants have already had a ripple effect in communities it has touched. This program showed “what is possible when we invest in models that equip our communities for the digital age and center the human stories that make digital access and knowledge real in our daily lives,” said Tyra Bosnic, a grants and partnerships manager at City Bureau, which co-sponsored the grants program throughout Cook County. “By sharing our knowledge with others it helps the information spread,” and “seeing how learners have shared their stories, so their communities know why supporting everyone’s ability to access technology matters.”
Through the library, Tech Empowerment classes and Wright to Learn’s Digital Resilience workshops, learners had the opportunity to gain more than tech skills, it utilized a digital resilience learning model. This approach encourages participants to have three foundational leaning tools: emotional awareness, safety awareness and pattern recognition. Since technology is ever changing, building confidence in experimenting with technology and being open to new experiences is key for successful ongoing learning that can then spread to friends and family.
Several students came to the celebration and shared examples of the many skills they took away from the experience. These included connecting to a remote Wifi network; how to use a laptop in a remote location; being less afraid or anxious about experimenting with technology; patterns to help identify scams; creating passwords that are memorable, unique and safe; whether two factor authentication is safe; and the pros and cons of biometric authentication.
Skye Lavin, Forest Park’s adult services librarian, said the library will continue to provide classes, support services, and have a new resource called Northstar literacy which will springboard into more classes. In addition, the library enables connectivity, offers digital hotspots to check out and will be offering some information to help people find the best and most affordable networks they can connect to in their area among their services.
Community leaders also attended the event and framed prioritizing digital literacy and its importance in communication throughout Forest Park and the region. Rachell Entler, village administrator, identified that technology is becoming more integrated into the daily lives of our community. “One of the things the village is working on is our parking pay machines — which are very expensive to maintain and we are moving to a more app based payment. We have both right now,” but she has heard some resistance to using an app for parking and “restaurants not having menus that someone can look at and hold rather than having to scan a QR code.” Recognizing the challenges of adopting new technology, Enter said, “it falls on both ends — teaching the older generation to use and feel comfortable with the QR codes and with online work and those of us in the online world having more compassion.”
Cecily Rowland was in one of the digital cohorts and has since made a video for family. She also uses the Spothero Parking app when parking downtown. She added that she has been keeping up the habit of getting on a computer. “Coming here helped build up your confidence again, even though I’m not a dummy, I can still get on this computer and do something.”
Editor’s note: This is the fifth in a series of stories about the Forest Park Public Library’s digital inclusion efforts. The series is underwritten by a grant from the Cook County Digital Equity IMPACT Small Grants program. The grant is a shared effort between Wright to Learn, the library and Growing Community Media, publisher of the Forest Park Review.
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