On 11/11/2005 16:41, Sophia Huyer wrote about:
On 11-Nov-05, at 10:02 AM, Andy Carvin wrote:
Study Says Europe Has Digital Divide
BRUSSELS, Belgium - A digital divide has appeared among Europeans,
with age, income and education determining whether the continent's
citizens use the Internet, according to a new European Union study
released Thursday. (...)
http://www.mantecabulletin.com/articles/2005/11/11/ap/hitech/
d8dpl9j80.txt
It would also be interesting to know the percentage of women in
these different groups, to get a sense of whether the gender
divide in Europe may be changing.
On Nov. 3, Bonnie Bracey-Sutton sent a description of the Pew Internet
Report on Teen Age Blogging
<http://www.pewinternet.org/PPF/r/166/report_display.asp> to the
Net-Gold <http://groups.yahoo.com/group/net-gold> and Minority
<http://lists.nici-mc2.org/mailman/listinfo/minority> mailing-lists
(1).
This report has a part on gender-related use, showing that girls blog
more than boys, in average. It is based on a Nov. 2004 *US* survey,
though. As to the European situation, Bonnie also collaborates in
several European education-with-IT projects, some women-lead, so
she can
probably answer you more precisely.
I can only answer about my country, Switzerland, also re Don
Samuelson's
and Dave A. Chakrabarti's raising the issue of young people's use of
blogs to coordinate riots.
*Gender*
In Switzerland, gender is still a strong factor in the digital divide.
Some statistics about this can be found in the reports of our
infosociety think-tank <http://www.infosociety.ch> meant to advise the
federal government on information society policies.
percorsoArianna <http://www.percosoArianna.ch> is a women-only program
aiming at empowering women living in remote Alpine valleys through ICT
training, so that they can go back to work once their children start
school, by creating their own projects using ICT resources. One of the
institutions supporting percorsoArianna is our Federal Bureau for
Equity
between Women and Men. But the program tends to go for hi-tech, using
for instance a learning platform made with flash, with a village-like
interface aied at removing psychological barriers against tech
(picture
of the platform in <http://www.percorsoarianna.ch/sez0/
descrittivo1.htm>).
This means that the leading team, in theory all-female too, has to
include someone with the necessary flash expertise to edit and update
it, and so far this someone has been male, though the present one
is now
training two women to do so. But another issue remains: when the
participants finish the program, they will only have used this
custom-made hi-tech flash platform, and not available lighter
solutions
like blogs and online communities.
On the other hand and side, though, G.S. started a "blog for studying"
for her class when she was in the second year of high school
<http://compitionline.splinder.com/>. Actually, she had begun with a
Yahoo group when they were in first year, but then a filter was
installed on the Cantonal server, which blocked all Yahoo and MSN
groups
- so she shifted to this blog. Now she and her class are in 4th grade
and the blog is still going strong. A year ago, they decided that no
names should be mentioned in critical comments about teachers, G.S.
told
me recently.
*Nasty/dangerous/illicit uses of blogs by young people*
Last April, we interviewed Nancy Willard, of the Center for a Safe and
Responsible Internet Use <http://csriu.org> for our Tam Tam broadcast
<www.adisi.ch/tamtam>, about cyberbullying and education to a
proper use
of the internet, including instant messenging, groups and blogs.
Back then, cyberbullying was not perceived as an issue in
Switzerland. A
few months later, though, teachers and education authorities became
aware that teachers' pictures taken with cell phones were being posted
in blogs with unsavory comments, in several cantons. Moreover, in
Geneva
at least, the police found that rival youth gangs were using blogs to
plan attacks on each other.
Geneva education authorities have taken some steps. The use of cell
phones is now forbidden in school. They also produced and
distributed to
students a leaflet entitled "BLOG sur Internet - une arme
d'information
massive qui requiert de la prudence!"
<http://wwwedu.ge.ch/sem/doc/semblog.pdf> (Blog on the internet: a
weapon of mass information requiring caution), warning them of legal
consequences of misuse of blogs. Unfortunately, what comes through in
the leaflet is that the authors know what blogs are, how they work,
and
their possible misuses, but have never considered serious uses of
blogging in education.
I know of two adult-started, course-related, blogs in Switzerland,
both
at university level: <http://www.creative-writing.ch> and
<http://newmine.blogspot.com/>. And the latter is used as a one-way,
ex-cathedra, tool, as comments have been disabled. There might be
other
adult-started uses of blogs in education, sure, but on the whole,
blogs
do not seem to have made it yet as serious tool among Swiss educators.
Until they do, i.e. until young people can learn about
responsibilities
involved in blogging by doing it in schools, misuse prevention
measures
like "Blog sur Internet" are not likely to have much effect.
Information
is part of prevention, but it is not enough, per se.
(1) another description of this Pew report was sent on 3/11/05 by Doug
Johnson to the WWWEDU discussion list
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/wwwedu>. See also Marc Ahnless' and
Nancy
Willard's replies there.
Have a nice week-end
Claude
Bcc to: Doug Johnson, Marc Ahnless and Nancy Willard - not to Bonnie
Bracey-Sutton as she will already get this through the list.
--
Claude Almansi
Castione, Switzerland
claude.almansi @ bluewin.ch
http://www.adisi.ch
http://www.digitaldivide.net/profile/Claude
http://www.digitaldivide.net/blog/claude
http://www.digitaldivide.net/community/languages
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