Digital Arts Service Corps - ctcvista

OLLIE gigs and Dental complaints

gariet cowin — Fri, 25 Jan 2008 21:45:09 +0000

I'm just finishing up week one (week two for some schools) for the Winter session of OLLIE. The groups we are working with this time already seem to be an infinite improvement over some of the groups from last session. I'm not going to put all of the blame on the schools and students though. I was so burnt out by the end of the Fall session, that I probably wasn't very fun to work with either. From now on, I am going to make sure that I have a couple weeks between sessions where I can regroup and de-stress. That doesn't necessarily mean a vacation. In my case, it just means doing something else that doesn't involve kids.

In other news, I am extremely frustrated with my dental situation. I've been avoiding the dentist because I can barely afford a cleaning, not to mention whatever fillings might be required. Turns out this was a bad idea. But now I REALLY can't afford to go to the dentist because I know something is (expensively) wrong, but not wrong enough to warrant immediate relief-of-pain surgery which is the only type of coverage I have. So what can I do? Wait until it gets worse and painful, I guess.

Would it really cost that much for the government to throw in a little basic dental care for us? It seems to me that it would save them money on costly emergency dental procedures. Maybe I'll just swap my teeth out for some dentures. Then I won't have to worry about it.

What's Going On.

gariet cowin — Mon, 26 Mar 2007 20:51:12 +0000

Hey everybody! Long time, no blog.

Things have been crazy around here as of late, but now that it is spring break, I have one week without OLLIE gigs to catch up on everything that I have been neglecting. That means four short movies to edit, some DVDs to create, and a website to build. We'll see how much I actually get done.

In other news, I managed to put together another Kirsten Academy class (after nearly 3 months without one). The topic this time was stop-motion animation! Check out the movies we made here. We used a program called iStopMotion, which can be purchased online for about $40. Recently, however, I was talking with Andrew of YVXN/NYMAP fame, and he recommended a program called FrameThief, which is actually free!

So if any of you want to make some stop-motion movies as well, download FrameThief, find yourself a digital camcorder and a firewire cable, and get to it. It's as easy as that. If you watch all 5 of our movies (which are all very short), you can see that we used a variety of materials; construction paper, magazines, clay, coloring books, buttons, etc. It was really easy and lots of fun. In fact, there have been requests for an encore lesson. If I ever get around to teaching a second class, I'll try to put together a tutorial video as well, so that all of you can see how easy it is to make your own animation.

After which, I might declare a cross-country CTC VISTA supershort animation contest! Anybody interested?

NYMAP computer is here!

gariet cowin — Tue, 02 Jan 2007 18:14:15 +0000

We finally got our super-sweet computer that we will be using for the NYMAP youth video exchange. Unfortunately, I got it about 5 minutes before I left for vacation, so it has just been sitting around for the last week. But now I am back, and ready to put it to good use. Youth media swapping, here I come!

I'll post another entry when I actually have a chance to try it out, and learn more about the whole exchange process.

To Wiki or Not to Wiki, that's the question

danielle martin — Fri, 15 Dec 2006 12:00:32 +0000

Part of my work this year for the CTC VISTA Project is fostering some resource development among the VISTAs. This is new concept for a project that has mostly focused on just training, supporting, and placing capacity building VISTAs in community and technology centers. As Paul Hansen mentioned in his Project update article in the last Digest:

"It's because a more focused structure makes it much more feasible for us to provide substantive (priority area specific) support and training to the our VISTAs. And, in a tighter network of VISTAs, members are more likely to support each other in more general ways, as they face the challenges of VISTA service."

As a sometimes idealistic VISTA Leader, I see creating resources as just another way to support CTC VISTAs - to not only give the current VISTAs a chance to summarize and exhibit an aspect of their work but also capture that work for the next round.

Fellow VISTA Leader Ben Sheldon and I have been hashing out both the ideal ways for the VISTAs to collaborate, tempered by the practicality of VISTA life, such as limited time, varying technology skills, and motivation/value of the CTC VISTA network. It's a big challenge to build an active community and build the right tools to support it at the same time. So, we started informally polling VISTAs old and new, by phone, email, and at the MA area meeting. I appreciated all the responses, especially because they were honest and surprisingly in-depth.

The current blog system was created under the idea that VISTAs would have one point of entry to contribute content to the Project. The problem with the blog is that it is traditionally a journal of a VISTAs tasks, impressions, and musings over time. When we encourage people to blog once a month, the entries are often entered out of guilt, contain several different ideas or discussion points, and VISTAs don't got back to entries to update them if issues evolve. Even with the addition of tagging, you still need to read through a month's work of reflection to find one idea. Plus, blogs are still primarily a one-way / one-to-many communication tool or as Ross put it "communicating by publishing." Unless people comment and the author responds, there's not any two-way collaboration on the ideas.

And these IDEAS is what I'm trying to harvest, chunk, and sort.

So, our newest idea is to create a wiki. I am a self confessed wiki skeptic. Yes, I use Wikipedia, and yes, I trust the content, but the wiki collaboration process seems very techie and wonky from the outside. Former VISTA Leader, Saul Baizman, created and maintained a wiki for the Project but he was primarily the only person who added anything to it, even among Project HQ staff.

BUT (there's always a but..), why do we think a wiki is possibly a good tool for our little resource gathering project? As usual, Tech Soup has a clairvoyant sense of what I'm wondering about as a community technologist: check out this article, Nonprofits Share Their Wiki Success Stories, by Brian Satterfield. First bit that struck me was the reference to a "wikimaster" - a sort of editor to oversee/maintain the wiki with a "big picture view." We've been talking at Project HQ that some central editor is going to be essential to keep the resource development hopping.

Second part that caught my eye was the case study of how Alzheimer Society of Ontario rolled out the use of their wiki. They introduced the wiki technology in person ("...the organization initially got the wiki off to a good start by getting major stakeholders excited about the technology"), then did in-person trainings, online documentation, and Quicktime movie tutorials.

Our idea is to create a mini-working model of how the wiki could work and do a focus group at the PSO in January with new and current VISTA to gauge their reactions to the tool. I'm hoping to work with Aliya and the other TANP VISTAs to do a survey in the coming months to get opinions as well.

Ben can speak more to the wiki technology options (Drupal module vs. Media Wiki vs. hopping into existing wiki site somewhere), but I'm curious as to how the CTC VISTA community at large feels about resource development and wikis as a tool.

ANY INPUT IS WELCOME...in fact, more input is exactly what we're aiming for!

Making it...

Richard T. Anderson — Mon, 20 Nov 2006 16:44:54 +0000

I have been wanting to say something about making it on low income.

One, I don't have any secret to doing so. But I aught to, I suppose.

I think I'm a bit different. A lot VISTA talk was about sacrificing by making such a low income for a year. I get the impression that for a lot of you, this is a big change. I, on the other hand, have hardly ever made more than I'm making now. And in fact, had been unemployed since June when I started my service in September.

I don't think I've ever cracked $15,000 for a year. The amount I'll be making from the living allowence is much more typical. And I've made less.

So, I aught to have great advice. But I don't I have horrible credit and I've been to a doctor once since my dad's insurance stopped covering me when I was 19 (I'm 36 now). Hmm. I can say this, I don't trust credit cards or checking accounts. Something always gets messed up. And don't live off your student loans. That was a bad idea.

This is the poverty level, but I still go out. I see movies. I hang out with friends, eat dinner (or lunch) out occaisionally. Take my ex-girlfriend's kids to eat or to a movie. I'd date, but I don't know how to tell what's a date and what's hanging out. I live like I always have, with bills hovering, a car that has problems, and lots of stress.

It's not easy, but with the health benefits (I've foresworn the Seven Corners for an MI Health Card) it's actually an improvement. The fact that I'm doing something I enjoy for a change is amazing. And once this yeat is out I hope that my experience will translate into a job that I enjoy and gets me above the poverty level for a change.

I hope every one is doing well on their low incomes. I had a bit of freak out session with my car tire going flat twice and the door refusing to shut, but I'm doing okay now. I got a used tire for $25 and I just have to remember not to open my driver's side door. :D

Take Care,

Rich

Background Checks

Richard T. Anderson — Tue, 17 Oct 2006 20:00:10 +0000

Does anyoneknow how one goes about doing a background check?

We had a guy come in to volunteer a while ago, and he seemed okay. but until that point we hadn't had anyone come with us that the MoLLIE supervisor didn't know. Everyone had already worked with MoLLIE before. And for some reason, Jeanne and I thought the same thing at the same time after he left, 'what do we really now about this guy?'

It was surprising to me that in 5 years, the idea of doing background checks on people had not occured to those running a program that works regularly with children. That's like a no brainer, right? There's laws about this sort of thing, right? Well, from now on we are going to do checks on employees and volunteers, we just have to figure out how.

Unfortunately, no one here knows anything about how to do background checks. I did some looking online a few weeks ago. You get dozens of sites claiming to do background checks. On several of them I checked myself. And though I didn't give my social security number, the sites could have still done better. most of the info was wrong, stating that I had lived in several cities that I have not, etc.

Jeanne is gone for most of the week helping her father in Florida. She asked me to try to figure the background check issue while she was gone. I'm not sure where to look. the proliferation of such sites online make it hard to determine which, if any, are on the level. So if anyone has suggestions, I'd love to hear from you.

Thanks,

Rich

New CTC VISTA Project Flyer

danielle martin — Wed, 11 Oct 2006 19:20:35 +0000

Here's an updated copy of our CTC VISTA Project flyer. It's handy if people ask you how to get or become a CTC VISTA. Paul made it but I've been updating it - It's spurning me to want to learn more about Adobe InDesign. I also enjoy Paul's treatment of old VISTA organizing clipart...

Recoil magazine

Richard T. Anderson — Mon, 09 Oct 2006 15:26:17 +0000

While at the PSO I wore a black t-shrit that said Recoil on it. Recoil is the name of a local free magazine printed on newsprint. On the front is a magazine devoted to local events and advertising, articles about and interviews of bands (local or those coming to town) and reviews of CD's local and national. On the back is a satire magazine of fake and funny news articles a la "The Onion".

I was wearing this shirt when we took the big group photo. That photo that greats us when we all when we click on"vista blogs". The word Recoil has been removed from my shirt. I'm guessing someone thought that it was a possible copyright issue or something. But I hardly think a local Grand Rapids magazine will be suing AmeriCorp for use of the logo.

Bizaar.

In the words of Sam the Eagle, "You are all weirdos."

Peace,

Richard

Comments

Corey Funderburk — Mon, 02 Oct 2006 20:07:13 +0000

Does anyone know if there is a way to be alerted when someone comments on your blog? Or somewhere where recent activity is summarized so that you don't have to look at every one? Thanks!

ZZZzzzzz.....wha?

gariet cowin — Fri, 29 Sep 2006 18:42:40 +0000

Wow...I'm glad everybody seems to be having a super-fun time in San Diego. I've spent the whole week updating 16 iBooks, using only a single installation disc, and a slow internet connection. fun.

Also, I finally got around to applying for food stamps. I'm not sure how much they are giving me, but it's not going to be as much as I had hoped. It turns out that if I had applied BEFORE the PSO, none of my "living stipend" would count as income, but having applied after my term of service began, it all counts as income. Making me poor, but not poor enough.

Lastly, as part of my work, I am researching digital distribution, and all kinds of crazy internet-y type stuff, so I decided to start my own vlog to get some hands-on experience. If you want to check it out, go to www.kirstenacademy.blogspot.com There won't be any video clips until next week though.