Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
were citizens from a diverse range of time zones—since the project headquar-
ters were in Boston, MA (EST), this meant that it was difficult to be online
at the same time as many of the participants. In addition, the Zora-specific
content, such as the activities, were supported in two languages—Spanish and
English.
(5)
Type of contact with participants
. As mentioned in previous sections, con-
tact with the citizens was done completely virtually, either through e-mail,
from the organization's intranet, called
The Village
(which in many cases
was not checked regularly by participants) or through Zora itself. Clubhouse
members who had an account in The Village could request a ClubZora user-
name and password via an online form in the Village. The project coordinator
received these requests and examined them to make sure that they were only
from Clubhouse members, in order to ensure the safety of the youth online.
Participation in the project was completely voluntary and at the discretion of
the youth to join.
(6)
Assessment
. Each part of an activity, as described in the curriculum section,
was followed by a few questions that we invited participants to answer online.
These questions related to the activity (“Did you like it?”), to the idea of positive
development (“I believe that by using computer technologies people can find
new ways to give back to their communities.”), and to culture (“I like to learn
about food from different cultures.”). Participants were also encouraged to send
feedback at any point during the project to the project coordinator. Finally, an
online survey outside of Zora (in order to also reach those Clubhouse members
who did not participate in Zora), in English and Spanish, was administered at
the conclusion of the project to elicit feedback about the project as a whole. In
addition, as described in the mentorship section, both local and online mentors
were required to complete field notes at the conclusion of each of their sessions.
Also, most activities within the software were logged and available for analysis
using the Zora Log Parser.
(7)
Access environment
. While individual youth could request a Zora username
and password, a Clubhouse Coordinator needed to install the software at the
Clubhouse. All Clubhouses were invited to participate in the Zora project; how-
ever, there were two requirements: (1) The only supported languages were
English and Spanish. Those speaking other languages were still able to par-
ticipate, but support was only provided in those two languages. This included
support documents, communication, and the Zora software itself (i.e., partic-
ipants in those Clubhouses in which non-Latin characters were used had to
switch to a Latin character set to be able to chat and modify text in Zora). (2)
A high-speed consistent network connection was required. The software was
only available as an online download and because of the heavy graphics load, a
low-speed connection would have made it impossibly slow to use Zora.
(8)
Institutional context of usage
. Because this project was done within the larger
context of an international organization, we had to be respectful and accommo-
dating to their organizational rules and ideals. For example, in the online Zora
Ambassador guide, we wrote:
