References: Goals 2002 and Goals 2003

Contents

Mission

Projects Help Desk
Recycling
Volunteers
Americorps*VISTA Program
Community Technology Center Information Clearinghouse
Training

Conferences RTPnet Conference
CTCNet Conference
Participation in Other Conferences

Grant Proposals Verizon
TechFoundation
Chapel of the Cross
Rural Internet Access Authority

Membership Services

RTPnet Web Site and Promotion of Services

Membership Changes

Finances Donations
Financial Report

Staff (Volunteers)

Board of Directors Membership Changes
Meetings
Accomplishments
Members

Board of Advisors

Mission, Service Area, and Staff

RTPnet, operated by a volunteer staff, serves Durham, Orange, and Wake counties in North Carolina.

Projects

Recycling: Cindy Bird contacted Orange County Solid Waste Management Department to learn how RTPnet might acquire computers they collect, and she summarized the status of local computer recycling in a presentation at the RTPnet conference in May. Cindy also established dropoff points where people can bring their used computer equipment for donation to RTPnet. Most of the computers go to Jerry Winegarden who handles refurbishing and distribution. As the program developed, procedures were added to the Web site: http://www.rtpnet.org/recycle/. The site now contains forms and instructions for dropping off equipment and for requesting equipment, forms for receipts, lists of donations, and lists of needs, as well as information on disposing of unusable computers. RTPnet was instrumental in providing used computers to the UNC Campus Y for the SET project, which placed computers in the homes of 9th graders who completed a 3-year after school program. Further development of the Recycling program will continue in 2003; see RTPnet Goals 2003.

Volunteers: There are more than 60 people on the volunteers e-mail list and more than 20 on the tech support (Help Team) list. Most of the volunteers found the RTPnet Web site surfing the Web, and they completed our volunteer form. The lists have very little activity. Most requests posted to the lists have been successfully resolved and the work of the volunteers is greatly appreciated. For some examples, see Letters That Show the Need for NC-HELP (the id is riaa and the password is proposal). Requests for help and the activities of volunteers have been difficult to track. Completion of the Help Desk Trouble-Ticket Management System will help keep track of requests, assignments, and resolutions. Working under the direction of Volunteer Grant Lilford, Shirl Rogers, an RTPnet Americorps*VISTA, has developed a volunteer database using data from the volunteer forms. One of RTPnet Goals for 2003 is to Develop strategies for making more effective use of RTPnet's growing number of volunteers. Perhaps we can set up regional volunteer coordinators.

Americorps*VISTA Program: Through the CTC VISTA Project, RTPnet has four full-time Americorps*VISTA workers.

• Douglas Dumont: Sponsored by ISIS: Information Science + Information Studies, Duke University, started June 2002. The goal of Douglas' project is to develop an after school program at Rogers Herr Middle School, in Durham, to be supported by Duke volunteers, and also to create a template for replicating the program in North Carolina and nationwide.

• Ella Holden: Jointly sponsored by the Riley Hill Community Technology Center and RTPnet, started April 2002. The goal of Ella's project is to develop a computer repair course for the Riley Hill Community Technology Center and teach the course.

• Shirlene Rogers: Sponsored by a grant from Verizon, started November 2001. The goals of Shirl's project are to assist the president of the CTCNet board of directors (Erroll Reese, Durham, NC) with CTCNet program development and capacity building and to develop, for RTPnet, a database of Triangle area volunteers.

• Martha Ann Moore: Sponsored by RTPnet, started February 2001 and plans to continue through August 2003. The goal of Martha's project is to promote community participation in the Birchwood Learning Center (BLC) in Durham, by developing, implementing, and publicizing computer education programs for the community that bring members of the community into the Center to learn and to help each other learn.

Community Technology Center Information Clearinghouse: Through a grant from Verizon, Easy Web Inc. has designed for RTPnet a prototype Web site of and for Triangle area community technology centers that includes programs, resources, partnerships, and other efforts, with the goal of making it easy for people to find the information they need. The Clearinghouse will be enhanced and expanded to the national level during 2003.

Training:

• Airport Gardens: A team of RTPnet volunteers teaches classes primarily for adults, Tuesday evenings at 6:30 p.m., in the computer room at Airport Gardens Community Center in Chapel Hill. Information about the project is available online at http://www.rtpnet.org/learn/airport-gardens/. The volunteers rotate weeks and keep in touch via e-mail, which is archived online. The group started with a Web-based forum but now uses an archived e-mail list.

• Birchwood Learning Center (BLC): The emphasis of RTPnet VISTA Martha Moore's training at Birchwood Learning Center, in Durham, has shifted from adult training to working with the John Avery Boys and Girls Club in the after-school program to help young people to develop their skills.

• Riley Hill Community Technology Center (RHCTC): Bob Sams has been assisted by VISTA Ella Holden and several volunteers in helping youth and adults increase or learn new computer skills in the Riley Hill Community Technology Center, in Wendell. The RHCTC is a result of formal collaboration between the community outreach ministry of The Riley Hill Baptist Church and regional technology professionals recruited by the Colors of Collaboration, Inc. to implement community-based programs. RHCTC also provides students with one-on-one help from a community mentor. More volunteers, mentors, and teachers are needed.

• Hargraves Technology Center has been closed most of the year while the building is renovated. The Hargraves Center is scheduled to reopen in February. Planning for reopening the Technology Center is needed.

• Orange County Public Library, Hillsborough, 14 sessions, taught by Judy Hallman:
  • Getting Around on a Computer: Feb. 20, Apr. 9, Jun. 26, Aug. 21, Nov. 14
  • Exploring the Internet: Feb. 21, Apr. 10, Jun. 27, Aug. 22, Nov. 15
  • Electronic Mail Using Hotmail: Feb. 22, Apr. 11, Jun. 28, Aug. 23

• GCF Global Learning RTPnet became a partner of GCF Global Learning. GCF provides career and computer training as a free service, offering both instructor-supported classes and self-paced courses.

Conferences and National Community Network Participation

CTCNet and AFCN: RTPnet is a member of the Community Technology Centers' Network (CTCNet) and the Association For Community Networks (AFCN).

• CTCNet Board of Directors: Erroll Reese, president of Durham-based EasyWeb Inc. (EWI), an information technology solutions-and-training firm, is president of the CTCNet Board of Directors, leading the national community-technology movement. Lucy Haagen, executive director of Durham County Literacy Council, was elected to the CTCNet Board for the term 2002 - 2005.

• CTCNet Conference: Thirteen Triangle area people attended the 11th Annual Community Technology Centers' Network (CTCNet) Conference held in Austin, Texas, June 14-16.
  • In the conference's opening plenary panel, Government Support: Current Climate & Success Stories, Charles Stanback, Outreach Director, Rural Internet Access Authority, described North Carolina's initiative to link all North Carolinians - especially those in rural areas - to the Internet.

  • Lucy Haagen, presented, along with Will Rogers (President of KB Career Services) Strut your Stuff: Career Portfolio, A Tool for Upward Mobility in the session Tools You Can Use: Innovations For & From the CTC Field.

  • Jerry Winegarden, Senior Analyst, Duke University Office of Information Technology, and Red Hat Linux Certified Engineer, presented a day-long workshop, Securing Your Organization Using Affordable Tools and Processes. Winegarden also presented the session, Networking 1, What is a Network and How Can it Help You: Basic Explanation of Computer Networks in a Community Center environment, Emphasizing cost-effective Solutions.

  • Starting and Running a Community Network, discussion of the practical aspects of starting and managing a community network, was a joint effort of four representatives of RTPnet:
    • Judy Hallman, Executive Director of RTPnet, described RTPnet's startup, operation, and services.
    • Bob Sams, President of RileyHill Community Technology Center, Wendell, NC, and an RTPnet board member, described RTPnet's support for community technology centers.
    • Jerry Winegarden (who is also an RTPnet board member) described efforts underway to start a statewide Help Desk. Interest in this topic generated a "Birds of a Feather" session.
    • Erroll Reese commented on RTPnet as a reproducible model for other community networks.

  • Shirl Rogers, an Americorps*VISTA working with RTPnet, was a panelist in the session The Americorps CTC VISTA Project.

  • All four of RTPnet's current Americorps*VISTAs, Douglas Dumont (of Durham), Ella Holden (Spring Hope), and Martha Ann Moore (Durham), and Shirl Rogers (Zebulon), attended the conference.

  • Hallman also participated in the conference's Community Technology Share Fair, providing materials on a new report,
  • Other conference attendees included: Shlonda Brouchet and Luke Reinke, Americorps*VISTAs, Durham County Literacy Council.

  Participation in Other Conferences:

  • Judy Hallman attended the International Symposium on Technology and Society (ISTAS'02) conference in Raleigh on June 8, where she staffed the Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility display table and also distributed information about RTPnet.

  • Jerry Winegarden set up a table for RTPnet for Lulu Tech Circus, September 27-29 in Raleigh. Several others from RTPnet participated in the event.

  • Jerry set up a table for RTPnet for the NC Knowledge Nova Conference in Winston-Salem, October 2. Bob Sams and Judy Hallman also attended this conference.

  • And Jerry had a table for RTPnet at the Partnerships in Assistive Technology expo October 31 in Raleigh. Mike Rulison also attended.

Grant Proposals

NC Help Desk: Requested from TechFoundation January 2002, $35,000 to develop a model Help Desk support service for Triangle area community technology centers and schools that are members of RTPnet with the goal of expanding the service state wide. Not funded.

Americorps*VISTA Support: Requested from ABC Sale/Social Ministry Committee, The Chapel of the Cross, Chapel Hill, $2,500 to pay the fees and expenses for one Americorps*VISTA worker to support Triangle area community technology centers for a year. Partially funded with a grant of $500. While membership fees have in the past been the main source of revenue for RTPnet's VISTA program, the Chapel of the Cross grant provides a model of support by faith-based organizations that could be replicated State wide.

NC-HELP: Requested from the North Carolina Rural Internet Access Authority October 15, $746,831 (over 3 years). NC-HELP is an affordable central portal for business and technical services, which will be available to public access sites, schools, nonprofit organizations and small businesses on a contract basis. NC-HELP provides Help Desk service (triage, dispatch, logging, tracking and problem resolution for systems and applications), online informational services for self-help, a centralized data base of volunteers and equipment donations that can be matched with requests, and training opportunities for both users and technical and administrative support personnel of public access sites and schools. The NC-HELP solution provides a single point of contact for all requests coming from public access sites. Not funded. An earlier version submitted in July was not accepted because it was late.

Membership Services

E-mail Lists: Charles Hall installed Mailman 2.0. Mailman is much nicer than Majordomo. We've changed the online instructions for lists to Mailman, and all new lists are set up using Mailman, but we still have instructions available for Majordomo. Currently we have 55 Mailman lists and 60 Majordomo lists. Mailman Version 2.1, which has some nice improvements, was released December 29. We don't want to be among the first to install the new version, but we do want to install it before encouraging members to move their Majordomo lists to Mailman.

Web-Based Forums: Charles Hall installed phpBB 2.0 for Web-based forums, and there is a link to it in the left column of RTPnet Web pages, Discussion Forums. phpBB appears to be a better product than phorum, which we installed last year. We've changed the online instructions for forums to phpBB and all new forums are set up using phpBB. Currently we have 27 registered phpBB users, 167 articles, and 21 phpBB forums in 6 categories, and we have 23 phorum forums in 10 categories. There are some nice modifications available for phpBB version 2.0 and version 2.1 is in development. We will look at applying some of the mods. There is no immediate need to move phorum forums to phpBB.

Differences Between Lists and Forums: A new document, E-Mail List or Web-Based Forum? is intended to help members determine when to set up e-mail lists and when to use Web-based forums. It contains general information about each and how they work.

Usage Reports: Charles Hall, with help from RTPnet member David Martin of the North Carolina State Beekeepers Association, reevaluated and significantly improved the Web usage reports produced for the RTPnet site. See http://www.rtpnet.org/webstats.html for rtpnet.org usage reports and http://www.rtpnet.org/userid/webstats.html for the usage reports for member userid. Log files for users accessing a Web site as www.mygroup.org are located in /home/mgroup/public_html/logs.

File backups on RTPnet: We have begun promoting RTPnet as a backup site for our members' important files, such as membership files.

Member Services Expanded State Wide: RTPnet's Member Services are now available to noncommercial organizations state wide.

RTPnet Web Site and Promotion of Services

• Using Google to search the RTPnet site
• Moving RTPnet organizational links from the left column into bars at the top and bottom of the Web pages, leaving the left column as a portal to local information
• An improved Site Map
• Improved promotional information, such as Why Join RTPnet? and What Our Members Say About RTPnet

Membership

RTPnet Membership increased significantly, from 126 to 151.

33 New Members

• chccs, Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools
• choral, TriangleSings!
• ctep, City-Wide Technology Enrichment Program (CTEP), Durham
• cwclub, Cary Woman's Club
• eenc, Environmental Educators of North Carolina (EENC)
• encsjhc, Job Hunt Collaboration (JHC), Eastern NC Section, IEEE
• esip, Earth Science Information Partners, Foundation for
• fmsps, Fort Macon Sail and Power Squadron
• gardener, Gardeners of Wake County, Inc.
• hemlock, Friends of Hemlock Bluffs
• jobseek, The Job Seekers Group
• jocarris, Children's Books with Humor
• justice, Office of Advocacy, ELCA North Carolina Synod
• kairosnc, Kairos of North Carolina
• kindred, Kindred Gathering, Cary
• nc-new, North Carolina Engineers Week Coalition
• ncfdp, North Carolina Fencing Development Program (NCFDP)
• ncps, North Carolina Pediatric Society
• ncwam, NC Women and Mathematics Mentoring Program
• ncwu, North Carolina Women United
• ocm, Orange County Mission
• parc, Phillips (Middle School) Amateur Radio Club
• paqa-s, Professional Art Quilters Alliance of the South
• pcrn, Piedmont Coastal Repeater Network
• pfc-itsc, Partnership for Children - Information Technology Service Center, Cumberland County
• ptt, Piedmont Transmitter Tracking
• sca, Southeastern Center for Anthroposophy
• stead, Suzuki Talent Education at Durham
• tiffany, Tiffany Woods Homeowners Association, Garner
• wakelit, Literacy Council of Wake County
• wf2003, World Flight 2003
• woha-nc, Windsor Oaks Homeowners Association, Cary
• yppc, Young People's Performing Company of Durham (replaces polonius)

The following 8 organizations canceled membership:

• citca, Carolina Interfaith Task Force on Central America
• nclcv, North Carolina League of Conservation Voters
• ncmea, North Carolina Music Educators Association
• nbcary, New Beginnings Christian Fellowship, Cary
• polonius, Young People's Performing Company of Durham (replaced with yppc)
• rotary, Rotary District 7720
• triyfu, Triangle Chapter of Youth for Understanding
• twnc, Triangle Woodturners of NC

Finances

• Monetary donations increased from $720 in 2001 to $1,840 in 2002. Some donations are coming through Network for Good.

• Equipment donations from individuals increased from a variety of drives and cards in 2001 to more than 10 complete systems in 2002, including two Pentium 3s. Most of the donations included monitors, almost all were in working condition, and many included software, cables, mice, and keyboards. Several printers were also donated. Many of the donations are listed online.

Financial Report

     Assets entering 2002: $5,275.87

     Income in 2002: 
         1,840.00  Donations
         9,140.00  Membership fees 
         4,713.61  RTPnet/TACT Conference
        15,000.00  Verizon Grant
           500.00  Chapel of the Cross Grant
           750.00  Riley Hill CTC (for VISTA)
         1,500.00  ISIS, Duke (for VISTA)
           175.00  Fee
        ---------  
       $33,618.61  Total Income

     Expenses in 2002:
        10,000.00  Easy Web Inc., CTC Clearinghouse
         3,727.70  VISTA Program
         2,868.61  RTPnet/TACT Conference
         3,760.00  Internet 
         4,404.85  Conferences & Travel
           522.35  Other Expenses
        ---------
       $25,283.51  Total Expenses
  
     Assets entering 2003: $13,650.97

Staff (Volunteers)

• Judy Hallman <hallman@rtpnet.org> or <hallman@email.unc.edu>
  Executive Director
  
• Charles Hall <Charles.Hall@sas.com> or <chall@rtpnet.org>
  Lead System Administrator
  
• Amnon Nissan <amnon@deltaforce.net> and Deltaforce Technologies
  Internet access and on-site services
  
• Roger Austin <rda@rti.org>
  Maintenance and support for Majordomo e-mail lists
  
• Others
  Directors, Advisors, Members, and other Volunteers provide suggestions and improvements

Board of Directors

Meetings were held March 28, July 9, and October 29.

Accomplishments:

• Began paying DeltaForce Technologies $400/month for Internet services for RTPnet effective March 1, 2002.

• Initiated a capability to receive donations via Network for Good, which serves numerous nonprofit organizations.

• Began defining a set of member services to be separated from WWW hosting and assign prices to each service. A $10 increase in basic membership plus Web hosting, from $50/year to $60/year, became effective with the June billing.

• Activated Board of Advisors.

Board of Advisors Membership