CREATIF, a french non-governemental organisation, federates persons involved in promoting "Access for all" to ICT's. We aim at improving digital literacy and social uses of ICT's by promoting best practices exchange, networking of telecentres & PIAPs professionnals, support to projects, monitoring and assessment of uses and promotion of an active participation of concerned population. We have created a serie of «best practices» handbooks (also available online) specially dedicated to eInclusion professionnals. Using collaborative writing in an open editorial board, this project contributes to share experiences and to promote local best practices at a national level.

Policy Context

Among managers and executive staff, more than 90 % use computers frequently, as only 55 % of french population do. Internet and digital technologies have taken an all compassing role in our lives regarding education, business, public administration, leisure, culture, etc. and have became powerful tools for creating and exchanging information and services. These tools can be considered as "social goods". But uses of these tools require new skills and abilities, understanding of communication processes, possibilities of expressing oneself, availability of computer hardware and accesses to networks, all of which are still unevenly available. The rise of digital uses createa growing feeling of exclusion for those who are not part of this changing social organisation. What is at stake in these changes and the risk of exclusions they bear is not sufficiently taken in account by public policies. Except a few local and regional initiatives, these policies leave on the side track millions of personns, already socially vulnerable. At the same time, the demand is high for access to public access places with facilitators, whereas public of ran by social organisations. This demand testifies of the need felt for a human accompaniment in developping uses of ICT's. All over France, dozens of local initiatives show us that helping people using ICT's can develop social ties, creativity, inclusion and self-esteem. Those leaders, entrepreneurs, innovative actors of long-life learning in the digital Era, are frequently isolated and lack support, visibility and recognition of their daily work. We are facing a double challenge : showing but also sharing good practices to contribute to elaboratethe design of public policies for digital litteracy aiming at the inclusion of disadvantaged and vulnerable groups.

Description of target users and groups

Booklets have a double target: they both contribute to promote innovative initiatives for e-inclusion among local authorities and to disseminate "best practices" among telecentres & Public Internet Access Points (PIAP) administrators & operators. We focus on people working with : disabled people, vulnerable & marginalised groups, rural areas, elderly people, ...

Description of the way to implement the initiative

The series is co-funded by regional authorities members of CREATIF and by Caisse des Dépôts, a state-owned financial institution operating « Cyber-base » network. Additional partners can join the production team on a specific project, as the "Délégation aux Usages de l'Internet", part of Ministry of Education, for our newest title. Handbooks are sold to local & regional authorities to be distributed for free to e-inclusion workers located in their area. Sales incomes permit to invest in creating new titles. It's possible to access free of charge to the content on-line (html format) or download the entire booklet (pdf format) from CREATIF website. The content is provide under Creative commons BY-NC-SA licence. Now, we are looking for building new partnerships and developping international & multilingual projects, as creating multimedia contents (podcasts, videos) for training and e-learning programs towards e-inclusion workers (telecentres administrators & operators, social workers, librarians, ...).

Main results, benefits and impacts

Results : 4 titles available in the series (2 more titles in progress). Each title presents interviews (local actors & experts), innovative initiatives, exemples of projects, methodological advices, legal issues, funding programs, educational materials & ressources, ... Impacts : - Increasing number of contributors on the site: 180 registrered writers, half have published at least an article. - Increasing website visitors : from 900 monthly in 2004 to 20.000 visitors monthly in 2007. Consulting our e-inclusion "best practices" handbooks on-line represent 22 % of the traffic, and news about local initiatives on e-inclusion 40%. 600 subscribers to the monthly newsletter. - New membership and partnership with regional authorities (Mégalis Bretagne, Région PACA, Région Pays de la Loire ...) : now 10 french regions are involved in our "best practices" sharing and publishing activities about e-inclusion. Innovation: Producing and writing in a collaborative way stimulated telecenters & PIAPs networks activities and federate coordination efforts from regional and local network headquarters. - Open editorial board - Online collaborative tools (wiki, CMS SPIP) - Social bookmarking relevant links Pooling & cooperating for training programs toward isolated e-inclusion workers, permit to build answers in an bottom-up way instead of National programs that frequently tend to standardize practices. A significant part of visitors of the website come from french-speaking countries around the world, so that isolated telecentres operators can find on-line information to enrich and renovate their practices.

Return on investment

Return on investment: Not applicable / Not available

Track record of sharing

Participation in congress, seminars, meetings, training programs about e-inclusion (disabled people & vulnerable groups). Involving researchers & ICT field actors : - Icom Centre Handicap International, ICT's and disability resource centre - ATD Quart-Monde, « Internet de rue » project - Laboratory M@rsouin, ENST Brest Contributions to research projects : - PSAUME Project - Interfaces & digital divide (FING & Région Ile-de-France) International activities : - Participation in I-Twinnings project to develop exchanges with telecentres network in Peru. Some articles & interviews translated (in french) and published after that project : - Poverty, can ICT be an answer ? (Miguel SARAVIA, Soluciones Practicas – ITDG, Peru) - Podcasts reach Peruvian villages (BBC) - A telecentres network in Araucania (interview with Manuel Morales,Univ. of Temuco, Chile)

Lessons learnt

Lesson 1- « If you don't know how to, ask somebody who has already manage it ». Sharing experiences is the best way to learn how to succeed in implementing an eInclusion project in your area and to develop new skills to manage it. Lesson 2- Partnership is a key point : « To grow a kid, you need a village ». Working on digital litteracy can't be a specific task given to a special corp of e-inclusion professionnals. To reach vulnerables groups, you need first to establish good partnerships with social workers, communities leaders, etc. Scope: National