Media.Knet.Ca

On July 29, representatives from SLAAMB, Confederation College and NNEC met with KO community members and KO staff to present information concerning General Educational Development(GED) and the Canadian Adult Achievement Test (CAAT). During the CAAT / GED Information Video-conference Wayne Zimmer and Gayle Murdock from Confederation College, Bob Bruyere from SLAAMB and John Dudley from NNEC talked about the GED test, their organizations involvement in setting up these initiatives in the First Nations. Discussions took place about the 12 weeks of community-based training that is being considered for KO First Nations with sufficient enrollment.

Information from the poster circulated before the meeting described the GED Test as a "measurement of the level of your Educational Maturity". The GED is a set of 5 Tests on the Key High School Subjects of:

• Language Arts: Writing
• Language Arts: Reading
• Mathematics
• Social Studies
• Science

If you score 450 or more on all 5 tests, you will get your Ontario High School Equivalency Certificate from Confederation College. Score less than 450 on any tests and you can re-write them. You don’t have to re-write tests if you scored over 450 on them.

To take the 12 week GED Preparation Training Program and be eligible to write the GED test you must :

1. Be seriously committed to a very intensive 12 week GED training program (night school) in your community;
2. Complete the Canadian Adult Achievement Test and score between Levels 9 and 10 or better;
3. Be at Least 19 or older (some 18 year olds may be eligible);
4. Not be a high school graduate;
5. Have been out of school for at least one full year;
6. Be a resident of Ontario.

If you’re on welfare or E.I. you can take training without penalty.

The July 24 issue of Wawatay News contains two more news stories about the work being completed within the Kuh-ke-nah Network of Smart First Nations demonstration project.

This week's issue of the Kuh-ke-nah page in Wawatay News include the following articles:

• KO Communities Planning On-line Maps and Data - Robert Hunter, KO's GIS/Architectural Technologist talks shares his story about working with other members of the KO Smart Team to take existing databases and digital maps (canoe routes, community infrastructure, etc) and make this information available on-line.
• Live web casts streaming from First Nations via Internet - Different live events are now being shared and archived on-line with others using the K-Net streaming server and the video conferencing equipment in each of the communities. Examples talked about in this article include the Wasaya - Bearskin signing ceremony from Bearskin FN, the Grade 8 Graduation Ceremonies from Kingfisher Lake FN and the Sandy Lake FN award.
• K-Net Showcase - contains photos from the Fort Severn First Nation portal (http://fortsevern.firstnation.ca)

Rick Garrick is researching additional stories for future articles. If you have a story that you want to share about this project and the work that is happening in your community to get connected, please send us an e-mail.

Various newspaper articles are being scanned and stored for reference purposes in this photo gallery.

On Wednesday, July 23 to Friday, July 25, several guests made the journey from their homes to travel to Sioux Lookout, Slate Falls First Nation and Keewaywin First Nation. Luis Barnola, who works with IRDC (International Development Research Centre, Head Office
Institute for Connectivity in the Americas) arranged to bring a film producer from Columbia (Mauricio Beltran) to visit K-Net and some of our partner First Nations. They flew from Ottawa to Thunder Bay and then Carl Seibel from FedNor drove them to Sioux Lookout and then we flew into Slate Falls First Nation and then over to Keewaywin First Nation.

Click here to check out the story and the pictures posted on the Keewaywin community portal about their visit to their community.

K-Net staff are doing an on-line presentation this evening for the PTC Monthly Virtual Conference Webinar scheduled for July 22nd at 10 pm CST. Tonight's session is entitled: "Telecentres - Their role in social and economic development". Click here to see the K-Net presentation for this event entitled "Telecentres and Community Development in the First Nations K-Net Project"

It is an open event for everyone to join. K-Net participated another one of these sessions last year and did one of these last year and it was an interesting experience (click here to check out last September’s event).

The conference Coordinator (David Wortley) reported ... "The PTC virtual conference webinar on Telecentres attracted over 20 participants from all across the globe, but for those who were unable to attend the live event, I have now posted the archived presentations in the virtual classroom. To view these archives, please logon at http://www.hcln.net/PTC2003/PTC_logon.htm  and click on the "Review" button on the top menu bar in the virtual classroom. This will also enable you to print out the 4 presentations."

Everyone is invited to check out the event by logging onto http://www.hcln.net/PTC2003/PTC_logon.htm to see more details and to set up your system for the event. Click here to see the PDF file of instructions for this on-line event.

Here is the text of the invitation sent around by the host of tonight’s show, David Wortley.

----- Original Message -----

From: "David Wortley" dwortley@massmitec.co.uk
Sent: Tuesday, July 22, 2003 3:35 AM
Subject: Telecentres - Their role in social and economic development - PTC Monthly Virtual Conference Webinar - July 23rd (except USA when it will be July 22nd)

I hope you will be able to join me in a few hours time as we visit Japan, Jakarta, Geneva, Rio de Janeiro, Lubenham, San Francisco, Ontario, Australia, New Zealand, India and Germany in the Pacific Telecomms Council SIG's first monthly virtual conference webinar on the subject of Telecentres.

The program and logistics for this event are shown below. Anyone with access to the internet via a Windows PC with recent browser should be able to log on and share ideas and knowledge on this important topic. If you access the group chat facility within the virtual classroom you will see we have already had visitors from across the globe.

We are encouraging ideas for future topics for these events and have already had suggestions for sessions on ICT and gender, youth, and disability as ideas for forthcoming webinars. Please let us know if you wish to make a presentation on a specific topic in the future by replying to me at dwortley@massmitec.co.uk

AGENDA

The topic of this one hour session will be "Telecentres and their role in social and economic development". The presenters for the webinar will cover a diversity of Telecentre situations and applications with a provisional agenda as follows :-

• David Wortley (UK): Telecentres and the UK Community Access to Lifelong Learning Strategy
• Kenji Saga (Japan): Key Issues for the Successful Implementation of Rural Telecenters
• Naswil Idris (Indonesia): Community Telecentres in Indonesia
• Brian Beaton (Canada): Telecentres and Community Development in the First Nations K-Net Project

GLOBAL TIMING

The timing of the webinar has been organised to favour the Asia/Pacific region covered by the PTC with the relevant times across the globe shown below :-

USA West Coast (Vancouver/Seattle) - July 22nd - 20:00 - 21:00
USA East Coast (New York,/Montreal) - July 22nd - 23:00 - 24:00
United Kingdom - July 23rd - 04:00 - 05:00
Central Europe -July 23rd - 05:00 - 06:00
Moscow - July 23rd - 07:00 - 08:00
Mumbai - July 23rd - 08:30 - 09:30
Jakarta - July 23rd - 10:00 - 11:00
Tokyo - July 23rd - 12:00 - 13:00
Auckland - July 23rd - 15:00 - 16:00
Honolulu - July 22nd - 17:00 - 18:00

Anyone with an IBM PC compatible and access to the internet is welcome to participate in this free event and contribute to the discussions.

Please logon to http://www.hcln.net/PTC2003/PTC_logon.htm  to see more details and set up your system ready for the event.

If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact me and please feel free to pass on this invitation to others you think might be interested.

Regards

David Wortley
Mass Mitec Creative Collaborative Communications
Office Tel: +44(0)1858 410366
Mobile Tel: +44(0)7831 118943
EMail: dwortley@massmitec.co.uk

A snap shot of a busy five days visiting communities in Northwestern Ontario with the team from the Gold Trail Open Network Society (GTONS). Click here to visit an earlier KNews story for additional information about this organization. GTONS is leading the partnership of CANARIE and K-Net in developing an on-line training resource and tool kit to support community based Broadband Network Technicians who are working in rural and remote communities across Canada. Be sure to watch for the video clips gathered during this trip that we will be posting on-line.

Sioux Lookout (Monday and Tuesday - July 14 and 15)

• travel day from Victoria and Vancouver for the GTONS team of Sandy McElroy, John and Quinn Savage
• tour of Sioux Lookout (the community fibre optic loop, the C-Band satellite earth station, the wireless network and all the partner organizations connected to this hybrid broadband network)
• meetings and taping with the K-Net team along with video conferencing with remote communities working with the Kuh-ke-nah Network (Fort Severn, Balmertown, LaRonge SK, Sydney NS, Winnipeg MB, etc)

Poplar Hill First Nation (Wednesday, July 16)

• flight from Sioux Lookout to Balmertown so have Les Meekis join the tour over to Poplar Hill
• met with Erica Owen and Susan Owen at the Poplar Hill e-Centre
• went through the different buildings, identifying items for the to-do list to address technical requirements and updates
• New band office is being wired for Cat5 cabling throughout with the appropriate outlets being located on the building floor plan. The plans has the contractor running all the cabling back to a patch panel and install boxes and covers in the offices
• KIHS classroom was inspected for any preparation work for the start of the 2003-2004 school year. Some wiring needs to be cleaned up and some boxes installed for patch cords along with the health programs being relocated
• the local school requires some attention with some classrooms requiring cabling and some computers needing to be connected
• the e-Center requires some ongoing maintenance to ensure the entire building is properly networked and supported
• at the nursing station the antenna will be removed and sent back to Sioux Lookout.

North Spirit Lake First Nation (Thursday, July 17)

• Darlene and I met with the Circuit Judge from Kenora to discuss video conferencing in the communities. Some video conference calls were made to demonstrate the capabilities and the opportunities. The Judge and party were impressed by the opportunities that were possible and will be contacting us for more details and how to work with K-Net and the communities to meet their needs and the needs of the people participating in the justice system.
• provided some technical and maintenance support for updating video drivers and air conditioning for cable head end
• throughout the visit in each community Les and the crew from BC visited community leaders, children and organizations getting their video footage and meeting

Balmertown (Thursday evening and Friday, July 18)

• continued the meetings and video taping gathering information and sharing experiences about best practices and lessons learned in developing community-based broadband networks in rural and remote communities
• return trips to respective communities to work on the production of training and support material for the growth of this industry for other communities across the country.

Click here to check out the pictures of the North Spirit Lake leg of the trip.

Last evening in Edmonton, Phil Fontaine was sworn in as the new National Chief of the Assembly of First Nations after winning 60.9% of the Chiefs' votes (338 of 555 votes).

Click here to see the announcement providing the official results as presented on the AFN web site.

Native America Calling is a live call-in program, linking public radio stations, the Internet and listeners together into a thought-provoking national conversation about issues specific to Native communities. Each program engages noted guests and experts with callers throughout the United States and is designed to improve the quality of life for Native Americans. Native America Calling is heard on more than 60 stations in the United States and in Canada by more than 37,000 Native listeners each week.

The team from Gold Trail Open Network Society in British Columbia is coming to visit Sioux Lookout, Poplar Hill, North Spirit Lake and Balmertown this week. They plan to videotape a series of interviews and community scenes that show the impact that the Internet is having on daily life in rural communities, both in Ontario and British Columbia.

They are producing a video documenting the process involved in establishing high speed connectivity in rural communities. By showing the work done by K-Net and Gold Trail Open Network Society, they hope that this video will assist others to establish broadband connectivity in their own regions.

The team includes Quinn Savage, the videographer, John Savage, the Gold Trail Open Network facilitator and Sandy McElroy who is overseeing the development of online craft level training modules for the development of local connectivity. Les Meekis and Dan Pellerin will be the tour guides. 

 NOTE: In March 2003, Sandy first visited K-Net (see the news story) to discuss training and partnership opportunities. He shared some a powerpoint presentation about the GTONS that is available on-line (Click Here).

On July 9, five of the six Regional Management Organizations (RMO) with Industry Canada's First Nations SchoolNet program met over their IP video conferencing network to discuss various collaborative initiatives. Check out the pictures of the meeting using the new network bridge.

In anticipation of some additional opportunities to develop and support a variety of additional services and on-line applications, each of the RMO shared their ideas and recommendations. Each team agreed to take on different tasks to ensure all the First Nation schools across Canada are able to benefit and participate in these innovative initiatives.

The July 10 issue of Wawatay News contains two more news stories about the work being completed within the Kuh-ke-nah Network of Smart First Nations demonstration project.

This week's issue of the Kuh-ke-nah page in Wawatay News include the following articles:

• IP telephones improving First Nation communication - Slate Falls First Nation employees are now able to have telephones on their desks instead of having to share the single public pay phone. Community members share their stories and plans for the use of community-own IP telephony systems operating on their community broadband network.
• Telework a reality for K-Net communities & employees - Darlene Rae and other K-Net staff share their experiences about being able to be connected to their offices and work from wherever they are able to find a high speed Internet service.
• K-Net Showcase - contains photos from the North Spirit Lake First Nation portal (http://nsl.firstnation.ca)

Rick Garrick is researching additional stories for future articles. If you have a story that you want to share about this project and the work that is happening in your community to get connected, please send us an e-mail.

Various newspaper articles are being scanned and stored for reference purposes in this photo gallery.