Two Be Connected Community Engagement grants have also been secured to support a hands on, “meet the people” exercise in the NT and the other will provide support for ASCCA’s presence at the forthcoming NSW Seniors Festival Expo where the SWADE NSW Be Connected Digital Mentoring program will be on show.

Not to be outdone, SWADE WA continues to make inroads into the digital arena in regional Western Australia. To this end we are about to facilitate one of the first of the new concept “Digital Health My Way” projects in the towns of Walpole and Kununurra respectively with Jenny and Tik running sessions in their own communities to connect their audiences (18+ in this project) to digital tools to manage their health and information.

SWADE NSW will see some new faces this year delivering the round four Digital Mentor training -ASCCA’s own Mark Young and new kid on the block, Roger Hack will be the Lead Digital Mentors. Plans are in place now that their training has been undertaken, to finally provide the momentum this project has needed for some time.  

If you would like any more information on upcoming opportunities to participate in any of these Be Connected training opportunities please email Natika or Jenny who will provide you with more information.  

SWADE - Seniors West Australian Digital Expansion project - an ASCCA initiated concept.

The SWADE and WARRC Teams have been collaborating over the Christmas and New Year period and have relaunched the website that SWADE built in 2018 to have all the information for SWADE and WARRC at the end of January.  This is the event, hosted online thanks to our partner BeingThere Video Conferencing.  

The most exciting part of what we have done, is meeting with a number of CRCs since February to chat about the SWADE program and get you all kicked off with your Be Connected tasks, get you in touch with the Activation Grants and the new Digital Skills Building grant rounds announced towards the end of March.  

After our initial conversations and digesting the information we have from your survey answers, we formulated a couple of sessions to help you get your Seniors excited about learning new things. 
We had a number of CRCs register and participate in a couple of sessions with Jen, and we are working towards setting up the next session for the Neighbourhood Centres when they are keen to participate in the project.   

Jen and I are working through the survey responses many of our CRCs have completed, we're hoping to put together a great range of support options for you to get excited about, we're excited to be helping our CRC family to spread the digital love across our state, helping anyone to increase their digital literacy, all while showing the rest of the country how us lot from regional Western Australia are setting the pace for playing our role in making sure we're doing our part to ensure that every Australian is connected.

Digital literacy. What is it about digital literacy that the government is so keen to make sure everyone's connected? The boring answer is that it’s the way of the future. What if someone just flat out does not want to engage. Why should they? The standard, “I've lived my life without it. Why do I need it now?” response.  What will it bring to my life that I don’t seem to be missing?” Now for those of you who know me, Tik, and Jen you may or may not know), are both passionate about technology & the difference it can make to people's lives. Some might suggest that our passion borders on the extreme end at times. Jen has spent the last ten years (at the very least) spreading her passion for all things digital and seniors through her patch at Walpole. Whilst I have a (somewhat exaggerated) reputation of being the ringleader when in the Big Smoke and the calling of the Apple Store drags one or more of us in...

The sharing of digital discoveries & the ways they may or may not improve their lives, pending the usual frustrations that some tech can pose... like the app I have found that allows me to sit on this plane, with my iPad, Apple Pencil and headphones. I am writing, yes like on a piece of paper, very retro I know!  I love the feeling of writing.  I love how things can flow (or waffle-depending on which side of the story you're on!) and then save my ramblings to the Dropbox which I then copy and paste right into here! Saves time, gives me the opportunity to review and edit without having to then type my handwritten notes from scratch! Its great! I love it, especially when it works well!

But I'm getting off topic, I suppose what I'm trying to say is that we all have different drivers to embrace new technologies. What one person loves about technology another may loathe.  We, as enablers (and I mean enablers in a good way) need to find those drivers for our less enthusiastic participants. The digital literacy we are all championing with the Be Connected program is going to mean different things to different people. It can help to reduce the risk of social isolation that many of our older Australians potentially face if they're not comfortable online.

Many of our community members are already connected but as technology evolves, and rapidly so, it can be daunting for older users. The constant updates and, changes can cause confusion, frustration and fear.

I see our roles as the calming force, reassuring and encouraging. Jen and I are here to help you to help your community members.

We are looking forward to working with you on keeping your teams' skills, motivation and enthusiasm going this year!

We're looking forward to sharing with the rest of the Be Connected partners just how amazing a network and people regional West Aussies have/are!

I have set up the first of the Video conferencing support sessions for our CRCs - you can book online, just remember to test your link before the session, let me know if you need me to test the day before or not and if I can I will be there to test, otherwise, give Pam or Gerry a call.  

See you soon CRCs!