- Home
- Study guide
- Module 1
- Topic 1: What is Student Digital Civic Engagement?
- Topic 2: How is Digital Civic Engagement Impacting Universities (and Beyond)?
- Topic 3: What Competences do Student Civic Engagers Develop?
- Topic 4: What does Student Digital Civic Engagement Look Like in Practice?
- Evaluation test for module 1
- Resources and further studies (Module 1)
- Module 2
- Topic 1: Problems that need solving – spotlight on global issues
- Topic 2: Improving your community through civic engagement
- Topic 3: Taking a service-learning approach to an DCE project
- Topic 4: DCE is building your competency levels. Here are the opportunities
- Evaluation test for module 2
- Resources and further studies (Module 2)
- Module 3
- Topic 1: What Do Great Digital Civic Engagement Projects Include?
- Topic 2: Getting Involved In Your First Digital Civic Engagement Project/ Initiative
- Topic 3: Using Technology To Enhance Your Civic Engagement Work
- Topic 4: Designing/ Delivering Digital Civic Engagement Solutions
- Evaluation test for module 3
- Resources and further studies (Module 3)
- Module 4
- Module 5
- Topic 1: Estimating Project Costs And Financial Needs
- Topic 2: Spotlight On Lean Start Up and Sustainable Business Model Canvas
- Topic 3: Crowdfunding Your Civic Engagement Projects /Causes
- Topic 4: Leveraging the power of corporate social responsibility
- Evaluation test for module 5
- Resources and further studies (Module 5)
- Module 6
- Topic 1: Why Building Credibility, Trust and Relationships are Key
- Topic 2: Cultivating and Growing a Student Civic Engagement Community
- Topic 3: Spotlight on Mission Marketing
- Topic 4: Technology Tools to Help You Share and Spread Your Civic Engagement Work
- Evaluation test for module 6
- Resources and further studies (Module 6)
Topic 3: Using Technology To Enhance Your Civic Engagement Work
This topic provides information on tools and reasons why students should use digital technology for their SDCE project. The learning outcomes of this topic has students learn about various digital tools and how they might utilise them in the development/ progression of a digital civic engagement project.
Including Technology in Your DCE Project
Once you have established who is leading your DCE project, and you understand the reasons that you are partaking in the project, it is important to work out how you might use technology to help aid your project.
Technology can assist us in many ways with regards to our DCE project, from finding new ways to meet or host your meetings to covering angles such as marketing.
Using Technology to Find Like Minded People
There are many tools and platforms that you can use to find people who are like minded and that have similar passions to you. Social media platforms allow us to find like minded people through groups or pages. Curious on how you might start? Try looking for community groups on Facebook, focusing on pages or groups that are in your locality.
If you can’t find anything local, try extending your search to a key cause that interests you.
Tools to Connect
Take a look at the following tools that can be used to help link up like-minded people.
Meetup is a tool where you can meet people with similar interests, both in a professional and casual manner. You can choose to join a group, or you can find events you are interested in. Can’t find a group that matches exactly what you are looking for? Try making one!
Check out Meetup’s website here:
https://www.meetup.com/
MeetMe is an app available for Android and iOS that enables people who have similar interests to be able to communicate with one another.
It consists of a live chat service so that you can speak to people who are nearby who have the same interests as you do.
Check out the website for MeetMe here:
https://www.meetme.com/#home
Communication Tools
Once you have met some people who you are interested in starting/ partaking your DCE project with, you will need to connect with them to organize the project and conduct meetings.
Explore the following apps to help get a good idea on what you might use to have online conversations with your teammates.
These digital tools can also be used to host meetings with community groups, brainstorming sessions and more.
Zoom is a video-chatting tool. Zoom can be used to conduct online meetings, as well as host online lessons. Users can also brainstorm on a virtual white board and collaborate on projects by annotating documents on other students’ screens.
Link to the Zoom website.
Facebook Live is a tool that can let the user live-stream video through a Facebook Page or Group. This can be used for recording gatherings, events, performances and lessons.
Webex is an online tool that enables users to have online conversations with up to 100 participants Webex can be used to communicate via voice or video call. It can also be used to screen share, or to share documents between people.
Webex is considered an inclusive software, offering equal experiences for everyone regardless of geography, language, or communication style.
Click here for a link to the Webex website
Project Management Tools
Project Management tools enable people to organize, plan and manage projects in a simple and effective way.
Project management tools will help you to make sure everyone is up to date with what needs doing, as well as what process of your Civic Engagement project you might be on.
There are a lot of different types of project management tools out there- you will have to decide what suits your project the best.
Trello allows users to create boards, lists and cards which enable you to keep your projects organised.
With each board, you can share items from many different sources, such as blogs, websites and news articles giving your users accessible information-fast.
Trello can be used as a free version too!
Click here for a link to the Trello website
Microsoft Teams may not initially be thought of as a project management software, it is a platform that gives its users a hub for teamwork. Teams uses channels rather than file folders and uses chats instead of emails. This change to the usual way of working in a team allows for each team member to access and work on the same files at the same time.
Click here to find out more about Teams
The DCE Toolkit
Within this section, several different digital tools have been introduced. But did you know we have an entire Toolkit as part of the SDCE project?
The DCE Toolkit is an excellent resource to help give you some ideas on what tools to use and when- it also contains some inspiring tools that have been used to help local communities throughout Europe.
For more information on the DCE Toolkit click on this link
Quick Test
