Creating a National Civic Communication Corps
Moving on a key Knight Commission recommendation
Go for a hike in a state or national park, and you are likely to run into some legacy of the Civilian Conservation
Corps. Formed in the depths of the Great Depression to give young men work that met public needs, the CCC
constructed bridges, trails and lodges that we still enjoy today.
Imagine the legacy of a national 21st century Civic Communication Corps (CCC) program, formed during the Great
Recession. Diverse Corps members fan out across the country to help ensure equal access to the digital information
and resources that have become the lifeblood of our economy and crucial to our civic life. As a result of this Corps,
institutions like libraries and community centers are better equipped to engage 21st century citizens, thousands
receive training in digital communications, communities have better civic knowledge and stronger civic cultures
thanks to a richer array of online resources produced by more diverse citizens, and the digital divide closes
dramatically.
Need: The proposed CCC is a direct response to the needs framed by the 2009 Knight Commission report
“Informing Communities: Sustaining Democracies in the Digital Age” (http://www.knightcomm.org/read-thereport-and-comment/). The report states that “Information is as vital to the healthy functioning of communities as
clean air, safe streets, good schools, and public health.” But testimony before the Knight Commission showed that
the information and communications infrastructure of civil society is very unequal, with serious consequences for
economic opportunity and civic life.
Role of CCC: CCC member activities will include the following:
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Assess local community information needs and assets.
Help maintain local online community hubs—and create them if needed.
Increase capacity of community organizations to use technology to engage residents in their programs as
volunteers, participants and donors.
Conduct offline community outreach to increase residents’ awareness of web resources that offer local
civic information.
Provide training to community members to close the “digital divide” and ensure equal opportunity to use
technology to participate actively in civic and economic life.
Create new community information resources using digital arts, social media and other technology tools.
A Networked Approach: We will build upon existing institutional infrastructure to create a national network of
sites that will contribute to a body of best practices and tools that will be widely disseminated. The CCC sites will
become local centers of excellence that can provide training to other programs on how they can effectively use
technology to engage their constituents and increase their social impact. Through rigorous evaluation, we will
demonstrate the impact corps members can have in improving the creation and dissemination of information that
helps community members participate in democratic and economic life.
Moving Forward: We are targeting a September 2012 start date in the field for the first class of CCC members.
To that end, we plan to convene two planning sessions in the spring and summer of 2011, bringing together leading
practitioners and thinkers with expertise on using new technology to encourage civic engagement. We anticipate
some of those planning meeting participants will join the CCC implementation proposal. The planning will lead to
a detailed proposal for implementing the CCC to be submitted to the Corporation for National Service and private
funders in the fall of 2011. We are actively seeking additional people that would like to participate in and/or
support this planning process.
Prepared by David Crowley, President & Founder of Social Capital Inc. and Peter Levine, Director of Research
and Director of CIRCLE (Center for Information & Research on Civic Learning & Engagement) at Tufts
University. The authors are initiating a planning process for the project and welcome additional collaborators.
Contact David at dcrowley@socialcapitalinc.org if interested The following pages have more on the planning
process and the SCI program that serves as a model for this concept..
Start-up Funding and Process: We seek to raise $35,000 in start-up funds to cover our planning expenses over
the next year—our goal is to raise the first $20,000 by June 30 to allow us to focus on planning work over the
summer and prepare to submit AmeriCorps and other grant applications in the fall of 2011. Our early projections
show this start-up investment will lead to a $2 million budget in the first year of program operation (starting
September 2012); and over $3 million in year two.
The start-up funds will enable us to devote sufficient time to developing a detailed plan for the operating program.
This will include convening a planning meeting with prospective lead partner agencies from around the country;
securing agreements with at least 5 lead partner agencies; working with those partners to develop local partners that
will host Civic Communication Corps members; defining program outcomes and creating an evaluation plan;
developing Corps member training and systems for knowledge sharing. Creating a strong, detailed plan will be
essential to winning in the competition for a federal AmeriCorps grant. We will also identify alternative
revenue sources and program structure in case we are not able to secure an AmeriCorps grant.
Social Impact: The social impact is the most important return on
the start-up investment in the Civic Communication Corps. We
project 100 young adults will be engaged as Corps members in
Year 1; developing valuable skills that will serve them well as
community leaders and in the workplace. We will develop more
detailed social impact outcomes in the planning process; but based
on our experience at SCI, we project the 100 Corps members will
engage 50,000 citizens in community life and reach nearly
200,000 individuals.
Ways to help launch the Corps:
 Make a tax-deductible donation to help us reach our 6/30 start-up fund goal of $20,000.
 Join our network of advisors to help with strategic and technology planning issues.
 Engage with our Corps members—help with training, host them at your company, join online discussions
 Donate gently used computer hardware
Building on experience: The new Civic Communication Corps will build on the relevant experience of SCI and
other innovative organizations. SCI’s model that provides a base of experience for the project is summarized on the
following page.
Building a Corps of Civic Technology Coordinators:
The Social Capital Inc. Model
This description of the SCI model appeared in the white paper “Civic Engagement and Community Information:
Five Strategies to Revive Civic Communication”, by Peter Levine. Published by the Aspen Institute and the John S.
and James L. Knight Foundation.
Social Capital Inc. is a Massachusetts-based nonprofit that seeks to increase local civic engagement and social
capital through a variety of initiatives that connect diverse individuals and organizations in the community. Since
its founding in 2002, SCI has incorporated information and communications technologies as essential components
of its programs to connect people, foster civic engagement and build healthier communities. SCI currently serves
ten communities in the state.
With funding assistance from the Corporation for National and Community Service, SCI is now in its fourth year of
placing a team of AmeriCorps members in four of its partner communities—Dorchester, Fall River, Lynn, and
Woburn--to serve as Outreach and Technology Coordinators. These young adults are charged with using both
digital technology and more traditional “offline” outreach in the community to connect residents to civic
information and encourage them to participate by volunteering and attending public meetings and community
events. Outreach and Technology Coordinators are placed at SCI community partner organizations, which include
community health centers, YMCAs, Boys & Girls Clubs, and local community based organizations.
One central task of the Coordinators is maintaining and promoting community portals developed by SCI. Each
portal includes a community calendar, listing of volunteer opportunities, searchable information on community
resources, and news of public meetings, community events and other local happenings. Coordinators also publish a
weekly electronic newsletter that highlights the latest community information and encourages readers to visit the
website for more information. More recently, the Coordinators have been using social media (Facebook and
Twitter) as additional channels for sharing this information and engaging with community residents.
The Outreach and Technology Coordinators also make frequent presentations to community members and
organizations about the SCI community websites and other online community resources. They conduct workshops
on basic computer literacy topics and how to use social media. The Coordinators themselves start the year with
training to help them develop the outreach and technical skills they need for their work with the community. While
they typically arrive with good general technology skills, most Coordinators require training in how to apply these
skills in a community-building context.
SCI measures the impact of its initiatives to build civic information resources through community surveys, and the
results are promising. Over 10,000 individuals per month now use the SCI community portal tools; usage has
climbed significantly since SCI has had the AmeriCorps team in this role. Seventy-five percent of respondents to
one SCI survey indicated that they have been more civically active as a result of having the SCI online resources
available.
The SCI team has been able to leverage technology to address a wide range of pressing needs in the communities it
serves. Examples include organizing information about resources available to local Haitian families in the aftermath
of the 2010 earthquake in Haiti; creating a computer class at the Codman Square Tech Center in Dorchester, where
residents of this diverse community can learn Word and Excel skills and how to construct a resume; hosting an
online discussion about needs of low-income Woburn students which led to a collection of back to school supplies
for them; connecting an isolated elderly resident to a neighbor who volunteered to help with snow removal in
response a notice in SCI’s Week in Woburn enewsletter; other help to connect neighbors to help each other through
difficult situations; and increasing participation at public meetings.