Funding Opportunity—Verizon Tech Savvy Awards

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Neighborhood Networks provides potential funding sources to help centers develop and improve programs and services. Featured this week are the Verizon Tech Savvy Awards.

Program Areas: Established by the Verizon Foundation, the National Center for Family Literacy, and Former First Lady of Iowa Christie Vilsack, the Verizon Tech Savvy Awards are the first national awards given to intergenerational digital learning programs. The Verizon Tech Savvy Awards recognize outstanding educational programs that demystify technology for parents so that they may better support their child's academic and social growth in an increasingly complex 21st century. Goals of the awards are to:

	Provide an incentive for grassroots, community-based nonprofit organizations, libraries, and schools to include information communications technology literacy for parents as a component to enhance existing literacy programming.
	Promote and support programming that empowers parents, and subsequently their children, to utilize technology-based resources and tools for literacy and language learning.
	Encourage intergenerational technology applications that improve the literacy and life skills of both parents and children.
	Recognize innovative programming that prepares families for success in the 21st century through the use of digital media.
	Help parents be active participants in all facets of their children's education.

Programs should demonstrate innovative and creative use of digital learning, including but not limited to computers and the Internet, software applications, mobile learning, gaming devices, and video, to:

	Increase parents' understanding and use of technology to support their children's growth.
	Empower parents to use technology to access, analyze, manage, integrate, evaluate, and communicate information.
	Expose parents to the educational opportunities offered through digital learning.
	Encourage and support parents to be actively involved in and to advocate for their child's education.
	Bridge the gap for parents between theoretical technology use and real-life applications, especially in ways that promote 21st-century learning skills such as critical thinking, communication, problem solving, collaborative learning, and global awareness.
	Provide a setting for facilitated interactions using new media for parents and children.
	Provide learning activities that are transferable to home and/or the community to encourage technology use outside the program setting.

Programs should demonstrate that they are sustainable, scalable, and measurable.

Targeted Area: Nationwide (Northeast, Mid-Atlantic, Southeast, Midwest, Southwest, and West).

Eligibility: Community-based nonprofits, libraries, and schools with Internal Revenue Service 501(c)(3) nonprofit status may apply. Religious or sectarian organizations may apply only if the program(s) offered serve a broad cross-section of the community.

Award Amount: One national award of $25,000 and four regional awards of $5,000 will be given to organizations that have developed and delivered exemplary programs for parents and children. The awards will be presented at the 2009 National Conference on Family Literacy in Orlando, Florida. See a map of the regions.

Application Process: Program self-nominations are accepted online only. In addition to general information about your organization, you will be scored on your response to the following questions:

	Identify the new media tools used by parents in the program (5 points).
	Describe how the program increases parents' understanding of the educational benefits of technology (15 points).
	Describe how the program encourages parental involvement in children's education (15 points).
	Describe how the program empowers parents to use technology in real-life situations (10 points).
	Describe how 21st-century learning skills are supported by the program (10 points).
	Describe how teachers/facilitators design experiences that encourage parent-child interaction using digital tools (15 points).
	Describe how families transfer digital learning experiences outside the program (15 points).
	Provide specific evidence of success for the program to date (10 points).
	Describe how the Verizon Tech Savvy Award will be used to sustain or expand the program (5 points).

Deadlines: Deadline for application is December 12, 2008 (midnight, EST).

Contact: For more information about the Verizon Tech Savvy Awards, contact:

National Center for Family Literacy
325 West Main Street, Suite 300
Louisville, KY 40202-4237
Phone: (502) 584-1133