Appendix 9 - Networking the Nation Annual Report 2003-04

A view from the Bush

At the time of commencement of Networking the Nation, many people in rural and remote Australia felt alienated from mainstream Australia, particularly in areas such as access to higher level telecommunications and information technology. It seemed to them that they were forever destined to remain decades behind.

In 1996, city dwellers were taking up mobile phone technology with gusto, but people in the vast inland rural areas could only imagine lives made easier and safer if they, too, could access mobile phones. At that time, carriers had no strategy to expand the coverage to any extent. Over the life of Networking the Nation, access to mobile telephony has been largely addressed.

In 1996, people in rural areas were beginning to realise the value of the Internet, but the cost of using it, together with a widespread lack of technical skills in many inland areas precluded many from access. Some had to pay up to $18 an hour just to get to an ISP, and then pay per hour provider-charges on top of that. Speeds as low as 2.4 kbps added to the frustration and expense.

Projects funded by Networking the Nation acted as a driver to bring down access costs to the Internet, and emphasised the need for access to higher speeds to become more universally available.

Training programs provided the means to develop expertise which helped people gain confidence in using new technology.

In 1996, if you did not have face-to-face access to government services, you did without. For example, state taxpayer-funded services such as legal aid were simply not available, or did not meet client needs. Today, videoconferencing from even the smallest towns can greatly simplify gaining access to appropriate legal advice.

After seven years of the program, the result has been that the bush has embraced new technologies, and will not go back to the past.

The program has raised expectations and skill levels, as well as providing much better access to communications infrastructure and resources. People outside the metropolitan areas today routinely use online services to meet a whole range of needs, including business, social, health, education and community.

In conjunction with other Government initiatives such as the Extended Zone Tender, Networking the Nation-initiated projects have enhanced the quality of life of many rural families and provided new opportunities for interaction both within rural Australia, and with metropolitan areas.

As a rural Australian, I am aware that Rural Australia still faces many challenges. And as an NTN Board Member, I know that with the improvements delivered since 1996, rural Australians today are in a much better position to meet them.

Lindsay MacDonald
'Coolatai' Blackall, Qld

An essential life skill

Basic ICT skill proficiency is increasingly being recognised as an essential third life skill alongside literacy and numeracy. Users, and particularly new ICT users, require adequate training that provides information, advice and assistance in relation to the use of the services and the problems and issues that arise out of their use.

But, in the 1990s, ICT training opportunities in rural and remote Australia were not readily available, with more isolated users often having to travel long distances to access relevant courses.

The funding of online access centres and specific training programs through NTN has gone a long way to addressing the lack of training opportunities. Almost all online access centres established by NTN incorporated a training component as a necessary part of their operations. In addition, NTN provided direct funding of around 30 IT training projects which have worked to develop rural people's skills in using personal computers and online services. Tens of thousands of regional Australians were able to benefit from projects such as the Queensland Rural Women's Network 'BridgIT' project; the Regional Connectivity Project in Victoria which, through 20 public Internet access sites in small towns in western Victoria, provided informal training in IT and the Internet; South Australia's 'Networks For You' project, a state-wide Internet training awareness initiative; Local Government Association of Northern Territory 'I've Got Email' which provided basic Internet and email training (including electronic banking); and the Volunteers for Isolated Student Education (VISE) project 'Internet to the Outback' which successfully trained more than 1400 families living on isolated properties and communities.

NTN also supported a number of innovative educational projects including a pilot project to trial high quality Internet Access via satellite into home classrooms for South Australian School of the Air students. This award winning project has empowered students and teachers (and this has also extended to parents who have become more computer literate). Tasmania's 'OPEN-IT' project provided statewide delivery of online education for kindergarten to TAFE levels across a range of education providers and improved schools' access to online materials and increased curriculum choice for students in rural and remote areas.

There remains an ongoing need for basic IT training and technical support in regional and remote communities and it is pleasing to see that, following on from the success of the NTN program, the Government has allocated further funding specifically for IT training and technical support in the most remote areas of Australia.

I am certain that increased ease and familiarity with information technologies amongst regional communities will prove to be one of the most important legacies of the NTN program.

Professor Gerry Anderson
Ballarat

It was head banging stuff!!

Prior to NTN, if you were on a committee in a remote community seeking better telecommunication services you would have experienced: No interest by telcos in community driven approaches for mobile phone coverage; No interest in provision of local call access to the Internet; and Not being taken seriously in requesting access to ISDN connections for videoconferencing. With many groups knowing a bit about IT and believing in its potential, our communities were willing to contribute. If only we could be given a chance to kick-start the process!

Local call access to the Internet, IT equipment and training, technical support, mobile phones, access to videoconferencing, Satellite and growing Broadband services are a few of the benefits our remote communities have seen from the NTN program.

I'll focus for a bit on Telecentres/Community Access Centres or similar centres that many communities have established.

The combination of community ownership, community contributions, and NTN funds assisted to speedup and spread the use of IT throughout the country. The strengths of this approach have been acknowledged by international visitors who have noted the real benefit of joint investment compared to just throwing $ into infrastructure.

The approach does not guarantee the initial project will last forever, it does ensure the ownership, knowledge and experience will be spread through the regions and add so much more value to our communities. The infrastructure remains and the opportunities increase.

Many centres have grown and broadened their vision by using their IT centres to form a base to bring a greater range of services and community development projects to their regions while still making the IT available to users. This fits well with the goal of centres becoming self-sustaining. We have seen NTN projects where partnerships have been developed with other Commonwealth and state rural programs e.g. RTC, Regional Solutions. This has been a great advancement in allowing communities to work towards their own solutions - the increased use of IT in local solutions is demonstrating increased knowledge, expectations and change.

The investment in IT centres has been such a positive step that we should not stop now. There is a recommendation in the Estens Report that 'All tiers of government should work together to support online access centres in regional, rural and remote Australia'. This will work along with our communities continuing to look, seek out and embrace their own opportunities towards sustainability. We should recognise that in some of our small and remote areas where these centres are most needed there should be a willingness to provide the appropriate resources.

As a Board member of NTN, I have had the privilege of seeing the enthusiasm, contribution and commitment many have invested towards NTN projects which increased the value and benefits far beyond the initial funding allocation.

Eleanor Scholz
Wudinna, South Australia

Tasmanian Telehealth Network

This project pioneered the establishment of a medical quality video-conferencing network. It provides links to specialist and other medical advisory services in the main centres of Hobart and Launceston. Currently:

• 26 Telehealth Studios are fully operational, providing statewide coverage, with links to King, Cape Barren and Clarke Islands;
• 19 Community Health Centres and District Hospitals have received ICT equipment and network infrastructure upgrades;
• Specialist services currently being accessed via videoconferencing in response to community needs include: Palliative Care (specialist consultations, case reviews, case conferencing), Mental Health (Adult, Child & Adolescent, Gerontology, Forensic Services), Wound Management/Dermatology, Diabetes Education and Support Groups, GP Training, Emergency Clinical Audits & Case Reviews, Orthotics/Prosthetics, Parkinson's Clinic, Specialist Clinic Appointments (LGH only), Ambulance Volunteer Training & Support, Oncology - Statewide Case Reviews, Drug & Alcohol counseling, Child, Youth & Family Services Family Conferencing, Child and Adolescent Mental Health On-Line Counselling Service, the Dementia Online Network, and the Community Pharmacy Network initiatives.

Over $1 million annually is being saved in travel costs and salaries of medical staff, as well as the ongoing, greatly enhanced, medical service for rural Tasmanians. Innovations in standards and processes developed as necessary parts of the methodology under this project have been made freely available to other states.

Regional Connectivity - Victoria

The University of Ballarat established a public Internet access presence in 13 small towns in central western Victoria. The University provided the key role in identifying these towns and opportunities in them to cooperate with other community activities. The University identified people who could form a local committee to be responsible for each site, but kept a broader network coordination active through personal contact, email and a monthly newsletter to exchange information and expertise.

The sites were named Community Enterprise Centres (CECs) to focus attention on long term sustainability.

The area was selected for attention because of low levels of IT awareness and utilisation, high unemployment and low levels of per capita income. Of the 65 long-term unemployed given an opportunity under the Work for the Dole scheme,

52 (80 per cent) gained employment.

Informal and accredited IT training was provided to over 30 000 people and over 200 000 people attended and used the Internet and computers, with user friendly assistance from the 'Knowledge Navigator' at each site. On-site IT advice was provided to small businesses, for which demand was increasing by the end of the two years. It was estimated that the catalytic effect of ideas generated by the new technology brought approximately

$38 million of new money into the region.

The sense of community and optimism was raised in each town, and a new level of initiative generated by the committee management processes. Social and technical skills were improved in a great many young people through the developmental atmosphere of the sites.

School of the Air - SOTA

The SOTA trial to deliver a more modern distance education delivery method through high quality Internet access via satellite into student's home classrooms was overwhelmingly successful with all primary children enrolled with SOTA

being taught via satellite/internet since

April 2003. Students and teachers now have a virtual classroom and communicate with each other using voice over the Internet and a 'live' video camera.

As in real-life classrooms, students can now have instant feedback, show work done and work in small groups for exercises such as brainstorming and the teacher can 'move' between groups to check on their progress. It has really empowered students and suddenly long division, cooking, science experiments, and PE can all be taught much more effectively. Classroom activities are now full of fun, opportunity and social engagement.

Parents have also felt the flow-on benefits of the project and have become Internet literate while helping their children with schoolwork and using these newly developed skills in their businesses.

The project has also won an international award in the Brandon-Hall Excellence in e-Learning Competition.

BridgIT Project

In 1998 the Queensland Rural Women's Network (QWRN) recognised the great IT challenge facing women living in rural, regional and remote Queensland in accessing affordable and 'woman-friendly' basic Internet training and support. From this recognition grew the notion of BridgIT, an innovative and far-reaching project to provide Internet training for rural and remote communities.

BridgIT offered personalised, basic Internet and email training to individuals and small groups in rural and remote Queensland by having centrally based trainers living and working in a number of training regions across the state. Training was conducted

in the home or office of the client or at public venues.

The project has had considerable success in assisting people in getting over those first hurdles of using the Internet in isolation, with over 10 000 people having participated in community awareness activities. Some 4000 individual training sessions were also delivered. The project has been held in such high esteem that it has been used as a model for the delivery of training. It has also been recognised through awards both nationally and internationally.

Local Government Association of Queensland

The Local Government Association of Queensland's Connecting Communities project aimed to:

• establish Council and Community Online Services;
  
• improve intra-local government information exchange;
  
• identify and define opportunities to improve Council information and telecommunications infrastructure and systems;
  
• support the take-up of e-procurement; and
  
• improve dealings between Local Government and the Queensland State Government, by establishing infrastructure to allow all Queensland Council staff to access the State Government's intranet, GovNet.
  

Project findings suggest that potential savings of up to $20 million per annum for Queensland Councils can be realised through the adoption of online technologies.

The project has led to the development and establishment of Local Government Online, which provides participating Queensland councils a suite of online services including e-procurement, billing, and tools to manage the storage and retrieval of local and state Government information and data through a one-stop access point.

The Municipal Association of Victoria

The Municipal Association of Victoria Online Services Delivery project has made a significant contribution to local government in Victoria. Council web and intranet capability has been transformed from first generation web sites to sophisticated content management and distributed publishing systems.

Electronic payment of rates through the Internet is now almost universal across local government, supplemented by the development of a cross-jurisdictional open source public licence agreement. Electronic purchasing was introduced on a standard local government system, a web services implementation system was developed and the project was able to forge closer links with both the Victorian and Australian governments. In late 2003, an independent consultancy assessed that Councils had obtained benefits valued at $25 million during the life of the project, for the $5.8 million invested.  Many of these benefits will continue to be reaped each year into the future.

The Association has since hosted a conference open to all councils nationally, and continued dialogue with local governments in other states, to improve standardisation of processes and inter-operability nationally.

The Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara Media Aboriginal Corporation project

As a result of the project, communications on the PY Lands have vastly improved.

There are 19 Internet centres offering a total of 67 computers for community use. ICT training and awareness programs are being implemented. On-going sustainability is being supported by sponsor organisations and revenue is being received from various facilities.

Website development is continuing, with all communities and homelands represented. The site (www.waru.org) also offers a comprehensive photo archive and an online shop with potential for online art and/or music sales.

Thirteen videoconferencing sites have been established, with associated business plans for each community.

Technical support is available, both on-site and remote support, including a help line. Three trainees have been trained in technical support.

The UHF CB network is currently being installed in the region, including along an on-road corridor. Equipment includes mobile, static and handheld units.

Enjoying a new freedom

The spread of mobile phone coverage has brought smiles to the faces of many.

Emergency service volunteers spread across rural and remote regions are one group to clearly benefit. Using their mobile phones, volunteers can now phone in to get details and let the communications centre know the call has been received and they are on their way to assist. This can now happen whether volunteers are out on the tractor, away from the business, home, office or just out taking a daily walk - we can now ring someone to pick us up and this cuts down on response times.

Prior to having mobile phones we always had to swap rosters to make sure there were always two people who could respond quickly.

Sounds pretty simple but it is amazing the freedom this gives to small groups of people who provide 24/7 emergency service coverage to their regions.

Eleanor Scholz
Wudinna, South Australia

NTN Board Field Visits

Throughout the seven years of its existence, the NTN Board's responsibilities extended well beyond the assessment and approval of funding applications and projects. Almost every year, the Board embarked on a week-long field trip to view various NTN projects around the country and see first hand how the NTN funds were impacting regional, rural and remote Australia. These visits enabled the Board members to meet with individuals within the communities and obtain grass roots feedback on what NTN was achieving.

The NTN Board trips tended to focus on the more remote areas of Australia including:

• Alice Springs, Barron Creek, Yuendumu, Darwin and the Tiwi Islands in the Northern Territory;
  
• Walpole, Denmark, Albany, Wagin and Geraldton in Western Australia;
  
• Wudinna, Kimba, Tumby Bay and Port Lincoln in South Australia; and
  
• Laura, Lockhart River, Weipa, Mornington Island and Burketown in Queensland.
  

During these trips the Board visited a variety of NTN projects in regional centres, country towns and indigenous communities. It also met with the various State Government NTN Advisory Groups/Committees. The types of projects encountered included public access centres, libraries, schools, telecentres, Internet cafes, mobile telephone sites, telehealth sites, arts/cultural centres and videoconferencing facilities.

These visits allowed the Board to gain a better appreciation of a range of different communities and projects as well as experience first hand the benefits these projects brought to the communities. They demonstrated the role of community leadership and active community contributions in achieving successful outcomes. The importance of state governments working cooperatively with NTN to deliver infrastructure and services was also highlighted.

Overall, the Board was greatly reassured by what the NTN projects achieved and the impact they had on so many dimensions of day-to-day life. Particularly impressive was the role that telecentres and public access centres appeared to play in raising the IT skills of people in rural and remote areas and providing Internet access and telelearning opportunities. The growing importance of videoconferencing facilities in hospitals, prisons, legal centres, schools and medical centres was also highlighted. And, of course, the popularity of projects providing enhanced mobile phone coverage was almost universal.

It is sometimes all too easy to underestimate the importance of field visits such as those on which the NTN Board periodically embarked. But for all Board members these visits proved to be invaluable, not only in providing a first hand demonstration of the impost that NTN projects can have (and have had) on individuals and their communities, but also in ensuring that the Board remained in touch with the needs of rural and remote communities and was able to make informed decisions.

Johanna Plante
Port Parnham, South Australia