Web Places: Project-Based Activities for At-Risk Youth

This proposal describes an effort to improve the education of at-risk youth through web-publishable, project-based activities. These activities might include electronic journalism on community issues, natural science projects, or digital art Galleries. Activities such as these are particularly appropriate for at-risk youth through their power to integrate school and home or street life, to give students focused, meaningful work, to connect them with communities outside of their own, and to enhance their identity in productive ways. Current barriers to implementation of web-publishable project- based activities include lack of appropriate hardware and software, the requirement for extensive technical expertise, and a lack of support services for project-based activities. Proposed here is development of a system, Web Places that will help schools surmount these barriers. Web Places consists of the hardware and software needed to develop project content, a set of configurable, dynamic templates for project development and publication, and an organization devoted to the support of the Web Places community. Phase I will develop a skeletal project template and conduct a tryout with at-risk youth. Phase II will develop finished prototypes of several project templates and submit them to extensive evaluation. Phase III will establish an organization for commercialization of Web Places.