• Posted on 26 Nov 2020
  • 4-minute read

This week the Centre for Social Justice & Inclusion was awarded a Knowledge Exchange sponsorship by the City of Sydney to scale up a COVID-response digital mentoring program. The grant will allow us to expand the program from its pilot in our local neighbourhood, Glebe, to a wider geographical area, starting with the adjacent suburbs of Ultimo and Pyrmont.

Universities can have an immensely positive role to play in their local neighbourhoods. We are not only global centres of learning, we can also be local institutions, with a footprint in our local precinct and a responsibility to the people who make up our local communities.

UTS has a longstanding role in the Glebe precinct as part of the Glebe Connected project, engaging with community groups, individuals and organisations in the area to benefit the community through pooling our resources, expertise, build up community networks.

Our most recent project has involved meeting local needs through working with Glebe’s aging population, who have been at a heightened risk of social isolation throughout the impacts of COVID-19.

Moving online risks leaving people behind

Jaz Stephens, who participated in our program as a digital mentee, says, ‘IT was in many ways unknown and secretive to me … my mentor Rusafa extends that boundary.

‘We might be looking at going from A to B, so we look at maps. We might look at ways to send email, management of digital photographs, and also how to search and find. As a result, my world has opened a lot. Put me with my computer now and I know where to go.’

Her mentor, Rusafa Rabi, says ‘I’m loving it … we have been doing this for two months, and I’ve really enjoyed the program. And I’ve learned a lot too. While the program says that I'm meant to be the mentor and I'm helping my mentee, at the same time I think I've developed so many qualities.’

Jaz and Rusafa sit apart from each other on a park bench in an outdoor setting. Jaz is looking at the camera with a big grin, Rusafa is looking at Jaz with a fond smile.
Mentee and mentor, Jaz Stephens and Rusafa Rabi.

When 2020 brought a global pandemic, many services and facilities made a rapid pivot to being provided online. Huge leaps in access to technology and online access have enabled many of us to maintain access to basic needs. But COVID has also exposed a digital divide for significant portions of the population.

This came to light earlier in 2020 in the work that UTS and others were doing as part of Glebe Connected. In particular, residents over the age of 55 were less likely to have had access or experience in accessing online services. Gaps in digital literacy were directly affecting social isolation for this portion of the population.

Simultaneously, UTS was embarking on another COVID response plan for their own international student cohort who were facing their own issues with lost employment, social isolation and uncertainty. UTS created a COVID response plan in March specifically to find and support students who found themselves in financial hardship.

The Glebe Digital Mentoring Program was developed to bring both of these groups together to provide mutual benefit, increasing digital literacy confidence and skill in older residents while offering income and experience for student mentors.

The Glebe pilot employed UTS International students as corporate volunteers for up to ten hours a week over three months to mentor people over 55 who needed support with their technological needs.

Building connections

Support included digital skills like checking email, creating folders, accessing MyGov, downloading apps and taking and storing digital photos. Where residents are undertaking digital literacy programs elsewhere, mentors can support and supplement their learning. But the program has delivered more than just acquiring new skills.

On the cultural exchange element of the program, Jaz says, ‘I’d never met someone from Bangladesh before – a cultural difference which is absolutely delightful. Along with learning useful skills, we’ve become friends.’

‘The thing that I’ve noticed is it’s about so much more than just acquiring digital skills, it’s so much about the relationships. Both for the international students who can also be quite isolated, especially at this time, and for the mentees – it’s about the relationship for them alongside acquiring the digital skills. Students are making connections with members of the population they may not have had access to before, with the potential for genuine friendships,’ says Bilquis Ghani, Social Impact Practitioner at the Centre for Social Justice & Inclusion.

‘We’re looking forward to expanding the program. This grant will enable us to reach more community members by scaling our footprint in the local area.’

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Descriptive transcript

The Glebe Digital Mentoring Program essentially brings together students from UTS who were looking for work, who were out of work through the COVID period, international students especially, and brings together seniors in the Glebe area who might have difficulty accessing information that's available only in the digital space now, or connecting with friends and family.

Through some of the work and research we've done in the area, we found these two situations that we could marry to resolve the lack of work for some of our students, and the lack of access to information, digital technologies, communication, and that kind of thing.

I feel completely blessed to be in this program, and I think it's really important that older people learn how to use the internet and all those sorts of things, because that is our world today. If we don't have them, you just fall behind, and you become in a very lonely world.

It can be so isolating, especially during COVID this time, so it was actually even great just coming to our sessions and chatting with someone, because during COVID, you didn't get that sort of normal experience of just going out, chatting to people, so it felt really good.

It didn't feel like work for me, it felt just like a friendship, just helping a friend out, I guess.

It's just been really important for me to be reassured that I'm actually helping people during this tough time, and even if it's just a small thing like calling someone or videoing someone, I can see how much of an impact it's had on my mentees, and especially for you, even with the file management, I can see that it's a weight off your shoulders, and you feel decluttered, so it's really wonderful for me to see that outcome with my mentees.

And I was just thinking about the ripple effect actually, you know, like I can actually help my friends now.

Yeah.

What did I gain the most? I think two things: better management of my computer systems, and secondly, working out how to get from A to B, all the different alternatives.

So I think in general it's added a nice dimension to my life, so now I feel, as I said earlier, I'm in charge. The E-world isn't running me, I'm running it.

For me, I think with this program, I learn a lot of things. Though the program says that I am going to be the mentor and I'm helping my mentee, at the same time, I think I develop so many qualities, like leadership, time management, and also building a relationship, and also the patience and how to manage everything, because I've been the mentor so I have to manage everything. So the quality I've gained, and I really enjoy doing the program.

I can put it down to one word: it's called hope. It's called E-hope. Now I can hope to be able to open a new chapter in my life.

So, yes, I definitely have benefited tremendously from the program.

When you say, can I tell you a story about the difference I experienced, my whole relationship with the computer is different. I'm not one million percent comfortable, but I'm a lot, lot, lot more comfortable when I turn on my computer or I take my phone in my hand. I'm a lot more comfortable, that's my experience.

Now I am realising if I hadn't been to this program, maybe I would have been struggling. I have been struggling a lot, because I know people who've been with me in this country, and they have been doing some other jobs, like a delivery job, which is going on everywhere in this pandemic. So if I had been doing that job, my future targets would be different.

But now I have very good goals to achieve, just because of this program I have realised what I have to do in the future.

Things come so easy for me. Instead of, I've got to go everywhere, look for it, and it takes a while, but now I don't have to do that anymore. I just stay home, open my laptop, and bang, I do it straight away.

I thank Sabrina for that, the mentor that fits me like this.

So I just want to say thanks to UTS for this opportunity, and building relationships is very important in a very fast world.

I'm very happy, Sabrina, for what you've done for me. I will never forget that.

You make everything really easy for me, which never happened before.

So if this program happens again, you're in, yeah?

I'm in, I'm in.

You're in, yeah, she's in.

I want to be in triple events.

Triple events!

Byline: Laura Oxley, External Communication Officer, Centre for Social Justice and Inclusion

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