A collaboration between Piikani Youth Empowerment Strategies (Piikani Nation Secondary School and Peigan Board of Education) and the Faculty of Extension at the University of Alberta has received funding from the Internet Society’s Beyond the Net program. The project, titled Exploring digital literacy through the Piikani Cultural and Digital Literacy Camp Program, builds on a[…]
The following article was posted by the Canadian Internet Registration Authority. CIRA’s Community Investment Program celebrates its fifth year – Part 2: The First Mile Connectivity Consortium CIRA is embarking on the fifth year of its Community Investment Program. Canadian not-for-profits doing good things for and through the internet can apply for a CIRA grant[…]
On Friday, December 1, 2017, FMCC filed our comments on the Future Programming Distribution Models with the CRTC. The CRTC put out this Call for Comments in response to the Governor in Council’s request for a report on future programming distribution models to be presented before June 1, 2018 (https://crtc.gc.ca/eng/archive/2017/2017-359.htm and https://crtc.gc.ca/eng/archive/2017/2017-359-1.htm). FMCC’s submission is available for[…]
See below for a message from our colleagues at the Internet Society — the First Mile Connectivity Consortium is a partner in this upcoming event: If you plan to attend the Indigenous Connectivity Summit but haven’t registered yet, please do so today! We’ve got a great line up of speakers from across Canada, the U.S.[…]
A team of First Mile partners including Penny Carpenter from K-Net Services, Tim Whiteduck from First Nations Education Council (FMCC Chair), Dr. Heather Hudson and Dr. Rob McMahon travelled to Ottawa on June 15-17 to participate in the Indigenous Radio National Conference at the University of Ottawa. The presentations and notes about the conference will[…]
Last week the Gwich’in Tribal Council’s Department of Cultural Heritage (GTC) hosted a day-long workshop on Digital Content and Connectivity in Gwich’in communities. This pilot was designed by GTC staff and partners from the University of Alberta’s Faculty of Extension and the First Mile Connectivity Consortium. The team included Dr. Rob McMahon and Master of Arts[…]
The First Nations Information Governance Centre (FNIGC) held a conference from March 28-30 called “First Nations Data Governance: Tools for Empowerment”. FMCC coordinator and University of Alberta researcher Rob McMahon travelled to Gatineau, QC to give two presentations at the event. The conference showcased the work of a range of participants, from First Nations community leaders, data[…]
Rob McMahon and Heather Hudson presented at this year’s Pacific Telecommunications Council (https://council.ptc.org/ptc17/) conference in Honolulu, HI on January 15 to 18. The session, entitled “Policy and Regulation” included a discussion about the FMCC’s efforts at the recent CRTC hearings on the Basic Service Objective, including our proposals to address digital divide challenges in remote and rural regions. The description[…]
In response to Saadia Muzaffar’s opinion piece on CBC’s web site at http://www.cbc.ca/news/opinion/broadband-basic-service-1.3913627 –What good is declaring broadband a ‘basic service’ without regulating retail prices? Without affordability thresholds, there’s no guarantee that access in vulnerable communities will improve .. Brian Beaton wrote this First Mile response: IT IS THE FIRST STEP in a very long process .. It has taken[…]