Problem: Schools and students are traditionally disconnected from their community and seldom do they work on interrelated projects that will benefit both the school and the people of the community.

Solution: Mentoring students to develop applications using free software, such as the Drupal content management system, will introduce students to the myriad of careers, disciplines and skills necessary to build a successful web presence around a sustainable business model - cooperatively. A web presence is more than just a website and also includes items like video, audio, and written content that is compelling.  Engaging people in things vital to their community is going beyond a web presence, students will also be mentored in ways to engage their community in building platforms and tools owned by the community.

Based on the information I learned during a course at the civic media: collaborative design studio at M.I.T. lead by Associate Professor Sasha Costanza-Chock - I have designed a pedagogy using connections and benefits as the motivator. Putting together the pieces and the players, we can construct our own foundations for sustainable communities powered by the minds of our own citizens.

I will use real world examples and relate topics to realistic everyday needs of most communities.