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Global Information Internship Program
A UC Santa Cruz course designed to make a world of difference
For eight years the Global Information Internship Program (GIIP) has been bridging the ‘digital divide’ in places like Africa, India, South America, Mexico and right here in Santa Cruz.
This popular UCSC program enables student interns to travel all over the world and work with partner organizations to promote Information Communication Technology (ICT), facilitating community involvement and grassroots organizing.
Adam Thompson, associate director for programs and instruction for GIIP, has been with the program since 2002. Thompson graduated with a BS in Information Systems Management and traveled to Africa for a GIIP internship.
“I joined GIIP because I was interested in seeing groups other than big companies get benefits from all the different technologies I was learning about in school,” Thompson said.
Kyle Eischen, now a professor at Santa Clara University, co-founded GIIP. The Global Information Internship Program started as a response to Professor Paul Lubeck’s Sociology 15 “World Society” class eight years ago.
“Student’s loved the class, but found the whole reality of globalization, inequality and injustice extraordinarily depressing.” Eischen says. “The question students kept putting to us as teachers was, ‘so now that we know what’s wrong with the world, how do we fix it?’ GIIP became a way to find a solution to real problems using the ideas and technologies being developed in our own backyard.”
The three quarter program begins in the fall and introduces students to the theories and methods of information technology based activism. During this time students work with local, community-led organizations to learn how technology can be applied and useful to these groups.
The winter quarter focuses on teaching innovative project design and problem solving methods. Students develop technology-based projects with local and international community-led organizations such as Barrios Unidos, Planned Parenthood and the Honduras based Riecken Foundation.
By spring the students’ proposals are reviewed by GIIP instructors and pushed forward toward execution. “Spring is largely about refining projects and getting feedback,” Thompson said. “It’s largely about mobilization. How do you refine this project, get it funded and then get it started.”
The program includes technology sections used to build practical skills in databases, the Linux operating system, open source software and web design.
Through all three quarters, including an additional summer Community Organizing TechCamp with the Progressive Technology Project (PTP), students turn their ideas into a final project proposal. Following the completion of the program many students go on to apply for grants through GIIP and other organizations to conduct their projects.
Thompson, the director of TechCamp, says the conjunction with PTP over the summer is GIIP’s biggest collaboration with the local community in Santa Cruz thus far.
Thompson describes the main goal of TechCamp as allowing members of community-led organizations to build their technological skills, connect these organizations with a broader network of people and communities to support groups like GIIP and PTP.
Lily Foster, a student and fellow in GIIP, recently received a grant from the Center for Information Technology Research in the Interest for Society (CITRIS) for $7,500. Her project focuses on creating a web portal that will help environmental organizations spread information about urban agroecology in Mexico.
Other interns, however, choose to stay local and collaborate with Santa Cruz non-profit organizations.
Shaeleya Miller, a junior at UCSC, is a fellow for GIIP. “I joined GIIP because I am a sociology major and wanted to apply my academic interests to real-world situations and social change,” Miller said. “Theory only goes so far without action.”
Miller will be staying in Santa Cruz this summer to work with local non-profit organizations.
“I am working on the PTP and GIIP TechCamp” she said. “So we are using several different types of ICT- specifically looking at basic computer literacy and then developing more advanced skills like databases as needs are indicated from assessments and feedback from community organizations that participate.”
Lubeck says UCSC alumni appreciate GIIP for following Santa Cruz traditions of community organizing in conjunction with the current digital age.
Alumni like Mark Headley, president of Matthews International Capital Management, donated over $10,000 to the program.
“It combines Santa Cruz traditions of social justice and social engagement and learning real world skills that enable people to manage non-profits,” Lubeck said.
