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SFSU Public Affairs Press Release

Published by the Public Affairs Office at San Francisco State University, Diag Center.

#132
Contact: Ted DeAdwyler
phone: (415) 338-1665
email: pubcom@sfsu.edu

S.F. State Techies lift nonprofits into cyberspace

SAN FRANCISCO, June 12, 2000 ---Thanks to the work of more than a dozen newly-minted Web designers from San Francisco State University, four San Francisco-based non-profit agencies will now jump into cyberspace.

Directors of the agencies --- the Chinese Newcomers Service Center, Nihonmachi Little Friends, the Samoan Community Development Center and South of Market Child Care, Inc.---- say without the volunteer help of the students, the long-overdue moves to the Internet would have been too costly.

"It would have taken us much, much longer to get on-line if we had to do it ourselves,' said Cathy Inamasu, executive director of the Nihonmachi Little Friends, which provides child care to preschool and elementary school students. "We don't have the expertise for this or the money for professional help."

The Web work is a project by S.F. State multimedia studies students and Teaming for Technology, a collaborative effort of Americorps*VISTA, IBM, the United Way of the Bay Area and the Northern California Council for the Community. Teaming for Technology is working with nonprofits to assess their technology needs and helps bring quality service to disadvantaged communities and their residents.

Craig Abaya, program coordinator for S.F. State's Web design program, said the project shows that the high-tech industry does have a heart.

"Here is a model for giving back to the communities who may have felt displaced by the insurgence of dot-coms," said Abaya. " The students demonstrated a great sensitivity towards the agencies and the communities they serve. They learned about the cultures, and made sure they were accurately represented online."

The 20-week Web design program at S.F. State's Downtown Center, 425 Market Street, culminates on Friday, June 16 at 6 p.m. with graduation exercises for the students, who will publicly unveil their sites for staff and supporters of the nonprofit agencies.

The S.F. State students, who are graduating from the Web Design Intensive Program in the Multimedia Studies Program (MSP) in S.F. State's College of Extended Learning, volunteered their services through the university's Office of Community Service Learning to create commercial quality Web sites for the agencies.

"We designed a Web site that is clean, easy to navigate," said Kathy Becker, who led the Nihonmachi Little Friends design team. "The site conveys a sense of Japanese design and, through extensive use of photographs, shows a love for children while also allowing users to see the facilities, teachers and kids."

For more information, call either Ted DeAdwyler of S.F. State at (415) 338-7110 or Deborah Harper of Americorps*VISTA (415) 439-4258, Lydia Perez of United Way of the Bay Area at (415) 772-4463.

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