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NESTA launches projects to use web technologies in social challenges |
First project, Jailbrake, aims to break the cycle of youth re-offending.
The National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts (NESTA) is launching a series of projects to explore ways in which collaborative web technologies can be applied to socially important issues.
As part of its Reboot Britain programme, the experimental programmes will explore how web technologies, with their focus on collaboration, self-organisation, openness and sharing of knowledge, allow people to engage and interact more easily with public service providers and have more of a say in the design and delivery of services.
The aim is to cut bureaucracy, increase response times and demonstrate new solutions to public service delivery which complement traditional approaches.
The programmes will explore how collaborative web technologies can increase the responsiveness of those working in child protection through more efficient sharing of information, provide direction for those not in employment, education or training by offering online peer to peer mentoring and allow communities to work with police more effectively to make their communities safer
Also, help break the cycle of reoffending amongst youths, which the first project to launch, Jailbreak, deals with. It aims to find ways to use simple web and mobile tools to help slow down or stop the cycle of re-offending by 15-17 year olds who get caught up in the criminal justice system each year.
Each area has been identified as socially important, costly to support, an area of high anxiety for the public and where traditional interventions have been unable to offer a complete solution.
Each project will be tested in partnership with those who run traditional services in a live environment.
Jonathan Kestenbaum, Chief Executive of NESTA, said: "We’ve seen how moving public services online can contribute to providing more efficient services."
"With these programmes we aim to take this a step further and deliver the next generation of public services which are focussed on collaboration and effectiveness."
Further information:
NESTA
Jailbrake
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