When the COVID-19 crisis hit, Neighborhood Allies immediately took action, pivoting and shifting our programs and investments to align with the current needs of our residents and neighborhoods. Our staff diligently adjusted their work to create and implement effective strategies to help stabilize our partners and lift up those working so diligently to serve their fellow community members. Read more about how our staff and programs have adjusted meet people where they are at and provide the resources they need in the post-COVID world.
Vanessa Buffry, Director of Digital Inclusion
As the Director of Digital Inclusion, Vanessa manages our work and partnerships that address digital literacy and workforce readiness through credentialing, upskilling, and access to emerging technology. She coordinates the development of remote programming and brick-and-mortar Digital Inclusion Sites in Pittsburgh, as well as manages the Beyond the Laptops hardware-connectivity- education ecosystem of investments, research, and advocacy.
How did your work pivot to address the COVID-19 crisis? We were supposed to be building Digital Inclusion Centers through Spring, but all that got put on hold, so instead we scrambled to get our target communities furnished with the devices and connectivity necessary to get by under COVID lockdown, and ended up kicking off Beyond the Laptops.
What need did you seek to fill with this new work? Seismic changes are occurring this year as commerce and communication has almost completely shifted online, collapsing into a few months a process that might have transpired over a decade. On that note, we also had to fill a gap that would have taken at least a decade to fill– which is to get folks on the wrong side of the digital divide connected with devices, internet, and know-how to use these as tools of economic and creative empowerment. That’s a tremendous financial and normative leap, but we’re taking it one step at a time.
What impacts do you think Digital Inclusion had for our communities and their members? Any stories to share? We were able to short cut families who had no devices in the home as they waited for PPS 1-1 device distributions. Having a device and internet did not just mean someone could get online, but that they could be safe at home and engaged, making it ever so slightly more bearable for families to get through this crazy moment in history. My favorite testimony captures this perfectly: “It was a struggle every day for [my daughter] having to go over to her grandmother’s house just to be able to log in for schooling. It was taking away from her personal time as a kid having to commute from house to house for computer use. It has made it so much easier on me as a single working mother of two and one being a small child. We are now able to stay home in the comfort of our own home and get school work done and done in a timely manner with us having our own device.”
Over the past few months, how has that work continued to evolve? Has the program/initiative/etc. continued? Adapted? Well, our first laptop distribution evolved into getting internet so people could use those devices, and then ultimately the digital skills programs to truly activate these computers.
How were you personally able to adapt to working remotely? What was different, harder, or easier? I already had all my work on the cloud before COVID because I disliked lugging my computer to and fro on the bus. Also, we’re an international family and most of our social communication with family members takes place over video calls. So when we shut down, I had a strong foundation for a pivot. The best and worst thing about it all, however, is taking care of a child at the same time. On one hand, there is this unprecedented moment in history where, as a woman, I can have a career and a family. Feeling the gift of the extra time with my daughter deluded me for the first 3 months because I was burning out doing ‘double duty’… feeling like I couldn’t give her enough attention, or that I must be forgetting something because I couldn’t give my work 100% focus at every moment. For 3+ months I just kept feeling like I must be missing something or falling behind, a feeling that would stick with me even on weekends like.. did I leave the stove on? Was I supposed to be answering something? When was the last time I gave the kid a bath? Over time my husband and I had to develop a childcare system to preserve mental space and end multitasking.
What is something you’ve been doing to care for your mental, physical, or social health during quarantine? I deleted Facebook and started reading again– not on a kindle. There is something meditative about being able to focus on words on a page without having the option to ‘quickly check’ the news every few minutes!
What gives you hope for the future? I am gonna take the biggest trip ever when this is all over. I plan on crashing a wedding in the Bahamas, leaving my kid with Grandma overseas and eating my way through the region’s food. Also, I’ve been binge-watching travel-food documentaries on Netflix, so after Street Food Latin America, you’ll find me nose-deep in a taco mountain somewhere south of the border.