Espais eSTIC - eSTIC Spaces - Sant Boi de Llobregat
Sant Boi de Llobregat (Spain)
In the fight against the digital divide, many actions have been carried out in our city: training courses for different groups, informative and awareness talks or campaigns for the use of digital services. But the gap still exists; the difficulties in the use of digital services by different groups of the population remain.
We have asked ourselves why, what is the cause that despite all the efforts, this difficulty in the use of digital services continues to exist.
The conclusion we reached when working on this with the neighborhood associations of the city was that the time between citizens receive training until they use a digital service maybe so long, and when they have to face the use of the service, they continue to have difficulties.
The key is then to offer an accompaniment service at the moment when the citizen needs to use the digital service. With this objective we have created the "Espais eSTIC". ("eSTIC" in English would be like "I am")
The eSTIC Spaces are a physical accompanying service to provide personalised support to people aged 55 and over who have doubts related to the use of basic digital tools. The objective is to extend the service to the entire population.
This service can help citizens, for example, to create an email account, connect to a Wi-Fi network, make an appointment with the doctor or carry out an administrative procedure and, in addition, we explain how to do it in case you want to next time try it independently.
Another important aspect is which people offer the service. We are creating a network of volunteers who can be students or people who already collaborate in neighborhood associations, in such a way that it includes an intergenerational aspect as well as community involvement in the fight against the digital divide. All coordinated by the person responsible for digital transformation of the city council.
eSTIC spaces are the physical places where people with these difficulties can use digital service, because they aren't alone, and they can overcome their frustration, allowing them to be self-confidence in use of digital services.
When they can use the eSTIC service for the first, second and perhaps the third time and they realise that they are increasingly capable of doing it on their own, we are helping to overcome fears in the use of digital services.
