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Government

Schools and sick children get Web money boost

Funding for an online network for chronically ill children and for Internet access in rural Victorian schools has been announced by Minister for Communications Helen Coonan.
Written by Suzanne Tindal, Contributor

Funding for an online network for chronically ill children and for Internet access in rural Victorian schools has been announced by Minister for Communications Helen Coonan.

The funds come from the Coalition's AU$113 million Clever Networks broadband program to put high speed Internet infrastructure in place to support e-health and e-education services to the bush.

Connecting ill and disabled children
The charity Starlight Children's Foundation will receive AU$7.2 million to extend Livewire, its pilot application for chronically ill children.

Senator Coonan said that the program will help 150,000 young Australians suffering chronic illness or disability to keep in contact with their family and friends.

"Maintaining contact with family and friends if you are sick in hospital is important in helping a patient to cope and recover," Coonan said in a statement.

A spokesperson for the Starlight Children's Foundation told ZDNet Australia that the most important part of the network will be enabling sick young patients to make friends with other people like themselves.

The spokesperson said that the features of the site included chat rooms, news and reviews, forums and blogs, adding that the features are in a state of flux, because the site developers are constantly taking feedback from the users.

"The whole personality of the site will come from that [the young, chronically ill] community," the spokesperson said.

According to the spokesperson, the network will be secure, with only chronically ill children and their parents having access. Moderators will oversee the chat rooms, which are split into age bands, to make sure that the content is appropriate for the age group.

At the moment the system is based on children using the network at home, but with the help of the government grant and future corporate sponsorship, it could be extended to include the parents and siblings of the ill children. The spokesperson estimated that the network may be available for children in hospitals sometime in 2008.

Clever Networks for clever schools
The Association of Independent Schools of Victoria (AISV) has received AU$5.2 million to provide 33,422 students and 2,771 staff in 90 independent schools in rural and regional Victoria with affordable high speed broadband Internet.

Michelle Green, CEO of AISV, said that until now students in rural and regional independent schools in Victoria had not had Internet equality. The Australian Government funding will provide fair access to online resources.

The government has also allocated AU$3.2 million to create an online environment in which 500,000 schools students and 50,000 teachers can access online education resources safely from state, national, international cultural and educational institutions.

Students and staff will be able to interact by using tools such as blogs, wikis and podcasts, which had been previously banned because of risk of inappropriate use, but will be allowed under the new secure system.

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