Some great apps came out of this Knight/FCC challenge. Consider submitting or pitching your own in the future. - Danielle<br><div class="gmail_quote"><div class="gmail_quote"><div style="word-wrap:break-word"><br>
<div><a href="http://appsforcommunities.challenge.gov/updates/119" target="_blank">http://appsforcommunities.challenge.gov/updates/119</a></div>
<div>
<p>Last April, Knight Foundation and the Federal Communications
Commission challenged developers and citizens from across the country to
develop apps that deliver personalized, actionable information for the <a href="http://appsforcommunities.challenge.gov/" target="_blank">Apps for Communities Challenge</a>. As a result, we received almost 70 entries from around the U.S., from California to Pennsylvania. </p>
<p>The challenge awards $100,000 in prizes to winning application
developers and is intended to bring together providers of public data,
developers, and traditionally underserved populations through a national
contest. </p><p>Today, the FCC and the Knight Foundation are proud to announce the winners of the <a href="http://appsforcommunities.challenge.gov/" target="_blank">Apps for Communities Challenge</a>,
developers who answered the call to make local public information more
usable and more actionable, making the benefits of broadband more
tangible for all Americans. They’ve created creating apps that directly
connect citizens to public information, like social services, job
listings, fresh food locations, resources for the homeless and education
training. Our winners inspired us with their creativity and commitment
to helping communities in need across our country. </p><p>The wait is over, and the winners of the <a href="http://appsforcommunities.challenge.gov/" target="_blank">Apps for Communities Challenge</a> include: </p><p><b>$30,000 — Grand Prize:</b></p>
<p><b><i>Yak.bus</i></b><i> <a href="http://www.yakb.us/" target="_blank">www.yakb.us</a> by Ryan Resella, San Francisco, California.<br></i><a href="http://YAKB.us" target="_blank">YAKB.us</a>
is a real time bus notification system that uses voice and SMS. <a href="http://YAKB.us" target="_blank">YAKB.us</a>
currently supports 3 different transit agencies: Arlington Transit in
Arlington County in Virginia, Charlottesville Area Transit in
Charlottesville, VA and Santa Clarita Transit in Santa Clarita, CA. </p><p><b>$20,000 — Second Prize:</b></p><p><b><i>Homeless-SCC</i></b><i> <a href="http://homeless-scc.org/" target="_blank">http://homeless-scc.org/</a> by Curtis Chang, Consulting Within Reach, California<br>
</i>Homeless-SCC
(Homeless - Santa Clara County) is a web based app that connects
homeless individuals with services according to specific needs and
eligibility. The app empowers local government, nonprofit agencies, and
the general public to collaborate around accurate and actionable
information. The app has been adopted by the largest county government
in Northern California, which includes the city of San Jose, and the
leading local agencies serving the homeless. It is currently in the
rollout process. The app was designed by Consulting Within Reach and
funded by a local church committed to serving the homeless. </p><p><b>$10,000 — Third Prize</b></p><p><b><i>txt2wrk</i></b><i> <a href="http://www.txt2wrk.net/" target="_blank">http://www.txt2wrk.net</a> by Dave Chiu, Roger Ly, Lawson Kight, and Elise Ackerman, Oakland, California<br>
</i>Txt2wrk
helps parolees, homeless, and other job seekers compete on a more level
playing field by providing text-to-speech delivery of job postings on
any mobile phone. With txt2wrk, job seekers are alerted to new job
postings, can listen to job descriptions, and apply for jobs, 24 hours a
day, all without a connection to the internet.
</p><div>
<p><b>$1,000 X5 - RUNNERS UP:</b> </p><p><b><i>PREPPED Kids</i></b><i> <a href="http://www.preppedkids.org/" target="_blank">http://www.preppedkids.org/</a> by Damien Leri, Ian Bennett, and Stanton Wortham, Pennsylvania<br>
</i>PREPPED
Kids is a web and mobile application designed to help low income
families more easily access preschool and pediatric (hence PREPPED)
services in their local communities. They chose these specific domains
because together they support the healthy development of children and
both have similar types of administrative hurdles for under-resourced
families — particularly if parents have low literacy and/or low English
proficiency. This web app is interactive and makes use of publicly
available information from education, health and social service
agencies. </p><p><b><i>PlacesKidsGo <a href="http://www.placeskidsgo.com/" target="_blank">http://www.placeskidsgo.com</a></i></b><i> by Ningning Lin, Jerry Lin, Andrew Chen<br></i>PlacesKidsGo
simplifies searches for appropriate children’s activities. Currently,
the site draws on hyper-local San Jose data, including program
information from nearby municipal recreation centers. After specifying
an activity category (e.g. tutoring, soccer, arts) and a location, users
can refine the list of choices by selecting the child’s age or the time
of interest. </p><p><b><i>Access Together</i></b><i> <a href="http://www.accesstogether.org/" target="_blank">http://www.accesstogether.org/</a> by John Schimmel, New York City<br></i>Access
Together will enable people with disabilities, their family, friends,
and neighbors to crowd-source a community’s accessibility information.
Similar to a Foursquare check-in, a user will open Access Together on
their mobile phone’s web browser, find their location, and supply
answers to accessibility questions. For example “Is the entrance
wheelchair accessible?” </p><p><b>PhillySNAP <a href="http://www.phillysnap.com/" target="_blank">http://www.phillysnap.com</a></b>
by Katey Metzroth, Mark Headd, Deng-Shun Chang, Tim Wisniewski, New
York City and PennsylvaniaSMS-based PhillySNAP seeks to connect
low-income, technologically isolated Philadelphia residents with fresh
local food sources. How it works: PhillySNAP users text their address
(house number and street) from a basic cell phone to a local phone
number <a href="tel:267-293-9387" value="+12672939387" target="_blank">267-293-9387</a> and users receive the following informative texts:
1. Address, hours, days, and distance to the closest Farmer’s Market
accepting SNAP benefits, 2. Address and distance to the two nearest
retail stores accepting SNAP benefits using the USDA API, 3. A
randomized text about one of several programs to maximize SNAP benefits
through affordable fresh local food programs. </p><p><b><i>Talk with Sam <a href="http://www.talkwithsam.com/" target="_blank">http://www.talkwithsam.com/</a></i></b><i> by Vikram Pant, Maryland<br></i>Talk
with Sam provides citizens the ability to see legislative bills near
them based on their location. It allows citizens to add comments around
the bill and use social media to share the bill to their social
network(s). It provides a vote up / vote down ability and computes an
approval rate based on votes. Through community development many more
features can be added to improve end-user experience. Talk with Sam uses
open data sets from Sunlight Labs Open States and the 2010 Census to
provide a location-based lookup of bills (open, passed, failed ... in
addition via subjects) in the citizen's area based on geolocation. </p></div>
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