Connecting the UN, NGOs and the World

In August 2003, the United Nations invited DePaul University to monitor the conference webcast. Steve Fenoglio, Assistant Director of Graduate Student Advising at the School of Computer Science, Telecommunications and Information Systems (CTI), sent an e-mail to the officers of their Computer Science Society and within ten minutes had an enthusiastic response.

Dan gave the webcast information to Steve, who in a 20-minute meeting with the computer science students had the monitoring all set up. Steve and CTI students read each e-mail and discussion board submission, and then decided whether to post the item and hide any that were inappropriate. Steve said: "One of the most critical and particularly relevant aspects of this project is security and the protection of all computers involved. Because some students were at home and others in our labs, one major issue was making sure that everyone used computers that were as secure as possible."

Even though the conference is over, people from around the world can still log on to the webcast archive and listen to or watch the plenary sessions, and continue to bring the discussion points to their organizations and classrooms. Many who attended the meeting have reported watching the webcast.
(See http://www.un.org/dpi/ngosection/webcast2003.htm).

August 2004, the CSS volunteers to monitor the NGO Web Cast for a second year.