I first heard about Katie Lips and Kisky Netmedia at a Merseyside Managers ICT User Group which took place in the Holly Oaks student bar at the Lime Pictures studios in
Liverpool November 2006. At the time I was keen to set up a project involving ICT and Youth Engagement. My thinking at the time was based on trying to understand how my own children used the internet whilst at school and at home. Further I attended a concert with my kids where only 500 people turned up in the audience instead of the 900 expected. It transpired that the event was not advertised on the net. The organisers did not use the technology available to engage with the youth and look what happened.
I invited Katie to a meeting at Merseyside Fire & Rescue Service HQ and we were joined by MF&RS Youth Engagement Manger Emma Dodd. The subject was to discuss the possibility of working together on a Youth Engagement project using dynamic technical innovation as the channel of engagement and in that meeting the ‘OurOpenSpace’ project was conceived.
The OurOpenSpace project is an initiative by Merseyside Fire and Rescue Service. The project is an exploration of Emerging Technologies and their use to support Youth Engagement projects. MF&RS is an innovator in Youth Engagement and acts as a mentor to other Fire Services in delivering best in class Youth Engagement projects.
Emerging Technologies can and are being used to support Youth Engagement work in a growing number of ways. MF&RS are working with Kisky Netmedia, a Social Media Consultancy to devise new projects in this area. This blog will discuss these pilot projects and disseminate our key findings and learnings. We aim to find and discuss related projects and to provide a growing resource of projects, ideas and conversations through this blog.
