Loaner laptops and email mentors help refugees in- tegrate in Case Study about the Chromebook-use of the German volunteer group “Freundeskreis -”

March 2017. The community volunteer group Freundeskreis Plieningen- Organization “Freundeskreis Plieningen-Birkach” provides refu- Birkach gees near the South German town with lap- Type of institu- Protestant educational tops for online language studies and research. Often tion center (Haus Birkach) several family members benefit from one device. Learn and practice Ger- The refugees commit to use the devices at least part Use of Chrome- man, find housing, home- of the time to study German and demonstrate their books progress through writing assignments. Volunteers work offer support via email and host meetups for further Managed Chromebooks training and to swap experiences. to use in public session Configuration mode or with a personal The Challenge account

Asylum seekers often wait a long time before they get non-profit Freifunk. This was a crucial component a place in a language course and not all are eligible for when preparing for the loan model. The refugees use a government sponsored language course. Members the laptops in the accommodations and they can use of the Freundeskreis have learned that computers, in- the WLAN at “Haus Birkach” which is available in all ternet access and online language courses can also over the house. help refugees to learn German and about Germany. Refugees who are interested in using a Chromebook Refugees already participating in a language course come to regular meetings in “Haus Birkach” where can deepen what they have learned with online con- Thomas Ebinger and other members of the Freun- tent. For this purpose, the Freundeskreis organized a deskreis give an introduction in using the Chrome- room at the Protestant education center “Haus books. The refugees sign a Chromebook loan agree- Birkach” and set up a room with laptops. At least one ment with the association “Freundeskreis Plieningen- volunteer is always on site to help the refugees with Birkach”. The contract covers how the Chromebooks their online research. Pastor Thomas Ebinger, who co- should be handled, and specifies the tasks of the bor- ordinates computer project, regretted that the help- rower to use the Chromebook in the long term. After ers did not have enough time to keep the room open he showed his identity card and deposits 20 €, the ref- throughout the day. A Chromebook grant from Pro- ugee can take the Chromebook home. Each laptop re- ject Reconnect enabled the group to switch to a new ceives a sticker with the user's name. approach with distributed learners supported via email and monthly meetups. This solution gives vol- Experiencing the Chromebooks unteers more flexibility on when to contribute. In exchange for the Chromebook, the refugees agree

Using the Chromebooks to once a month solve a writing task. These tasks are posted on the “birch leaves blog” by the association

“Freundeskreis Plieningen-Birkach” and can be found Most of the users live in three accommodations in the under birkenblaetter.wordpress.com. area, all equipped with free internet access from the

▪ Each user signs up for the blog. This ensures that Asylplus and ADIA Erding, each with a collection of rel- everyone is aware of the assignments and re- evant links for refugees and asylum seekers. When ceives updates and advice. For users with little signing up with a Google Account, users can change knowledge of German, the assignments are also many adjustments themselves and install apps. They available in German, English and Arabic. can also save data locally and edit them offline. ▪ The blog includes pointers to online courses and helpful websites, information about the German Deactivating if contract is not fulfilled culture and relevant event announcements. If a Chromebook is lost or stolen it is possible to deac- ▪ Most of the refugees use the laptops to find an tivate the Chromebook in the G Suite Admin console apartment, to contact family and friends or to without having to have the device itself. The deac- search for information about the asylum proce- tivated Chromebook can no longer be used. Thomas dure. Children also use them for their homework. Ebinger leverages this feature to reach users to he and the mentors lost contact, for example when a user Individual support does not fulfill the monthly writing assignment and To maintain the motivation of the refugees using the doesn’t get in touch with his mentor. When a deac- laptops to study and to recognize difficulties quickly, tivated device is turned on, a prompt informs the user every Chromebook user is assigned an email mentor that the device should be returned to Thomas from “Freundeskreis Plieningen-Birkach”. To these Ebinger. If the user returns his device, he will receive email mentors, they send their answer to the writing the 20€ deposit. The Chromebook can then be loaned task. The email mentors also help with questions con- to another refugee. Initially Thomas Ebinger had to cerning asylum procedures, housing searches things deactivate many Chromebooks, as users failed to like this. At regular meetings, users can share experi- complete their assignments on time and did not get in ences and meet their email mentors. These meetings touch. The learning curve has been steep. Monthly in take place once a month at “Haus Birkach”. person meetings and support from their email men- tors keep the users on track. It’s now very rare that a Centrally managed Chromebooks device needs to be deactivated. All Chromebooks were registered in a device man- ager. Privacy settings, permissions, homepage, Conclusion bookmarks and apps are centrally configured in the Google Admin Console. When a device connects The model is suitable for local initiatives with dedi- with the internet, it receives and automatically ap- cated helpers, who can provide custom support for plies the new configuration. the users. There needs to be at least one place where the refugees have access to the internet. The evalua- Private login and public session tion of the writing tasks is very time-consuming. Help- The laptops are configured to give the students two ing refugees progress in their German skills requires different login options: The “public session mode” al- intensive individual support. Staying in touch through lows users to login anonymously. At the end of a ses- email is usually not enough. Weekly meetings are sion, all information about this session is deleted. In helpful, preferably in the evening so volunteers can contrast, if students sign it with a Google account, attend after work. Thomas Ebinger and the other they can maintain their own bookmarks, install apps mentors are happy about the improvement in Ger- and keep them for future sessions. In the “public ses- man language skills that they observe through the sion” mode, three internet pages are pre-installed: writing assignments and meet ups. the “birch leaves blog” as well as the websites of

PROJECT RECONNECT

Information about Project Reconnect reconnect.nethope.org Documentation for Site Manager reconnect.nethope.org/support Contact: [email protected]