Digital Inclusion Leaders Gather in Flat Rock for BAND-NC Digital Opportunities Gathering

More than 130 digital inclusion experts and community leaders from 40 NC counties gathered on June 4, 2024, at Blue Ridge Community College for the Institute for Emerging Issues (IEI) first Digital Opportunities: Growing Connections Across North Carolina conference.

Hosted by IEI’s Building A New Digital Economy in North Carolina (BAND-NC) initiative in partnership with the Dogwood Health Trust, the event brought together community leaders and experts to discuss challenges to bridging the digital divide in North Carolina, as well as share success stories and best practices from across the state. The event also featured a celebration of completed digital inclusion plans covering counties in Western North Carolina that were funded by the Dogwood Health Trust. 

“We knew early on that [broadband] was an overarching topic over everything we were focused on as a foundation and that we wanted to help have an impact on it in Western NC,” said Dogwood Health Trust Vice President of Economic Opportunity Sarah Thompson during her remarks.

Panel discussions throughout the day gave speakers and attendees the opportunity to connect on topics like working with funders, starting projects, rural-specific challenges and opportunities, statewide digital inclusion resources, building a robust digital ecosystem and more. 

“We know that by providing funding and support to these [community-based] organizations we’re making the community more resilient, we’re building skills that are going to help the community not just now but also for many years to come,” said Hispanic Federation Director of North Carolina and MidSouth Operations Lariza Garzón during the Working With Funders session.

Attendees were also introduced to BAND-NC’s new Digital Inclusion Resource Hub – a one-stop-shop for resources on digital inclusion planning, data sources, funding opportunities and more.

Breakout sessions featured discussions on telehealth, engaging across sectors and implementing digital skills programming. Recordings of the plenary sessions and the telehealth general session can be found here.