October 23, 2014 - City Council Newsletter

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of “Birding” magazine and has studied birds on six continents with field seasons in Panama, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Hawaii, Maine, Michigan, Australia, Antarctica, the Galapagos Islands, and the Farallon Islands. Strycker also works as a naturalist guide on expedition cruises to Antarctica and Norway’s Svalbard archipelago. His “life list” is approaching 2,500 species. For more information, contact the Eugene Public Library at 541-682-5450 or www.eugene-or.gov/library. New Carsharing Company Launches in Eugene and Springfield On Saturday, Oct. 25, car2go, a carsharing company, will be expanding to include 10 square miles in Eugene and Springfield. Car2go allows members to rent any one of the 50 car2go vehicles in Eugene by the minute, hour, or day, and take it to their destination without having to worry about returning the car where they found it. Vehicles can be located using a smartphone app, the car2go website, or simply by finding an available car2go vehicle on the street. An agreement with the City of Eugene and Springfield allows the rentals to be parked on the street within the 10 square mile area. Car2go covers the cost of fuel, insurance, maintenance and parking. Car2go members can use cars in any of the 15 car2go locations throughout the U.S. and Canada. The car2go launch event will be held Oct. 25, at Broadway Plaza, from 1 to 5 p.m. For more information, please visit www.car2go.com or contact Jeff Petry at 541-682-5079 . City Teams Up with Lane Community College to Build Local Software Labor Force Area youth will be the beneficiaries of a demonstration project made possible by the City of Eugene’s Telecommunications Program. The partnership between Lane Community College, City of Eugene, and Eugene School District 4J will develop a Digital Dojo - a nationally connected and locally developed open source computer coding club - at Lane Community College’s Downtown Center. The dojo will provide a host of computer science-related educational opportunities and kick off with an open house on Tuesday, Nov. 18, from 3:30 - 5:30 p.m. at the Lane Community College Downtown Center, 101 West 10th Avenue, Eugene. The public is invited. Youth at any level of computer skill are invited to visit to try coding and see the resources the dojo will have to offer. All attendees are required to pre-register at the website: http://www.meetup.com/Eugene-Region- CoderDojo-Hub. The Digital Dojo partnership brings together instructional specialists with expertise in computer science from LCC and 4J and a state of the art classroom in LCC’s Downtown campus with $50,000 of telecommunications funds aimed at digital mentoring from the City of Eugene. “The Digital Dojo is an investment in education for today’s students, and economic development for employers, entrepreneurs and employees in the future,” said Senior Planner Nan Laurence, City of Eugene. “It will help us strengthen the creative and technical skills needed to build a highly qualified and flexible workforce in the expanding software employment cluster and retain and grow high tech businesses in our region.” The dojo creates a dynamic learning environment that brings at least a dozen computer industry employees into the classroom, employs computer science faculty, and focuses on middle and high school students to create an interest in the field early in the students’ school career. Eugene-Springfield area youth are welcome; females and under-represented youth are particularly encouraged to participate. Dojo sessions will be held on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 3:30 - 5:30 p.m. and Saturdays from 10 a.m. - 2 p.m,. beginning in December. The project can accommodate approximately 800 students over the course of the 2014-15 school year. Beginning in November, youth will be able to sign up online for sessions in advance. For more information, contact Nan Laurence at 541-682-5340. EUGENE CITY COUNCIL NEWSLETTER PAGE 2 October 23, 2014