Birgit Pfirrmann likes to compare the file folders on the computer desktop with suitcases that can hold several travel bags. When using the smartphone, the 64-year-old first of all points to the home button: “No matter where you’ve gone, you can always start over.” The pensioner from the Palatinate is one of 338 digital ambassadors – DigiBos for short – in Rhineland-Palatinate.
The aim of the volunteers is to support older people in particular in using tablets, notebooks, computers and smartphones – to promote their digital skills. The project started in 2018 will be expanded further and is also attracting interest in other federal states, says digitization and social affairs minister Alexander Schweitzer.
“The need is huge”
“The DigiBos are older people who are online with a lot of passion, fun and concentration,” reports the SPD politician. “The target of 300 DigiBos by 2023 has already been exceeded.” There are already volunteer specialists in each of the 24 districts and 12 independent cities. “With further qualifications we want to win even more digital ambassadors.” Schweitzer promises: “We will continue the program beyond 2023 – until the end of the electoral term.”
Pfirrmann celebrates this announcement. Because: “The demand is huge”, knows the self-taught, who has been with us from the very beginning and has already answered questions about the digital world or shown people how to access it on more than 2000 visits to the Landau DigiBo-Treff. The oldest visitor was 93 years old, but many are significantly younger, some just half as old.
Many people in their early 50s do not know how to deal with notebooks, tablets, smartphones and computers and have no one to ask their questions, reports the digital ambassador. “I am sometimes amazed that even 40 or 45-year-olds, apart from WhatsApp and telephoning, can hardly do anything with their cell phone and do not think about the fact that the person they are speaking to has to be online for a WhatsApp call.”
Find connection
The DigiBos are on average 69 years old; 41 percent of them are women, according to the digitization ministry in Mainz. Her nationwide more than 3000 offers – PC, smartphone and tablet meetings as well as house calls – are also mainly used by women. Two thirds of the participants are older than 70 years. 97 percent have little or no experience with digital media.
“We will always have people who are left behind,” says Pfirrmann. The technical development is simply too rapid. That is why the five DigiBos in Landau are also looking for so-called digital natives to strengthen their team – i.e. members of the generations who grew up with tablets and smartphones. “We all keep up to date, but the younger generation has grown up differently.” Often older people simply do not understand the language of the digital world. “We also see ourselves as translators.”
“85-year-olds have often not experienced digitization in their own professional life and have more difficult access than digital natives, who are 25 years and younger,” states Minister Schweitzer. “The higher the age, the greater the probability that digital participation is not expanded.” Studies have shown that. “But there are also 85-year-olds who are digital and 25-year-olds who have difficulties.”
Enable participation
Age and job are by no means the only reasons why people are excluded from the digital world with its numerous possibilities – or feel excluded. “There are whole groups of the population who do not have access to digitization,” says Schweitzer. “A …….