Apple Outreach for the Aging Community?

Question

Hello,
  My mother in law is an intellectually active 80 year old who is, although sharp and an avid reader, extremely intimidated by technology. 
My wife and I are concerned that she is becoming increasingly isolated by her age, the demands of caring for her husband, an the challenges
of getting around. 
  We think that getting her on line might significantly enrich and improve the quality of her life, as well as the life of her husband, but she has rebuffed our efforts to get her on line because the interfaces scare her, and I suspect that she doesn't want to be made to feel foolish. 
  Apple certainly was successful with their college and high school outreach program to get young people accustomed to the Apple environment, and has been successful at marketing Apple products as being more intuitive than their competitors. 
  My mother in law and her husband live by themselves a considerable distance from any family, so I was wondering whether Apple or any of the Apple Communities have ever mounted a geriatric outreach effort to introduce aging people to the Apple internet and communications environment.  If so, I would appreciate any information that anyone could offer in this regard.  I would appreciate any information that anyone might be able to offer regarding any similar internet/computer outreach programs for the aging or geriatric communities offered by educational or research institutions, or social service organizations.
  I submit this query to the iPad support community, as I thought that iPad might be a logical hardware platform for aging people due to its light weight, but I am open to other suggestions. 
Thanking you in advance,
Charlie

Answer 1

Those are big questions, from the specific to  univeral.
1. Trying to hook someone up to technology who is 80 and is [still] intimidated by consumer computer technology... remember that the technology has been around since that person was in her 40s so there was never sufficient motivation to get her started.   
You might take an activity she enjoys daily,  solitaire or crosswords can be done in a different and perhaps more convenient form.   If she is a reader, show her a Kindle or iPad reader app. Then feed her other stuff. Everyone here will have different  suggestions to hook someone. 
The trick is getting her motivated to adopt it herself: "what's in it for me?" * is her unspoken question and will be your guiding light.
2. Regarding geriatric outreach, try searching for government or university sites regarding access to senior citizens. e.g.
"senior citizens"  "internet access"  ipad site:gov or
"senior citizens"  "internet access"  health site:gov
"senior citizens"  "internet access"  Kindle readers site:gov
Or do same for state or county or government library programs. Libraries have preached and practiced community outreach for years.  Best wishes.
"what's in it for me?" is also the question on the part of tech industry and your "geriatrics" audience.
Answer that and you will have built a better mousetrap.