Digital Outreach Trainer Partner Organisation Event

It was great to see over 35 members of the Joining the DOTs team and associated organisations meet for the Partner Organisation Event last week. The event gave attendees the opportunity to discuss progress and the direction of the project as it moves in to its’ second year.

Project Director, Martin Cantor chaired the event and representatives from The Sheffield College, Access Space and E@sy Connects delivered presentations about their roles in the project. Julia Duggleby from The Sheffield College gave a DOT (Digital Outreach Trainer) update, noting that 102 people are registered to the website and the majority of these are DOTs. The college and Access Space have employed 16 e-mentors, all of which have undergone DOT training and are equipped to support DOTs through the accreditation process.

Julie Hooper, Course Leader at The Sheffield College, spoke about the Online College’s learning offer and encouraged the other delivery partners to share these opportunities with their students. She was followed by Wendy Mayes who co-authored the Fast Forward learning materials. Wendy also encouraged the delivery partners to take advantage of the learning offer and the staff training that is available from the Sheffield College to assist in using the materials.

James Wallbank from Access Space and Gary Simpson from E@sy Connects delivered presentations to illustrate the DOT scheme within a community setting and how the project can broaden its’ reach beyond the colleges. The group then split into internal partners and external delegates to hold ‘round table’ discussions around the development of the project.

The delivery partners represented reported on how they are utilising the ESF grant to deliver new digital inclusion initiatives, and the contribution they are making to the DOT scheme. Highlights included:

• Rawmarsh CLC delivering intensive digital media courses to NEETs;
• Barnsley Learning Centres utilising UK Online digital outreach workers as DOTs;
• Curriculum development at Northern College in digital skills, focusing on social media, personal interests and creativity for engagement, with the DOT scheme offered as a progression route;
• RCAT employing a full-time outreach worker to develop digital skill training at community sites;
• Doncaster IT Academy working with public libraries to identify individuals interested in digital skills, and also with St Leger Homes.

Everybody was delighted to hear that the DOT scheme was now fully operational and we are looking forward to many more registrations, especially when colleges reopen in September.

In both groups, there was lots of discussion around libraries and everybody agreed that these are ideal places to promote the DOT scheme. There were representatives from Rotherham Libraries at the event who were encouraged by the positive discussions.

You can find out more about the project by visiting the website: www.makingitpersonal.eu

This entry was posted on Friday, July 2nd, 2010 at 14:22 and is filed under Digital Participation. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.