Charities Newsletter
Issue 3

Charity Project Case Study
Name of Charity:	Women in Prison (WIP)
Name of volunteer	Manji Bhudia
Project Aim	To build a database for the organisation Women in Prison to allow us to log all clients cases on.  The database spans the organisation allowing workers from 2 projects (resettlement & education) to centralise all clients’ details and individual outcomes.  WIP has several years of paper based client files which need logged on.  The database will allow us to give accurate breakdowns of all the clients we work with and to predict patterns in the future and run reports to give information to our funders and future funders.
Project Delivery	Manji liaised with 2 key workers from both projects.  At the beginning he spent at least 1 day a fortnight in the office with the staff working and building the database, reviewing with staff exactly what we need.  After 6 months he started to come in less regularly perhaps 1 – 2 every couple of months.
Lessons Learnt	Staff in the organisation needs to be committed to the project and able to liaise regularly with the volunteer and give them time when they visit the office.  This is difficult particularly in small charities.
Outcomes for the Charity	Manji is a good friend of the organisation now and he still comes in to maintain our database and add to it as our projects develop and we need new information.

If you would like to showcase any of your ICT related projects so that others can learn from you, please get in touch with us at info@iT4Communities.org.uk