IT4Communities Newsletter Nine

iT4Communities - Volunteer Opportunities Newsletter
Number 9 - 18th November 2003

[You are receiving this email because you, or someone providing your details, has registered this email address with iT4Communities. If you wish to unsubscribe from this e-newsletter, please email info@iT4Communities.org.uk?subject=UnsubscribeVols and we will remove you from future mailing lists].

1. Latest News
2. Project of the Month
3. Website Highlights
4. Latest Feedback
5. The Opportunities
6. A word about your initial meeting with the charity
7. Final thoughts

1. LATEST NEWS

Things to do: We had ninety charity registrations in October and they've still flooding in. More projects are appearing in the Volunteer Opportunities section day by day.
Happy Birthday to us, Happy Birthday to us: iT4Communities was one year old last week. We didn't get many cards but the birthday cake was very nice.
We want to know about you: No, we've not gone 1984. We've adding a volunteer profile section to the website and we want to know more about you, why you do volunteering and what you get out of it. Please email Alex (info@iT4Communities.org.uk) for a profiles form if you would like your 15 minutes (or few weeks) of fame on the iT4C website.
Who you calling a geek?: If you missed it, you can find iT4C's call to arms for IT volunteering at http://www.computerweekly.com/Articles/2003/11/13/198464/thought-for-the-daybrstep-forward-and-de-geek.htm
Trust me, I'm an IT consultant: We're looking for feedback on how individuals build trust relationships and credibility with charities on short term, one-off projects. Please email Simon with your stories at simon@iT4Communities.org.uk.
A bag full of Case Studies: Thanks to everyone who has returned their Case Studies. We've published a few more of the recent ones. If anyone has completed a project but not yet completed a case study, please request a form by email to info@iT4Communities.org.uk.
Ciao baby: Alex is leaving us on December 5th (leaving cards and email to the usual address) so apologies if some of the replies to email after this date are a little slow. Thanks to Alex for his sterling efforts over the last five months (seems a lifetime doesn't it?).
Next newsletter: We'll publish the next newsletter in mid December, mulled wine and mince pies permitting.

2. PROJECT OF THE MONTH

Project of the Month: P518 - Young person's counselling service needs a web designer to update and redevelop their website and assist them in becoming proficient in maintaining it.
Northern Project of the Month: P511 - Family support charity requires a volunteer to help them create a website (with advice on hosting/visibility on search engines) and leave them with the skills to maintain it themselves. Some general advice on how best to maintain their computers would also be helpful.
The Little Bit Different Project of the Month: P530 - Charity providing assistance to ex offenders needs a volunteer to help them build extranet access to internal services through MS Sharepoint and advise on security issues surrounding this.
More details and projects at www.iT4Communities.org.uk

3. WEBSITE HIGHLIGHTS

Online Volunteer Opportunities. Say no more, just visit www.iT4Communities.org.uk
Caring Microsoft - [Broken link removed]
Who's responsible for a volunteering project? - [Broken link removed]
It's Just Fun - [Broken link removed]
For general advice on how volunteers can ensure that charities can continue to benefit from their contribution even after a project has ended, check out: [Broken link removed]
What sort of projects might I volunteer for: [broken link removed]
Here's some we prepared earlier: [Broken links removed]

4. LATEST FEEDBACK

View from an Advice Charity

"We got an excellent web site which gives a new company the exposure that it needs, when we didn't have the skills to produce it for ourselves, or the time needed to learn." - Anne Stratton, Coalville Citizens Advice Bureau.

View from an Arts Charity

"The benefits to Innovision Media were immense - the web site provides us with a high quality shop window which we could otherwise not afford. And knowing that our iT4C volunteer is approachable and that we can always turn to him for help is invaluable,
especially given our own level of competency with IT. Our volunteer's work helped us bridge the gap faced by many small charities of how to communicate effectively and in an attractive way, and how to harness the advantages of the net.

We also feel our volunteer has become a friend and a real support at a human (not just an IT) level. We'll always be grateful to him for being one of the first people to commit is hard skills to turning our plans into reality." - Simon Elliott, Innovision Media.

View from a Communications Charity

"As far as Write Away is concerned, we now have a greater understanding of what IT resources we have. They are running more efficiently and the architecture of the network and its peripherals has been reconfigured successfully. We have a company who can support us with many of our IT issues which we could not otherwise afford to outsource. As to the volunteers - we hope that they derived satisfaction from working with us and that they felt they were putting something back. That they were utilising their skills to fill a skill gap in our organisation, but in the long run were transferring some of the basic skills so in the long term we can support ourselves." - Andy Grout, Write Away.

View from a Refugee Charity

"Our IT 4 Communities volunteer helped us to think straight about what we really want from our IT. Having sorted out our own minds, he helped us to look at our options. We are only at the beginning of reaping the benefits, but the first concrete thing is that
we now have a website, and we have other plans in the offing." - Rosemary Watson, Slough Refugee Support.

5. THE OPPORTUNITIES

We have had telephone conversations with these charities (or the brokers providing the opportunities), and have filtered out any requests that were clearly inappropriate for volunteers. In the Volunteer Opportunities section we have included information about the type of charity, the location and a summary of the request for IT advice / assistance. If you are interested in volunteering for a particular opportunity, please click on the Volunteer button adjacent to the details of each opportunity. This DOES NOT commit you to the project at this stage but will enable us to send you further information.

Opportunities are categorised by location (London, North West, North East, West Midlands, East Midlands, SouthEast, SouthWest, Scotland, Wales). We're working on better ways of representing the projects/locations but all feedback welcome. Apologies in advance if we've offended anyone's geography.

Please bear in mind that I'm not a geography guru and what you think is East Midlands might have been added to West Midlands. It's worth looking at other areas near you.

We've also classified projects by skill type e.g. website, database, strategy. This does mean that some projects don't fit easily into categories so if you're a multi-tasking kind of volunteer or have special talents, check out the ALL category and find those hidden gems.

We will respond to offers to volunteer on a first come, first served basis and we will try to respond to all of you as soon as possible but this may take a few days depending on the number of responses and other activities. Your patience is appreciated. In some cases, we may provide multiple volunteer details for a particular project. We will also let you know if your opportunity has already been taken (assuming we've been told). We will deal with offers to volunteer as quickly as we can but we cannot guarantee to respond to all applications immediately.

Projects will remain listed until someone CONFIRMS acceptance. In some cases, volunteers have expressed interest but a project has not, for whatever reason, been confirmed. If you contact a charity about a project and they tell you it's no longer available, please let us know (sometimes they don't).

If there isn't an opportunity near to you, please bear with us. More charities and projects are registered each week. If you have any specific questions, please email Alex at info@iT4Communities.org.uk

6. A WORD ABOUT YOUR INITIAL MEETING WITH THE CHARITY

At your first meeting with the charity you will need to check out a number of issues. You will want to make sure:

that you and the charity are going to be comfortable working with each other - you will want to check out the charity and equally they will want to make sure that you have the skills and experience that they need - [broken link removed]

that the project in question is deliverable within your time constraints as a volunteer - [broken link removed]

that any issues of liability and insurance are covered, both by you and the charity. What happens if you fall down a dodgy stair in the charity's office or your work ends up losing all the charity's data? (We're not being pessimistic about this - most volunteering works without any problems but it is sensible to make sure that you and the charity have discussed these eventualities.) see http://www.it4communities.org.uk/it4c/open/volunteer/resources/risk.jsp (NB. IT 4Communities has no responsibility for any loss or damage howsoever arising from any act or omission of the volunteer or the charity who are the beneficiary of the voluntary activity.)

Getting this stuff right at the outset is worth the time spent and makes sure that you can then concentrate on delivering a great project

7. FINAL THOUGHTS

iT4Communities is a project to help the IT industry and IT professionals help communities. It depends largely on you as individuals and employees to deliver the expertise. We're here to provide the web-based resource and answer questions. We will try to provide you with introductions to charities and work with you as a group to develop best practice. You are the ones with the skills to change the lives of individuals, groups, to make a difference in your local community. If you have any suggestions about iT4Communities and / or this newsletter - do get in touch, we want to hear from you.

Let's go to work...

Simon.

Simon Davey
National Director, iT4Communities
e: simon@iT4Communities.org.uk
w: www.iT4Communities.org.uk

IT 4 Communities is an initiative to encourage companies and individuals with professional IT skills to volunteer these skills for the benefit of the community, and is supported by a partnership of key IT sector organisations.

We aim to achieve a significant and sustainable increase in the number of companies and IT professionals volunteering their skills in their local communities, and to maximise the effectiveness of this volunteering input in building the capacity of local charities and community groups.