Digital literacy programme comes to Marlborough area – followed by better broadband

If you’re reading this you’ve already cleared the digital literacy hurdle.  So much so that you could become a volunteer champion to help those in the Marlborough area who are still behind the digital start line. 

Wiltshire Council, through Wiltshire Online, are setting out to help the estimated three thousand plus people in Marlborough and its surrounding villages who have not yet used a computer or the internet. The Council wants to get them up to speed so they can be part of the digital world and enjoy its advantages. 

Some people may have computers and broadband and just find it all too complex and frustrating.  Others will be starting from scratch.

As its recent meeting, the Marlborough Area Board was told about Wiltshire Online’s pilot digital literacy scheme in Melksham.  A volunteer coordinator matches volunteer ‘digital champions’ to those who want to get started – some will, of course, need more basic advice and instruction than others.  Since March they’ve successfully helped eighty people.

For the Marlborough programme – in the first phase of the county-wide project – they are looking for two volunteer coordinators and twenty volunteer champions. They’re also working with the Marlborough Area Development Trust (MADT) to add the area’s Wi-Fi hotspots to their map – their online map.

And through MADT‘s Martin Cook, the scheme has the offer of assistance from St John’s school – including, as timetables allow, the use of one of the school’s ICT computer suites.

Martin Cook, who is a senior teacher at the school, emphasises that St John’s believes in education in its widest sense: “The volunteer programme seems to cover all bases – facilitating learning for those people who constantly miss out on new possibilities. We are excited by the prospect of encouraging this worthwhile venture and look forward to helping it succeed.”

Wiltshire Online project manager, Sarah Cosentino, believes this will be a great help as some people need a space away from their homes where they can meet and gain the necessary confidence.  However, for most people the help can be given at home.  And in the New Year a pilot scheme will start to provide low cost, re-cycled computers for vulnerable people.

If you want a first-hand testimonial of how the scheme can help, you can do no better than to ask Betty – an 86-year old grandmother who lives in Melksham.  You can watch and listen to her on the Wiltshire Council site. And, in case she doesn’t tell you, she’s on Facebook too. (Right click and you can see her full screen.)

Jenny Wilcockson, who is coordinator for the whole digital literacy scheme, told Marlborough News Online that she’s delighted with the offers of help since the Area Board meeting: “Marlborough is very well known for having a strong and capable community spirit so please help us by spreading the word to recruit volunteers and reach out to the most vulnerable members of the community who may benefit most from free computer support.”

To volunteer for the scheme in Marlborough just email Digital Inclusion.

Aside from the digital literacy scheme, Wiltshire Online’s main task is to improve the coverage and speed of broadband throughout the county – and this will take up most of the £16 million the Council is investing and the £4.7 million top-up the government has added from its superfast broadband fund.

Wiltshire Online has teamed up with Swindon and South Gloucestershire to select a commercial broadband infrastructure provider under the government’s Broadband Delivery UK project.  A preferred bidder will be selected by October 12.

As this will be state funding for an industry that is currently run exclusively by commercial companies, the scheme must get approval from the EU before it can be signed early next year. The Council estimate nearly half the county’s premises will not be able to receive a superfast broadband service by 2015 without support from Wiltshire Online and most of these are in rural locations – support for rural communities is a high priority for the programme.

They aim to be able to publicise the roll out plan in early 2013 and let people know about  its progress.  Watch this site for further information.

The target for 2015 is to get the standard (that’s a minimum of 2 Mbps) broadband to every premise and superfast broadband (that’s a minimum of 24 Mbps) to at least eighty-five per cent of premises and possibly even to ninety-five per cent of premises.

This is a major and ambitious programme which will have great benefits for medium and small businesses, for families and for home-workers – and, of course, the elderly and those living alone and those suffering from rural isolation. Sarah Consentino sums it up: “It’s a fantastic project to work on.”