ICT Resources
Support Signposting
Suppliers Directories
The first one is a North East directory of the ICT support network, including IT technical support providers, ICT advisors and training venues. It's also sub-regionally searchable. The second is a national database of suppliers of ICT products and services. It was developed and is managed by Lasa. The second is
www.vonne.org.uk/policy/ict/ictsuppliersdirectory
Funding for ICT
There's a bit of duplication going on in terms of where to look for funding your ICT needs and invariably subscription costs are required. That said, generally these funding websites remain worthwhile search points. After registering, you can input details about what kind of organisation you are and what you need funding for and they churn out details of any funding pots currently available;
It's a good idea to sign up for the Funding Information North East (FINE) free monthly bulletin, ConTracked. This has information on contracts available which are relevant to the voluntary and community sector. You could also consider signing up for their fortnightly News You Can Use (from £50.00 p.a.) which has lots of information about grants, loans and trading which is all relevant to the North East voluntary and community sector.
Accessibility
AbilityNet is a national charity helping disabled adults and children use computers and the internet by adapting and adjusting their technology. It can help third sector organisations to adapt the services they offer to increase accessibility. Their website provides a wide range of free factsheets and skill sheets concerned with ICT accessibility:
www.abilitynet.org.uk
Most frequently asked ICT questions
The web site of the Regional ICT Champions provides answers to frequently asked questions about ICT and how it can help the third sector.
It offers short, jargon-free answers and provides further links to useful information elsewhere on the internet.
www.ictchampions.org.uk
ICT Knowledgebase
A large and well-organised collection of free articles written in a straightforward way specifically for the voluntary and community sector.
www.ictknowledgebase.org.uk
How-To Guides & Documents
CITA have a nice series of 'How To' guides which aim to help the VCS to develop their IT, maintain compliance and buy IT goods and services. The topics covered include: full cost recovery, IT strategies & policies, website design, doing an inventory and backing up.
www.communityitacademy.org
Creating an ICT Strategy
Commissioned by VONNE this free online toolkit generates an ICT strategy. By answering a series of questions about your organisation and the work that it does, this toolkit will produce an ICT Strategy which will prove invaluable in accounting for your communication and technology needs into the future.
The toolkit will also allow the production of 'tailored' multi-budget strategies which you may need for specific projects and collaborations. Toolkit features include an ICT training needs analysis for staff and volunteers and an up-to-date costs projector for all of the equipment you have and will need to maintain.
www.web-toolkits.org.uk
Doing a Really Quick ICT Budget
If you are really pushed for time and resources to create your strategy, the following spreadsheet should take you just a matter of minutes to at least create a realistic annual budget for your ICT needs and usage. Some cost estimates are used which can be changed to your own actual costs, particularly those marked in red.
ICT Budget Calculator (opens directly as a 24Kb Excel spreadsheet)
Low cost software
Any charity can sign up to Charity Technology Exchange (CTX) to get very low cost software from suppliers such as Microsoft, Symantec and Cisco.
www.ctx.org.uk
Open source software
Open source software is free to use. These sites list what is available and some have comments on the various software as well.
opensourcewindows.org
Volunteers
IT4Communities provides a brokering service to advertise your needs to a network of IT professionals. There is currently a charge for this service.
www.it4c.org.uk
Publications
Publications, newsletters, contacts and other ICT-related information from many sources are made available on this site which is hosted by NCVO.
www.ncvo-vol.org.uk/advice-support/ict/publications
Recycling ICT Equipment
Recycling of computers is not done by many people, mainly because a recycling plant to do the job costs millions of pounds. So here's a document with the best current advice we can offer which was last updated in 2010.
Computer Recycling (63Kb PDF)
Briefing Papers
The Regional ICT Champions developed a series of briefing papers up to and including in 2011. Over 20 were worked on specifically with third sector organisations in mind. The following most popular ones can be obtained by clicking on the title links below (they will open directly as PDF files)
Where to find information about ICT
Ten ways to work better using ICT
Top tips for an effective website
To see all of the briefing papers and reports developed by the Regional ICT Champions, visit:
www.ictchampions.org.uk/downloads
Tel: 0191 233 2000