News from the People's Network and Resource
News from the People's Network and Resource
People's Network Excellence Fund expands ICT in public libraries
The People's Network project, which will connect all public libraries in the UK to the Internet by the end of 2002, has received £1.7 million from the People's Network Excellence Fund for 26 projects across England to enable libraries to further develop their ICT provision with new, exciting and innovative services. All of the funded projects will show how libraries are using their imagination and forward planning to create new People's Network services for their communities.
The People's Network has £100 million of national lottery money from the New Opportunities Fund across the UK to equip local libraries with state-of-the-art computer technology to make the Internet accessible to everyone in the community. The People's Network programme is managed as a partnership between New Opportunities Fund and Resource: The Council for Museums, Archives and Libraries.
Many of the People's Network Excellence Fund projects are focusing on the need to make library services accessible from remote locations such as the home,shopping malls, or other community venues. This will typically be done either by innovative software approaches or physically expanding the existing network infrastructure or, in some cases, both. Services generally being focused on are lending services or access to library-based electronic databases.
Other library services are using technology to help promote their People's Network services using video walls or outreach services with laptops. One particularly interesting project will loan out personal digital assistants(PDAs) to library users and allow the downloading of e-books and other MP3 files across the library's own broadband network.
The provision of online services on mobile libraries is particularly useful for those library users who are not within easy reach of a local static library. Internet, e-mail and real-time library catalogue and lending services are all being explored through radio or microwave technologies. Other technologies being adopted are smartcards, virtual learning environments, assistive hardware and software, and library services to young people via text-messaging.
A total of £1,700,202 is being awarded during late 2002 to 26 projects in England. In Windsor and Maidenhead an award of £94,000 from the fund will enable people with visual impairment to "leaf through" spoken-word books in the way that other library users leaf through paper books. New Opportunities Fund support for Stoke-on-Trent library services will ensure there is a public-access computer with an extra-large format keyboard in each local library, for use by those with visual impairment, arthritis or others who may find the traditional keyboard difficult.
In the South West, an award of £68,000 will help library users to operate public access computer terminals to search for information held in museums and libraries in Somerset and across the region. An award of £75,000 is being made to Brent Library Service to install a multicultural information and communications technology (ICT) centre at Ealing Road library in Wembley,offering computers with language translation packages and special keyboards for Asian-based language fonts. A grant of £118,000 to Birmingham will create"libraries without walls" where remote access to library and e-government services will be available through a Web browser.
Herefordshire will use £43,000 to develop smartcard technology to make the Internet and People's Network available outside library hours. A scheme in Newcastle, backed with an award of £106,000 by the New Opportunities Fund,will offer people the chance to explore creative ways of using new media and technology, providing opportunities to learn new skills with digital video. Users will be encouraged to use computers for creating and editing their own films.
Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation helps get UK Online
The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation joined forces with Resource to celebrate the enormous achievement of the People's Network at a Conference held at The Royal Society in mid-2002. The People's Network project, the UK's biggest ever public sector investment in an ICT initiative with the public libraries sector, will have connected 4,300 public libraries to the Internet by the end of 2002, and will have trained all public library staff in ICT skills by 2004. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation gift has provided £2.6 million in support of the project, which has helped develop the People's Network in public libraries in the most deprived areas of the UK by providing funding for extra ICT facilities.
Giving the keynote address at the conference, Arts Minister, Baroness Blackstone, said: "I would like to take this opportunity to thank the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation for its generous gift of £2.6 million which has been used to complement the infrastructure strand of the People's Network programme through the purchase of additional hardware, a total of 1,903 Internet terminals, in 413 learning centres in libraries in the most deprived wards across the country. This will make a tremendous difference to the lives of many people who, without this support, are at most risk of being on the wrong side of the digital divide."
"Thanks to the People's Network programme all libraries will now have the means to provide rapid access to a vastly increased amount of knowledge and information, and ordinary people of all ages and skill levels can access it supported by trained staff, thereby allowing them to improve their knowledge and skills and broaden their horizons. This has put libraries at the forefront of the Department's social inclusion strategy and I would like to take this opportunity to thank and congratulate all those who have been involved in this work, including the New Opportunities Fund and Resource, for the role they have played in designing and managing the programme."
Lord Evans, Chairman of Resource, commented: "It is almost impossible to overestimate the importance of the People's Network. The project, which is managed by Resource and has been lottery-funded through the New Opportunities Fund, will benefit communities throughout the UK, by allowing anyone and everyone in the country to have access to a computer and the Internet simply by visiting their local library. This will enable people, for example, to find new jobs, keep in touch with friends and family, and get support for their studies."
"It is important that the People's Network benefits all areas of the community. We are extremely grateful to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation for their generous gift which has enabled Resource to provide even higher levels of Internet and computer access in deprived areas through additional computer terminals. This mammoth project which is in budget and will be delivered on time is a huge achievement, and everyone involved must be congratulated and thanked."
Other speakers at the conference included Carol Erickson, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and Luis Herrera, City of Pasadena Information Services Department. There were case study presentations from Brian Gambles, Birmingham City, Ken McKinlay, East Renfrewshire Council, Stephen Walters, Gateshead Council and Linda Tomos, Wales Information Network.
For further information please contact Jo O'Driscoll, 16 Queen Anne's Gate,London SW1H 9AA, UK. Tel: +44(0) 20 7273 1450; Fax: +44(0) 20 7273 1404; E-mail: jo.odriscoll@resource.gov.uk;URL: www.resource.gov.uk
