VolunteerGenie.org.uk is a new FREE online guide for charities who want to recruit more volunteers. The site launched this week and it has everything a charity needs to help them create a volunteer recruitment campaign.

Go to www.VolunteerGenie.org.uk and…

• find out what motivates people to volunteer
• discover which media campaigns catch people’s attention
• access free guides to help you devise your own media strategy
• get top tips on working with journalists and reporters
• find out how to engage volunteers in the new media world
• …and much, much more!

Find out how PR and advertising campaigns can be used to persuade people to volunteer - and discover how you don’t need a big budget to get big results.

The site is packed with real volunteer recruitment campaigns from the likes of Samaritans, TimeBank, National Blood Service, Home-Start, Special Constables, ChildLine, Contact the Elderly, Crime Concern, VSO and many more.

We’d love to have your feedback (f.jenkins@vamu.org.uk). Let us know what you think of www.VolunteerGenie.org.uk.

Flora Jenkins
Acting Director, Voluntary Action Media Unit (VAMU) - TimeBank
e: f.jenkins@vamu.org.uk

CTN is holding a lunch and lecture at York Racecource on 9th November. The lecture will be delivered by Julia Unwin, Director of the Jospeh Rowntree Foundation and former Charity Commissioner. She will be drawing on her depth of experience with charities to identify the questions that trustees should ask to help them become more effective in their role.

In addition to the lecture, and an excellent seated lunch, there will be seminars available on:

• investments and money
• trusteeship
• the Charities Act 2006

The event is free for members of trusteenetplus, CTN’s membership package designed to address the key concerns of trustees, so we’d encourage you to consider joining for just £40 a year. Or, you can attend the lunch and lecture for just £20 or with the seminars for £25.

The day is generously supported by CCLA and the venue is fully accessible.

For further details visit www.trusteenet.org.uk/news

• Are you involved in a community or voluntary organisation?
• Have you come across the Compact in your work?
• Would you like to tell the government what you think is working and not working with the Compact?

Compact Voice, the representative body for the VCS on the Compact, is looking for people to take part in a focus group either in London, Birmingham or Manchester. The purpose of the focus group is to find out about your experience of the Compact and will be included as part of a wider report exploring the relationship between the sector and the government as framed by the Compact. What you tell us will be presented directly to government ministers (including Phil Hope and Ed Milliband) and will help set priorities for the future.

We are looking for people who have had positive as well as negative experiences. We are also looking to reflect the diversity of the voluntary and community sector so no matter the size of your organisation, the activity you engage in, or the groups you represent, we would be very interested in hearing from you. The focus groups will take place in London on 19^th September and 9^th October, in Birmingham on 27^th September and in Manchester on 2^nd October.

Lunch and travel costs will be provided as well as redeemable NCVO book vouchers and a copy of the final report.

To find out more please contact stefan.simanowitz@ncvo-vol.org.uk or telephone 020 7520 2486.

Networking for Green Space Practitioners in the Public and VCS

The newly formed Yorkshire & Humber Regional Parks Forum (YHRPF), are asking for people with a vested interest in parks and open spaces to come forward and be a part of a regional forum which is intent on improving the quality of life for the regions residents, and enhancing the visitor experience, by championing quality and the sustainability of green spaces throughout the region.

After only several meetings of the Forum, the coming together and the pooling of a collective green space mindset, has produced some very useful insights for those attending from the Public Sector (PS) and Voluntary and Community Sector (VCS); such as the identification of the use of Section 106 money and the new Government arrangement regarding its future administration.

If you are a part of a friend’s of a park group, or you are a member of a local authority, your opinions and input to the Forum is most welcome, and indeed essential if we are to obtain a true perspective and improve on the condition of our regions green spaces and their governance.

Undoubtedly answering one question will determine your next action; can you really afford to miss out on this opportunity to share best practices with some of our districts most innovative green space leaders?

If the chance to discuss your issues with others of a similar mindset is not enough incentive, then surely the selection of topics for future discussions and the adopted direction of the Forum; combined with the occasional introduction of a high profile guest speaker, may help to change your mind.

For further information on becoming a member of the Yorkshire & Humberside Regional Parks Forum please contact: Sarah Moore - Project Officer (GreenSpace) 01189469065 or by email to sarah@green-space.org.uk or for VCS contact Steve Hyde 07883046881 or email steve_hyde@lineone.net.

Thetford is set to welcome international visitors, as European Consulates visit Keystone Development Trust. For the first time, Janusz Wach, the Polish Consul General will visit Keystone offices on Friday 2^nd February. This is the second recent Consul visit to Thetford, as Miguel Pires, the Portuguese Consul General visited Keystone on January 26^th.

Organised as part of the work of META, the Consul visits provide an opportunity for Thetford’s migrant workers to meet the representatives from their home nations and to facilitate an ongoing discussion about key issues.

“The Polish community is one of the largest migrant communities in Norfolk and Suffolk. As Portuguese people had the chance to meet their Consul General, META decided to give the same opportunity to Polish people. We hope that this visit will help to further the relationship between local authorities and Polish people,” said Susana Forte Vaz Community Integration Facilitator at Keystone Development Trust.

The visit from the Polish Consul General forms a central part of META’s efforts to develop good working relationships with the Polish Government. In addition to this, META is hoping to provide an information service similar to that currently offered to the Portuguese community. This service assists the work of the Consulates, by helping prepare migrant workers for visits to their Consulates in London.

ENDS

For more information about META, and Keystone’s Equalities projects, please contact:

Elisa Pinto – Acting Equalities Coordinator

Tel: 01842 757332

Email: elisa.pinto@keystonetrust.org.uk

www.keystonetrust.org.uk

Editor’s notes

META – Working as part of the Equalities project, META offers information and advice to Migrant workers based in Norfolk and works with local statutory bodies to encourage community integration.

Equalities - The main objective of this project is about improve access to jobs and services for the migrant communities that now reside in the KDT area. However, the project also seeks to support the development of good relationships between these ‘new’ communities and the existing residents, something which can only be of benefit to us all. (Funders information and logos shown above)

Keystone Development Trust - Supported by a wide range of funders, we aim to improve the quality of life and opportunities for people who live, study and work in the Keystone area through sustainable, community led regeneration.

“as notícias” (The News), a newspaper for Portuguese nationals based in the UK, was launched on Monday 6th November at the Keystone Innovation Centre in Thetford, Norfolk. Aimed primarily at the UK’s Portuguese Migrant Workers, “as notícias” will give more than 500,000 Portuguese people living in the UK the opportunity to receive information in their language.

In fortnightly format, “as notícias” will start with a circulation of 20,000 copies, aiming to reach a circulation of 50,000 by 2007. It will be distributed to more than 600 Portuguese businesses, organisations and associations in 60 locations across the UK.

Project Manager Joao de Noronha said: ““as notícias” will be a free newspaper, aiming to share information and communicate with Portuguese migrant workers. The idea is to move towards integration. It will have Portuguese news, UK and World news and stories from Portuguese communities. It will also give advice to avoid scams and exploitation.”

The “as notícias” team consists of an editor and several professional journalists, many of whom are UK correspondents for several different media in Portugal.  Its main editorial office will be based in Thetford, with a team of journalists and correspondents located in London and other Portuguese communities.

The newspaper developed from ideas by the Multilingual and European Thetford Association (META), a project managed by Keystone Development Trust, in Thetford. META offers information and advice to Migrant workers based in Norfolk and works with local statutory bodies to encourage community integration.

ENDS

Keystone is part financed by the European Union and also supported by EEDA, Norfolk County Council, Connecting Communities Plus, Thetford Town Council and Breckland Council.

NOTE TO EDITORS

1.      PDF of Front Page of  “as notícias” is available upon request to media.

2.      For any information about “as notícias”  please contact:

João de Noronha, Project Manager

01842 754639

Email: joao.denoronha@keystonetrust.org.uk

www.keystonetrust.org.uk

3.      For further information about META, please contact:

Elisa Pinto, Acting Equalities Coordinator

01842 754639

Email: elisa.pinto@keystonetrust.org.uk

www.keystonetrust.org.uk

ChildLine has launched a micro site, featuring its range of fundraising activities tied in with the festive period. Activities such as promote a ‘Card Free Zone’ in your department, or arrange a ‘Letter from Santa’ for a child are here. Voting for who is to guide Santa’s sleigh this year is also proving an early favourite!

www.childlinechristmas.org.uk

People involved in the voluntary and community sector have a new place to learn, get inspired, meet and collaborate following Engage East Midlands’ launch of www.vcscollaborate.org, a national online social networking site built specifically for the VCS.

The concept of such an online network was developed in response to Engage East Midlands’ pioneering six year research programme into cluster collaboration for the voluntary and community sector. This research identified the significant need, and potential, for better collaboration between voluntary and community organisations.

The network site was developed for Engage East Midlands by e-democracy company Delib and draws on a mix of web functionalities designed to help users collaborate. For instance, the site includes an ideas bank for members to submit ideas and gather support for them, forums for project or issue discussion, resource upload and download for sharing important or interesting files and wikis where members can collaboratively author documents such as funding bids. Moreover, the site allows the creation of thematic networks and secure groups, enabling people to work together on specific issues or even internally.

Jasvinder Dudial, Capacity Development Manager at Engage East Midlands, said ‘the voluntary and community sector is demand-led and there was a demand for a place where individuals and organisations with little time to carry out lengthy research or attend meetings could learn and work together. This virtual space has been created to meet that demand, to help people get support for their innovative project ideas, network and get the best out of working with each other’.

Delib consultant Ben Whitnall said ‘above all, we hope that people will find the site useful: we know we’ll have done our job properly if the tools in the site become another way for people and organisations to better achieve their aims. Of course, there’s a dependency in such social projects on people using the site and being there to work with each other; hopefully, we’ve given people plenty of reason to be there and they’ll start seeing the benefits soon’.

People can sign up to or browse the site now at http://www.vcscollaborate.org

The South Yorkshire Community Media Fund is part of the larger ‘Turn Up The Volume’ project that offers advice, support and funding for Community Media projects in Priority 4a Areas in South Yorkshire. For an application form and more information, including the location of Priority 4a communities in South Yorkshire, visit us at www.commedia.org.uk/volume.

Round 3 Deadline - 5pm on Monday the 16th October 2006.

(More info on Previous post - Funding Available for South Yorkshire Community Media Projects - 5th September 2006)

YMCA England today welcomed the Prime Minister’s commitment to ending social exclusion.

The Community Media Association has announced the third round of the popular South Yorkshire Community Media Fund. The South Yorkshire Community Media Fund is part of the larger ‘Turn Up The Volume’ project that offers advice, support and funding for Community Media projects in South Yorkshire.

Liza Kellett, Director of the Community Media Association said: “This is an exciting opportunity for communities in South Yorkshire. In the first and second rounds of the grant scheme we’ve funded a variety of different projects, from an Age Concern Rotherham pilot community web-cast on demand, by and for older people in Rotherham, to a filmmaking project, run by Sheffield Independent Film, where several groups across Sheffield with different learning barriers made their own short films.”

Sam Kennedy, Income Generation and Marketing Manager, of Age Concern Rotherham, felt that without such funding, forward thinking groups would not have the chance to test new ideas - “Turn up the Volume gives local organisations access to funding to try new and creative new media projects which may not be supported by other funders due to the innovative nature of the work.”

In this round the Community Media Association are particularly interested in applications that will benefit Objective 1 P4a communities in Barnsley and Doncaster.

The deadline for applications to the third round of funding is 5pm on Monday the 16^th October 2006.

For an application form and more information, including the location of Priority 4a communities in South Yorkshire, visit us at www.commedia.org.uk/volume.

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