{"id":926,"date":"2022-06-01T09:29:55","date_gmt":"2022-06-01T08:29:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.dorsetcouncil.gov.uk\/digital-first\/?p=926"},"modified":"2022-06-06T09:19:26","modified_gmt":"2022-06-06T08:19:26","slug":"dorsets-army-of-volunteer-digital-champions-is-growing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.dorsetcouncil.gov.uk\/digital-first\/2022\/06\/01\/dorsets-army-of-volunteer-digital-champions-is-growing\/","title":{"rendered":"Dorset’s army of volunteer digital champions is growing"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Two<\/a>
A volunteer digital champion session running in Verwood Library<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Dorset Council\u2019s army of volunteer digital champions is growing to help meet the growing digital skills need in the county.<\/p>\n

Six new recruits have come on board to join the council\u2019s team of digital champions to help even more of the county\u2019s residents get online.<\/span><\/p>\n

Research has shown that nearly a third of Dorset\u2019s residents don\u2019t have the means or the skills to get online and are increasingly being left behind in a world that is becoming more reliant on the internet.<\/p>\n

The council recruits volunteer digital champions to help those residents through\u00a0regular face to face sessions at libraries across the county.<\/span><\/p>\n

They can also help people over the phone via the council\u2019s Digital Hotline.<\/p>\n

New volunteer digital champion, Ellen Paver said: \u201cI am a British Sign Language student with Dorset Skills and Learning. By becoming a volunteer digital champion, I\u2019m excited to help deaf, hard of hearing and deaf-blind people use technology as an access<\/span>ibility tool.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Another new volunteer, Paul Hutchings said: \u201cI was already volunteering in our local parish\u00a0online centre. Becoming a volunteer digital champion seemed like a good opportunity to reach more local people. I know how the older generation can struggle to connect, and it\u2019s a passion of mine to help in this way.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The digital champions can assist with any digital issue \u2013 from online shopping to orderin<\/span>g prescriptions and with help setting up and using new devices.<\/span><\/p>\n

Since the start of the year, they have held 457 sessions across 32 locations.<\/p>\n

Cllr Jill Haynes, Dorset Council\u2019s portfolio holder for Corporate Development and Transformation, said: \u201cWe\u2019re so grateful for the generosity of the volunteers, giving their time and <\/span>skills to assist our residents to get online.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIn Dorset, we still have 11% of residents who are completely offline and another 20% lack all the essential digital skills needed. This means nearly a third of our residents are digitally<\/span>\u00a0excluded in some way.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cOur volunteers do a great job, to help people become more digitally included and we\u2019re thrilled to have recruited more volunteers, and we are looking for people in the Wareham area to join us.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Two<\/a>
The volunteer digital champions receiving their certificates<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The volunteers recently received \u2018Dorset Volunteer Hero\u2019 certificates in recognition of their efforts.<\/p>\n

Residents can find out where their nearest digital champion session is by calling the Digital Hotline on 01305 221048.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Dorset Council\u2019s army of volunteer digital champions is growing to help meet the growing digital skills need in the county. Six new recruits have come on board to join the council\u2019s team of digital champions to help even more of the county\u2019s residents get online. Research has shown that nearly a third of Dorset\u2019s residents… Read more Dorset’s army of volunteer digital champions is growing<\/span><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":927,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[48,49],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/news.dorsetcouncil.gov.uk\/digital-first\/files\/2022\/06\/IMG_8666-2-scaled.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.dorsetcouncil.gov.uk\/digital-first\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/926"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.dorsetcouncil.gov.uk\/digital-first\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.dorsetcouncil.gov.uk\/digital-first\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.dorsetcouncil.gov.uk\/digital-first\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.dorsetcouncil.gov.uk\/digital-first\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=926"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/news.dorsetcouncil.gov.uk\/digital-first\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/926\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":931,"href":"https:\/\/news.dorsetcouncil.gov.uk\/digital-first\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/926\/revisions\/931"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.dorsetcouncil.gov.uk\/digital-first\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/927"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.dorsetcouncil.gov.uk\/digital-first\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=926"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.dorsetcouncil.gov.uk\/digital-first\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=926"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.dorsetcouncil.gov.uk\/digital-first\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=926"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}