Case Studies

Workplace visit—St Joseph's Primary School visiting Fujitsu
(18 June 2009)


	The School Principal, Joe Ryan, keeping an eye on things from the background!

Time to Compute in Harper's Hill Primary School

Alison Lamont and Tracey Rosborough work for HM Revenue & Customs in Coleraine. They have been supporting the children in Harpur's Hill Primary School Time to Compute since 2003 and have built up a very special relationship with the school and with successive year groups of children.

From left, Callum & Lauren with Alison, and Courtney & Glenn with Tracey

Harpur's Hill Primary School P5 class with teacher Claire McVicker (back left)
Tracey and Alison (at back right)

Time to Compute in King's Park Primary School

The IT company Northgate, which is based in Newtownabbey, has the responsibility for maintaining all the IT hardware currently in the Northern Ireland schools—both in primary and in post-primary schools. In the Time to Compute programme, they also support two schools in Newtownabbey.
David Duncan, Katherine McCallister and Tracey McCamley work with the children in King's Park Primary School. On the day our photographer called, both Tracey and Katherine were involved in training sessions in the company, so David had a solo performance in front of the camera with a number of the Time to Compute children.

David Duncan from Northgate with (from left) Courtney, Chloe & Lucas

Time to Compute in Elmgrove Primary School

Dorothy, Gerry and Philip work in Bombardier Aerospace Shorts and have been volunteering in Time to Compute in this school for the past two years. Photographs were taken on a recent visit to see them in action.

Time to Compute Bombardier Aerospace Shorts visits Elmgrove

Gerry Starrs, Dorothy Ireland and Philip Moffett
with (L-R) Matthewm Ben, Natalia, Rachel & Chloe

Philip with Rachel & Matthew

Ben with Gerry from Bombardier

Dorothy with Natalia and Chloe

Time to Compute in St Joseph's Primary School, Holland Drive

On 27 February 2009, a member of the BITC Education Team visited the Fujitsu & Steria volunteers and took the following photographs

Time to Compute Fujitsu visit to St Joseph's

Roy Thompson, Cathy Hawthorne (Steria), Stephen Alford, Eithne O'Hare, Paul Donaldson (School Vice Principal): front Maeve, Shan and Eve

Time to Compute Fujitsu visits to St Joseph's

"Time to Compute volunteers have enabled pupils to develop computer competence and to grow in self confidence; so much so that the pupils have gone back into the classroom to teach these skills to their peers (and the teacher)! Super!"
David Todd, Principal, Nettlefield Primary School

"I would describe my time as a volunteer on the Time to Compute scheme as a rewarding experience. I found it allowed me time to forget about the stresses of work for an hour and just to have some fun teaching the two children I had been assigned to work with on the computers. The kids themselves were motivated and they really improved their knowledge about computers, and then they shared that knowledge with their class mates. It was really nice to get to know the two children over the course of the school year—they were great kids".
Michael Dillon, Consilium Technologies Ltd

"Time to Compute is an excellent scheme whereby individual children benefit from the expertise of employee volunteers. This individual benefit is then shared for the good of the whole class!"
Henry Clements, Principal, Rathenraw Integrated Primary School

"It is important that employers are aware of the importance of taking part in local projects, which reaps great benefits for both the employees and the members of the community involved. Consilium recognised that it was in a position to provide help within the community by taking part in the Time to Compute programme. For just an hour a week, staff have been involved in sharing their IT knowledge with school children who may otherwise have not benefited from the experience of skilled professionals. Staff have returned to the workplace feeling motivated and rewarded through their volunteering efforts".
Olga Wright, Human Resources, Consilium Technologies Ltd

"One aspect of Time to Compute that is particularly significant for our school situation and our pupils is that the volunteers provide excellent role models from the world of work. The projects help to develop self-belief, confidence and social skills. In the future, we hope that this will impact on the expectations the pupils have of themselves and their future employment prospects. "
Brenda McMullen, Principal Cliftonville Primary School