10 million people in the UK have never used the internet.
Often, these are the people that could benefit most from the social and economic advantages the internet brings. Getting these people online is one of the toughest challenges faced by the UK.
Today’s children have grown up with technology and see it as part of their everyday lives.
This makes them the perfect ambassadors and teachers of the internet to the digitally excluded in their communities!
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Many primary schools in the UK are doing excellent and inspirational work to promote and teach children and their families about using the internet, and some have begun to extend this to benefit the wider community.
The Make IT Happy competition identifies and celebrates the best of this work. In 2010 we are looking for examples of primary schools from across the UK getting their communities online. Schools will be rewarded with cash prizes of up to £5,200 to benefit the school’s future use of technology, as well as gaining recognition from employers, MPs and the learning community.
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If you are a Local Authority that would like to promote Make IT Happy to your schools, please click here to view the Partners page for resources.
If you are an employer that would like to support the competition please click here to view the Employers page to find out how you can support the competition.
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The Make IT Happy competition is organised by the Parliamentary Information Technology Committee (PITCOM) in partnership with e-skills UK (the Sector Skills Council for Business and Information Technology). The competition is supported by the Institute of Engineering and Technology (IET) and the Nominet Trust as well as a growing list of MPs and employers.
Click here to find out more about who's involved.
This year the competition is supported by, and is supporting, Race Online 2012 which is a national challenge to give 4 million new people the opportunity to access the digital world by the London Olympics.
Go to www.RaceOnline2012.org to find out more