Digital Friends at Llanelli Railway Goods Shed

Recently a group of volunteers and staff at Llanelli Railway Goods Shed Trust got the chance to take part in Digital Friends Training delivered by Digital Communities Wales.

Digital Communities Wales is a Welsh Government funded programme which exists to reduce digital exclusion in Wales, encouraging those who struggle with technology to embrace it safely and use it in a way that helps them.

Over the course of a day, the DCW team taught us how to best deliver information about internet safety, well-being, and advice on how to pursue interests online to further enrich lives. Their training was efficient, compassionate and showed a real care for the people who needed help. One of the volunteers at the training said “It was really interesting. I didn’t know how many apps for accessibility were available for people. I think the websites we learned about during the training with the online safety session were really useful and something we can use in future sessions”. Another volunteer has booked to have some additional follow up training after saying “It definitely gave me confidence in advising leaners about password and website security”. Through their training, we are now able to offer the same help to others within our community.

We have delivered 4 drop-in Tea and Tech sessions at the Goods Shed, helping people who may otherwise have not used the internet to research things that matter to them, such as what vegetables thrive when planted with other vegetables, and how to use BBC Sounds to get a whole host of entertainment for free.

After these initial pilot sessions we’ve decided that the best course is to run sessions in conjunction with groups that are already established at the Goods Shed so that we can build a rapport with the ladies and gentlemen, allowing us to help them more in the digital community. These sessions are being held on the last Wednesday and Thursday of every month and people are always welcome to drop in, even if they aren’t part of a group. What has been fantastic about the sessions is that they are people-led, but with the Digital Friends training volunteers are able to deliver online safety messages and other essential digital skills alongside what each participant wants to know about.

We’re so thankful to Digital Communities Wales because they have provided us, not only with knowledge, but also Chrome Books to enable us to carry on our training. These are available at every Tea and Tech session to allow people to explore the internet in a safe location. We have had so many wonderful comments about the sessions which people have taken part in, including “Thank you so much, I’ve been so worried about shopping online and I haven’t known how to trust what websites are okay to use. Now I feel a lot happier about it”, and “Well, I never knew I could get free crochet patterns, that’s lovely!” The Digital Friends based at the Goods Shed have also booked onto further training with Digital Communities Wales to keep broadening their own skillset and to ensure future sessions are delivering consistent support for our local community.

We’re truly delighted to be part of this move towards a more digitally inclusive Wales and hope that we can help many more people within the community.

A Word from the Manager

“The Digital Friends training has been invaluable for staff and volunteers. It’s allowed us to improve on existing digital skills and realise that there are a variety of skills we have that the training has improved our confidence with helping others with their technology issues. We’ve supported people of a variety of ages and levels of ability to improve their digital skills, and it’s really allowed us to improve volunteer wellbeing by giving them the opportunity to give something back to the community…”

Words from Digital Communities Wales

“It has been an absolute pleasure working with Sarah and Sophie and the rest of the team at the Llanelli Railway Goods Shed. The staff and volunteers are very passionate about helping people with their digital skills and the unique setting of the Goods Shed makes it a fun place to learn. I have no doubt that the tea and tech drop-in sessions will continue to grow and become a huge success – Mike O’Hara

“The staff and volunteers engaged incredibly well with the digital friends training. They were able to learn about the impact of digital exclusion as well as health and wellbeing tools, inspiring activities and online safety. They used their knowledge of their community to decide what would be key for the attendees to learn first and developed their future sessions surrounding these topics. The volunteers were incredibly enthusiastic and grew in confidence when holding sessions with members of the public, learning new skills themselves. The attendees appeared to thoroughly enjoy the sessions and value the skills they were developing.” – Kirsty Wallace