Background

Wired up to Wellbeing grew out of an initiative from Birmingham's Yardley Libraries to empower the over-50s with support in using the Internet. This pilot project was part of the wider strategy of Birmingham City Council to foster greater independence among older citizens.

As Jenny York, District Librarian and Mike Byrne, Community Librarian at Acocks Green Library explain:

In libraries, we see it as a primary role to enable users to find information for themselves through user education ... In Yardley Constituency, the Libraries are adapting some of the principles of user education to Internet skills for over-50s.

This pilot encourages older people to make a fuller use of ICT to make a contribution to the community in which they live and access local events and groups.

(Source: 'Managing Information' April 2008)

Yardley Libraries partnered with Flo-Joe Training and Consultants to devise the course and deliver sessions to Library staff and members of the public. As Peter Travis of Flo-Joe explains:

It has been immensely rewarding to work with Yardley Libraries on this project. Participants who until this pilot had had little or no experience of using the Internet are now surfing with confidence and with a real focus.