PC Refurb - Bridging the Digital Divide

Discover the transformative power of digital literacy in our latest episode of Hatts Chats and Giggles. Join us as we chat with Sam Hardy and Elissa Bryant from PC Refurb about their incredible work refurbishing donated computers and offering digital skills training to those who need it most. From older adults to individuals re-entering society after incarceration, and young people lacking formal education, hear heartwarming stories of how access to technology has changed lives. Alyssa also shares her personal journey and motivations, highlighting the urgency of digital inclusion in today's tech-driven world.

We also unpack the broader issues of digital exclusion and the innovative solutions emerging to tackle them. Ever struggled with mobile banking? We share personal anecdotes about mastering these conveniences, often with help from younger family members. Compare the necessity of digital skills to basic reading, as we discuss community initiatives aimed at building these vital skills, focusing on projects in Tameside. Learn about the diverse teaching models, from group sessions to one-on-one assistance by dedicated digital champions. This episode is a poignant reminder of how digital literacy can significantly enhance lives and foster deeper social connections.

PC Referb - https://pcrefurb.org.uk/

JOSH'S BAD JOKES

Chapters

• 0:00 Digital Technology and Inclusion Importance
• 13:05 Building Community Digital Skills Capacity

Transcript

Mark: 1:53

Welcome back, listener. Welcome to this week's episode of that's Chats and Giggles podcast. Today, we're going to be discussing something that impacts virtually every aspect of our lives. Yep, you got it, it's technology. More specifically, we're exploring the growing importance of digital technology and literacy in a world that has gone truly digital, of digital technology and literacy in a world that has gone truly digital. To help us understand these issues and its implications, I'm pleased to welcome this week's guests, sam Harder and Alyssa Bryant from PC Refurb, a non-profit organisation working to provide technology access and digital skills training to our community. Thanks for joining us guys, thanks for letting us in, thanks. Let's start by having you explain what exactly PC Refurb does, and how does your organisation help improve digital access and skills?

Sam: 2:51

Yeah, we first started doing up computers that businesses didn't want anymore and refurbishing them and passing them out to people who needed them. Um and uh. On the back of that then we noticed a lot of people didn't know how to use tech, so we, um, get out and about uh, my projects are all around tameside, so hattersley and all sorts of other areas and we take people they can be at almost no level at all and show them how to do the sort of things you need to do to live nowadays get digital banking, talking to people, emailing all sorts of stuff right.

Mark: 3:35

Well, that sounds like tremendously impactful work, and can you share kind of some examples of the people and groups you serve and and how computer and internet access, coupled with the trainees, has helped improve the lives?

Sam: 3:49

yeah, no, that's great. Um, yeah. So your first thought usually when you think about tech is you think it's older folks who don't know this stuff. And there are lots of older folks who've never learnt it, but it's like people of all ages.

Sam: 4:05

So I meet quite a few people who say they've always worked on building sites and up till COVID they sort of just turned up at building site and the foreman said shift that muck. Yeah, you're hard worker, right, you're in in sight. And the foreman said shift that muck. Yeah, you're hard worker, right, you're in. And now they turn up at the gate and they say, well, all the jobs are online.

Sam: 4:21

And people's faces just fall because they've never used it. Or even younger people, if they've been to school and ended up, say, not finishing their school at the end or whatever, they might be able to go on their phone and do a tiktok video, but they haven't a clue how to fill in universal credit form or apply for a bank or anything like that that you kind of need in life. So I've come across quite a few people. One guy I had recently he'd been in prison for the last 10, 15 years and so he'd never really used computers in prison and he'd come out and the world's changed, hasn't it? And he did my training and he said I've changed his life. He said uh. He said I've got a digital bank account. He said I did a money transfer to my daughter last night. Um, I'm now emailing people.

Mark: 5:10

He said it's brilliant and it didn't take long to get there and to make a difference no and um, what I've found is especially there's like a fear of technology and people don't realise how simple interfaces are to use now and how things have been set up for the user. But that sounds like really rewarding work to me. So, on that, what interested you both personally, in this kind of work? Why? Why is it digital inclusion important to use?

Elyssia: 5:43

um, well, I've recently just joined the charity and I'm a digital skills tutor and I literally cannot go anywhere without my phone and I do everything on it.

Elyssia: 5:56

I have a laptop as well and my background is being social media marketing, so all I see is everything about being online. And it really interested me that people nowadays a lot of them still don't actually know some of the really basics of how to use a device and what's online and and I thought, and that really sad and not in like oh it's sad, but it's, it is. It's it's not fair that literally you cannot go about life now without being online, and I think everyone should have the opportunity to learn and to be involved with what's happening online and using all these devices. So that really struck with me on a personal level and I really wanted to help people because it seems so scary. I mean, I try and learn new skills and technology and things and it's rapidly changing and it is hard to keep up with. So I can't imagine what it's like for someone starting right from the start when everyone else seems so far ahead and how daunting that might be. So that's why I was really interested in becoming a digital skills tutor.

Mark: 7:12

Brilliant. Well, as you know, folks, we are live and I'm just going to go up to the window because I think we've got some builders outside the window and I'm just going to clear them off. So if you want to listen in for the giggles, can?

Sam: 7:26

you hear them? I couldn't hear them.

Elyssia: 7:29

No, I can't hear them. Hello, hello, can you go down?

Mark: 7:34

there somewhere. We'll just do it in the car. Yeah, the listeners are listening in. They can hear everything you're talking about. I don't know how appropriate it is Anti-vaping, Anti-vaping. Where I go for it is as they're having a cigarette.

Elyssia: 7:52

Anti-vaping, but they have cigarettes.

Mark: 7:56

Sorry about that, let's not. So, yeah, I agree with you. If we're getting back to that, I always think of of the older generation struggling, uh, with technology. Um, I think there should be more. I think the tech companies should be doing it, doing more uh.

Mark: 8:16

Personally, I don't want to get political and have a go it is political I don't want to be having to go out with capitalism, but I do kind of think that there is a responsibility of big tech taking on board some of this work or even funding initiatives like yourselves, because there's a massive need, particularly when everyone's talking about what's happened to the postmasters and how Fujitsu, you know how these big companies don't seem to be taking much responsibility for.

Sam: 8:51

It's government, isn't it? You know government can force companies to make a difference and when you're relying on like charity funding, everything's projects, isn't it? So you might come into somewhere like Hattersley, but you're only funded for 12 months, where if tech companies could put money into stuff like this, then you're not disappearing, are you? Because it's annoying for places where these people come and a project comes and goes, and I'm sure you feel like that with your project that you know you're always chasing the next bit of money and it's very frustrating when the work is out there and you know you can make a difference to people's lives and it takes a while for people to trust you and want to want to come and and use what, use the project you've got together. So by the time you've built up that trust and you've got some clients, you're almost at the end of it and it's a very irritating cycle the way this funding works.

Sam: 9:51

And, yeah, it would be brilliant if you know Vodafone or Microsoft or whatever sort of coughed up some of their profits rather than taking it to other countries.

Mark: 10:01

You know, I don't know if any of you could give us a bigger picture of how technology has transformed society and like we just have to look at film streaming. I mean video shops. I remember when you said you wouldn't get a vhs video shot from a video show and now it's all streaming, and the way young people listen to music and the way we are listening to music now is through a streaming service. It's transformed our lives so much, so I agree with you.

Sam: 10:33

My nephew was listening to the Beatles on Spotify the other week and it really struck my mum because she said when she was growing up in the 60s. She said no-one would have been listening to music from 60 years before. They wouldn't have been listening to some obscure jazz band, because you just listen to whatever was current. But it has. So you know, so far we've been kind of talking about the negatives of the technology, but there is so much opportunity for people like if, if they didn't get on at school once they're online, there's loads of free courses.

Sam: 11:08

You can go to Open University and there's loads of free stuff out there if you know where to look. People are scared of getting scammed and ripped off, but the chance of doing things and changing things and changing your own life and getting out of where you grew up If where you grew up, if you, where you grew up, didn't give you much opportunities getting online gives you the world and you can find people like you. So you know, if you're interested in some obscure bit of music, you, there'll be thousands of people you can connect with out there. So it it broadens people's horizons enormously, yeah, and I agree.

Mark: 11:44

I agree with you on the positive side of the work that you're doing and how liberating it is. I kind of see it as a To give an example is when I first passed my driving test and I got my first car. How liberating.

Elyssia: 12:04

Oh my God, so freeing.

Mark: 12:05

How liberating is that? And I liken it to that.

Sam: 12:10

Yeah.

Mark: 12:11

Is when you do open these doors to technology to people, it does give them access to lots and lots of things. I mean, you can go to university and pay a lot of money to go to university, but you can quite easily learn all that at home. You know, yeah, and you can learn. I learned on the weekend how to change a bulb on a Peugeot 207. Yeah, not only that, I also learned where to find the fuse for my electric windows on a Volkswagen Golf, because it was there, crazy. Someone had put this video up and it's showing you where the fuse box was, even how to get into the fuse box. All them things I would have had to pay for a mechanic to do. So you're right, there's loads of benefits from getting up to speed. So you're right, there's loads of benefits from getting up to speed.

Sam: 13:05

And it's like the banks used to be local, but they've all shut their branches, haven't they? So if you want to do banking or anything like that, if you're not online, it's massively, massively inconvenient.

Elyssia: 13:19

It was crazy. The other day I got a cheque through the post from a refund from uh, dvla and uh, I was like, oh my gosh, I don't, I don't know how to what to do with a check like it's not not something I'm used to, but now you can take a picture of it on your online banking app and it just automatically does that. I was like, oh my gosh, this was great, so I don't even have to go anywhere, it's automatically does that.

Mark: 13:46

I was like, oh my gosh this was great, so I don't even have to go anywhere. It's so easy. That happened to me. My son showed me that I didn't even know my phone app because I was going into Ashton to a bank to go and put this check in. And he was like why are you doing that? I'm like because that's what you've got to do. This is what you have to do with checks. What you can do, dad, is you can just take a picture and put it in on your phone. I'm like what?

Elyssia: 14:38

I know it's just like amazing.

Sam: 14:41

And I think that's the thing is that all of us who use technology, there was a point where we got our first smartphone, we got our first whatever, and it was often some you know our son or you know a nephew who knew what they were doing or whatever who sort of showed all of us the first time, and we can all remember what it felt like when we were sort of a bit confused by it and not quite getting it. And so it's not like if someone's out there and they haven't got these skills, there's something wrong with them. We've all been there on that and it doesn't actually take that much to get the basics. But also, it's still the case for all of us, even those who use it every day, that we do get frustrated by it. It keeps changing and we have to kind of keep on top of it.

Sam: 15:35

So, um, yeah, I think a lot of people feel a kind of shame that they haven't got this skill, but there's really no need for that because, um, they're just in the same boat as all of us. All of us were just not very long ago and, uh, and they, you know, anyone can pick it up. Um, I can often compare it to not being able to read, because if you can't read you really struggle in society. But learning to read is really hard. It takes years. It's like learning a musical instrument practice, practice, practice. Digital skills has as much impact as not being able to read. But when you've got it you're really good and it and it doesn't take that that much to get there.

Sam: 16:17

So it's uh yeah, you know that's, that's what's very satisfying about the job is you can see the changes in people's lives over a few weeks, that that you know that they can do something they never thought they'd be able to do so um, so tell us some after the after you finished at the food bank what, what else are you?

Sam: 16:35

doing what other things? Yeah, um, so we've been running a group for quite a while now at hatterley hub in the computer suite. Pc refurb put that computer suite in in the first place and, um, elissa is taking over being the tutor in that group and although it was four over 50s, there is some space in there for other people to come along who you know, get referred in and can come to that and then also at pop hide, so the cafe on the market. Um, I'm running a another group, again on a wednesday afternoon, um, that people will be able to come to and that will just be in the cafe there and people can come and learn. There's various others around tameside and by the time this podcast goes out, um, by going on the pc refurb website, you'll be able to find out the other groups that we have around and about Tameside. So if you know someone who lives in another bit of Tameside, there's bound to be something, because I'm setting them up all over.

Mark: 17:35

OK, then. So shifting the focus on to solutions, then how do you think we can build digital skills capacity in communities at risk of digital exclusion? I know the work that you're doing is doing that. I mean, what kind of training? What does training look like at the various ages and stages? Does that?

Sam: 18:00

Yeah. Yeah, I'm quite interested on Hattersley because we've got these two different models going here. So PC refurb tends to run groups that people can come to and we put them on a basic website called learn my way and it sort of teaches all about basics and people work through that and then we help them with whatever they're struggling with. But Sam Powers from Onward Homes, she's doing another thing where she's training up digital champions to go into groups that already happen on matters like and take equipment to them and show them in places where they are, and I think those two models are quite good. You know, like like a place someone can come to where they're surrounded by other people who are learning. That suits some people. And then people who can go out to where people already are and help them. That that helps other people and people who would perhaps feel a bit nervous about going into a group.

Mark: 18:58

Um, yeah, yeah, well, I think that sounds like a really good idea, because the people who are most likely not to have digital skills are people who are maybe not so confident about turning up and getting some training. I mean, you get some people who happily go on every course and learn everything, don't you? And then you've got other people at the other end. Is that they're not. They're not socially comfortable with me.

Elyssia: 19:24

Yeah, they're a bit more isolated maybe, and yeah, I think as well.

Sam: 19:29

People imagine a group's going to feel like school and they didn't like school often, yeah, um. So I often find that when people have met me or met alissa, they think, oh, they're all right, they're not you know, they're not a monster maybe, maybe I could go along. But but when, when they're just sort of imagining going to this group, they think, they think, oh, I'm gonna look like an idiot. I don't, I don't fancy it.

Sam: 19:53

But it's never, it's a class it's never like that and that's an important thing that we try to get over, that it's safe for people. You know people can come, they can make mistakes and it's no one's going to be putting them in the naughty corner with a duncey bat on no, it sounds great.

Mark: 20:11

It sounds great your project. I hope more and more people will get involved and I also think these things take time, working in communities and if you don't get it right, sometimes you feel like you're not getting it right. But these things take time, don't need to grow and evolve and they're quite organic. You know, like spreading word, amount, get word, getting about and stuff.

Sam: 20:37

So um, yeah, so one thing we've we've been doing here and we haven't managed to get very many people coming along, but we've been working with the food bank out of Hattersley because obviously people who are using the food bank often struggle with other things in life, and I've been training up some people from the food bank to be able to work with anyone who needs digital skills. So my team kind of don't need to be there because the people from the food bank can do it. So, um, it's so that's that's. Another aspect is it's like I'm saying, you know, getting people to work with groups where they are, but, um, yeah, it's, sometimes it feels frustrating because you have a good idea and you know people need the help, and then it's finding the people, and that's partly why we're at this podcast, because you know it's as many ways that people can find out about something.

Mark: 21:32

It's about like community capacity building, I suppose, because if you've left, if there's people there at the food bank now it's kind of a bit of your legacy really has been left there that they can train someone up. Yeah, they might have no-one one week and then all of a sudden they might have a few people, because people speak to each other, don't they, and say, oh well, I learnt that. Yeah, I've been down there, they're good.

Sam: 21:58

Yeah, and even if the weeks I've been coming I haven't found anyone that needs the help, those staff members have been trained up and if, like you, you say suddenly someone came along, even if I've stopped working with the food bank, they could get back in touch with me and go help. We've got these people now and come back and help us. Um, and it's and, and, so it's building capacity all around a community so that there's lots of people who can help people. And you know, know, know who to talk to.

Mark: 22:28

Right well, I think it's a fantastic project and I mean you've helped us. You've donated some iPads that we're going to use for young people who might not have iPads at all. For those who are listening who might want to get involved. They might want to donate a computer or something like that. What are some of the ways they can support your organization?

Sam: 22:52

yeah, we tend to find that, um, people's old computers are often that bit too old. By the time you know, individuals are finished with them. Most of the computers and stuff we get are from organizations. So if people work in a company, that's getting rid of 20 old laptops, because companies tend to only keep them for three or four years and then get new ones. When we get a chunk of stuff like that, that's really useful to us, because then what we do is we strip them back to nothing, put new windows on it and then we pass it out to charities, to individuals who are trying to turn their lives around, and it can make a big difference.

Sam: 23:35

Someone's trying to apply for a job. They don't have a laptop. We can provide them with a laptop and they can sort it out. And, like you say, with your project, we can provide iPads and iMacs and stuff that companies have got rid of and they're useless otherwise. You know the iPads we're giving you are very old but because you could take them out and about and record sound and record video and then use that in the music situation, you can actually make good use of something that otherwise would just go to the tip and that's fantastic.

Sam: 24:12

I think the other thing is, you know, if people want to be digital champions, if they want to help train other people, and you don't have to have, you don't have to, you know, be a computer whiz, you just have to be a kind person, you know, then they can get in touch with me at pc refurb and, uh, I can, you know, take, take them along to a group and help them, and it's very rewarding, like we've said already in this podcast. So, you know, people can be a digital champion and, uh, help other people, you know, bridge the digital divide, as we say oh, brilliant.

Mark: 24:48

Have you got any links? Have you got any emails? Are there any numbers you want to give out? I'll put them all in the in the podcast description for anyone who wants to.

Sam: 24:57

Yeah, the charity is pcrefurborguk, so by going on there people could see what we're about. And uh yeah, I'm samhardy at pcrefoorguk. If someone wants to email me.

Mark: 25:13

Okay, we'll leave them in the podcast description. And so, if you're a, maybe you're a company, maybe you're a business with a load of computers sat there not doing out, or maybe someone who wants to give it back back to the community and become one of these digital inclusion champions, get in touch with sam and they're doing great work. Um so, as we wrap up, have you any final thoughts on this, you on this issue as it relates to the community, in particular, anything about digital literacy?

Sam: 25:46

um, I think if you are listening to this and you haven't got these skills, or you know someone in your family who hasn't got these skills and you can see it affecting them, then just be either kind to yourself or kind to them and get in touch. Come along to something. It's quite easy, and you'll be amazed at how much you can learn and how quickly you can do it. Oh great.

Mark: 26:11

Well, let's put our hands together for Alyssa and Sam for coming into the show. Folks, Thank you.

Elyssia: 26:18

Thank you.

Mark: 26:20

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