Forum Diary - Updates, Rumours and General Comment

Monday 1st September 2003

Well, the summer programme (below) is now finished .. we hope those of you who came along enjoyed yourselves. We will shortly be starting the Autumn programme, the first event will be the enrollment for the Repair and maintenance course which will start on Thursday 11th September at Gorton North. The Enrollment is on Monday 8th September. Look out for the leaflet which will be inside the latest issue of Gorton News - out now! Also coming on 9th September is enrollment for the Photoshop course to be held at Gorton South commencing on Monday 15th September. Both these courses last for six weeks and take up two days per week. If you are interested contact Sadek (Gorton North on 231 7870) or Robin (Gorton South 223 9262
If you are unemployed or unwaged (there is a difference....) these courses are free of charge.

The much awaited colour Newsletter, chock full of Gorton news and events is now with us for distribution. Unfortunately, due to technical difficulties, we are having trouble geting it onto this site, but we will have the problem cracked very soon - again keep watching this space... and don't forget you can pick up a printed copy at the following places (among others).
Gorton Library, The Doctor's Surgery on Garratt Way, The Council Offices and the Vale Cottage.
Well, That's all for now, more soon, so keep visiting...

Tuesday 12th August 2003

Tempus has again, it seems, been fugiting and it is three months since the last update, so I thought it would be a good idea to do a bit of spring cleaning. So it is then that this page has been cleared down and the old stuff consigned to The Complete Forum Diaries. Please take the time to have a look through it, I have left it all unchanged, so it stands as a thread of the history of the site and what's been happening in Gorton of late.

But what, you may well ask is happening now? Well, as promised we now have both UK Online centres up and running, Gorton South has a very fast internet feed courtesy of Businessserve and Manchester Metronet. Metronet is a high speed broadband initiative exclusive to the Manchester area designed to bring access to places with which BT can't be bothered and NTL can't afford to go. Currently, the UK Online centres are running the Summer programme, a distillation of which appears below.

GORTON ONLINE SUMMER PROGRAMME

DAY & DATE	MORNING 10 - 1	AFTERNOON 1 - 4
GORTON NORTH	HIGHMEAD STREET M18 8PE	0161 231 7870
Wednesday 13th August	Introduction to the Internet	Drop In
Thursday 14th August	First Aid Online	Drop In
Friday 15th August	Gain Self Confidence Online	Drop In
Monday 18th August	ECDL	ECDL
Tuesday 19th August	Introduction to the Internet	Drop In
Wednesday 20th August	Introduction to the Internet	Drop In
Thursday 21st August	Gardening Online	Drop In
Friday 22nd August	Drop In	Drop In
Tuesday 26th August	Driving Theory	Drop In
Wednesday 27th August	Word Processing Taster Session	Help Your Child with Computers
Thursday 28th August	Introduction to the Internet and e-mail	Drop In
Friday 29th August	Photoshop Taster Session	Drop In
GORTON SOUTH	28a Sutton Road M18 7PN	0161 223 9262
Thursday 14th August	Drop In	CLAIT
Friday 15th August	Getting to know your Computer	Getting to know your Computer
Monday 18th August	Getting to know your Computer	Getting to know your Computer
Tuesday 19th August	Drop In	Theme Based Courses
Wednesday 20th August	Drop In	Driving Theory
Thursday 21st August	Drop In	CLAIT
Friday 22nd August	Getting to know your Computer	Getting to know your Computer
Tuesday 26th August	Word Processing taster session	Drop In
Wednesday 27th August	Drop In	Helping Kids with Computers
Thursday 28th August	Drop In	CLAIT
Friday 29th August	Getting to know your Computer	Getting to know your Computer

Basic three hour courses at Gorton Online centres are usually free, advanced and long courses (Clait, ECDL etc.) are free to people in receipt of benefits. Drop in access is free to all as is access to the Internet (subject to terms and conditions). Learndirect will be available from September 2003.

The centres are open between 9.30am and 5.00pm daily. If you have any queries please ring one of the numbers above and our staff will be happy to help.

Unfortunately owing to staffing and other constraints, we cannot extend our facilities to persons below the age of 18 years at this time.

It goes without saying that getting the UK online centres up and running has been a great achievement for Gorton Forum, and the project has had a lot of support from a lot of people along the way both inside and outside Gorton. Which makes it such a shame that some of the people who we thought might be most supportive have been relatively silent - indeed outside of official openings it is difficult to name an instance when one of the Gorton Councillors has set foot in either centre, let alone lent the kind of vocal support that we see from elected representatives from areas where there are similar projects. Shame on them.. Perhaps if we add a few butterflies?

If you get really bored and want to know what we've been up to over the past 3 years or so, you can access the Archive pages from here The Complete Forum Diaries