Oct 12
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Ground-breaking course helps women to campaign against social injustice

By | General, News, Newsroom

A ground-breaking course is giving women the confidence to take on the authorities and fight for the rights of disadvantaged people.

The Community Campaigners Course run by the Women’s Resource and Development Agency (WRDA) offers free online training to women to provide them with the tools to campaign for better services for their communities.

Women’s rights campaigner Kellie Turtle who devised the course said: “”I’ve met so many women with issues they care about and they just need a basic toolkit of ideas, strategies and tips to really make a difference. We’re looking for people who are ready to be part of a community of people creating positive change.”

Orla Fitzsimons who runs the Parents for Action CIC social enterprise and Independent Family Advocacy Service for parent carers, has benefited from the course and urged fellow activists to take part in the online sessions to make sure their voices are heard.

As a result of attending the course Ms Fitzsimons is launching the Parent Pride campaign to challenge the Education Authority and address the failings in special educational needs systems, identified in the NI Commissioner for Children and Young People’s Report ‘Too Little Too Late’, published in April 2020. This included a failure to help children with special needs return to their special and mainstream schools safely, following lockdown

She added: “The campaign we are launching to highlight this failure would not be happening without this course. Children with special needs were sent back to school without medical or mental health assessments. We were given no advice on how to integrate them back to school safely and many like my son couldn’t tolerate it and are now back at home.”

The course, which consists of four half day sessions, covers critical thinking, communication skills, strategic planning and how to use human rights and equality law to strengthen a campaign. They will start on Zoom in October, November and December.

Deirdre Quinn, the WRDA course co-ordinator, said the aim of the Belfast City Council-funded course was to get more women into leadership roles in their local communities.

She said: “There are many women who are passionate about issues and wish to become activists to improve the quality of life in their areas but need the confidence and practical skills to get the powers-that-be to sit up and take notice. Because of Covid-19 we have had to move our training online, but this means we will be able to reach more of those determined women.”

Participants do not need prior education or training, just an interest in developing their campaigning skills for the good of the community. Anyone wishing to take part must be from the Belfast City Council area. Those successfully taking part will acquire a Level Three Open College Network (OCN) NI in Community Campaigning and Lobbying.

WRDA Director Anne McVicker said: “This course is all about empowering women to get resources at a local community level. They are often best placed to identify the needs of their community in all sorts of areas such as perinatal mental health care, helping elderly people suffering from isolation and support for carers looking after family members with dementia.”

If you wish to take part, send a paragraph explaining why you are interested to deirdre.quinn@wrda.net

Sep 28
0

NI company invests to supply more Personal Protective Equipment

By | Business, Corporate, News, Newsroom

A Northern Ireland based healthcare company has increased capacity to provide more personal protective equipment (PPE) to healthcare professionals, organisations and individual members of the public throughout Ireland and the UK.

NI-PPE.com has employed more staff and increased its warehouse and office space in response to extra demand for contactless thermometers, face coverings, masks, gloves, aprons, goggles, face visors and hand sanitiser.

The company, a division of HealthCare Essentials Ltd based at Ards Business Hub in Newtownards, has created a high specification Web shop to enable fast dispatch with click and collect services to ensure vital PPE reaches organisations and individuals in time.

Mark Dinsmore MD of HealthCare Essentials Ltd, said: “The Covid-19 Pandemic has stretched global supply chains of PPE like never before. The previous supply chain model has been exposed and people now realise the importance of local hubs and supplies of PPE.”

“As a company we have adopted to the growth in demand for Personal Protective Equipment by investing to increase our capacity. We have seen a marked growth in demand from local businesses and education sectors as well as our long-standing healthcare clients.”

Mr Dinsmore added: “Our team are working to ensure local organisations and individuals have the right PPE equipment to mitigate risk as the economy starts to reopen for business.”

Parent company HealthCare Essentials Ltd has been providing medical & surgical equipment, RPE products plus services and PPE to the healthcare industry from its base at Ards Business Hub for the past 12 years.

Ards Business Hub Chief Executive Nichola Lockhart said: “NI-PPE.com is an innovative company that is adapting quickly to new circumstances to provide an online retail platform to provide vital equipment to help fight the Covid-19 crisis. We have been delighted to provide whatever service we can including offering extra office space to enable them to increase their sales.”

For more information go to: www.ni-ppe.com

Sep 28
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From Hollywood to Dollywood: Belfast film composer shares life in screen industry with next generation

By | Business, Creative Industries, Film

He’s worked with Dolly Parton, wrote music for Oscar-winning movie The Shape of Water, but Belfast film composer Mark Gordon’s career in the screen industry happened purely by chance and now he wants to share what he’s learned with the next generation.

Mark is one of 15 leading screen industry professionals offering free online specialist training for young people through the ScreenWorks platform funded by NI Screen and run by education charity Into Film.

While at university in the 1990’s Mark played in indie bands and even supported Ash at Maysfield Leisure Centre until fortune sent him spinning off in a different direction.

“I was playing in some local bands and luckily some of the music I had co-written ended up in a couple of big TV shows, Malcolm in the Middle and Sesame Street. I had a friend working with a local media company and sent some music to them and it went from there,” he said.

He describes how he was in LA doing some co-writing when he got the opportunity to pitch a song for Guillermo Del Toro’s new film, The Shape of Water, which won the Best Film Oscar in 2018.

“It was a background piece of music in a scene set in a mall and they were looking for some 1950’s advertisement music. The music supervisor couldn’t find pieces from that period, so we made up a jingle for a pretend brand called Monty’s Moustache Wax, wrote a full lyric performed by a Barbershop Quartet and mixed it using vintage recording equipment to get an authentic sound. It was a great opportunity,” he said.

His chance to work with Dolly Parton occurred while he was providing the music for popular children’s animated series, Lily’s Driftwood Bay on Nickelodeon. The country music legend was guest-starring as Noleen the Country and Western chicken, so Mark wrote four songs for her and recorded them in her studio at Dollywood in Tennessee.

“It was unbelievably nerve wracking at the time. I was with my colleague Colin Williams, the creator and producer of the show she was guesting on. The main thing her manager said was that she had listened to the demos, would be well prepared and would get it right. He added that what she wanted from us was strong direction and not to be overawed. I sat down with an acoustic guitar and played the songs to her and we recorded them. It was an amazing experience,” he added.

Mark, who runs the company Score Draw Music, is one of 15 leading professionals providing expert tuition for ScreenWorks Online, a series of web-based videos

offering training to young people interested in the screen industry. The programme, which is funded by the Department of Communities through Northern Ireland Screen and delivered by education charity Into Film offers those aged 14-19 an opportunity to learn more about careers in the sector.

He has recorded a special 35 minute video for ScreenWorks online, talking about his role and career to give students an insight into Music Composition as a career. In addition, he has set a number of exercises for students to complete at home to give them  first-hand experience at creating an original composition to accompany a film scene.

“Organisations like Into Film are very effective in giving pathways and opportunities to young people. These are opportunities that people in the rest of the UK would struggle to access,” he added.

ScreenWorks Online is being hosted on Into Film’s new learning platform at www.intofilm.org/screenworksonline As well as offering 15 expert tutorials exploring different screen careers it has a separate “Careers corner” which looks at CV writing and set etiquette.

ScreenWorks co-ordinator Sean Boyle said the aim was to encourage teachers and young people to use the programme in the classroom and at home.

“ScreenWorks Online is available to all young people aged 14-19 keen to learn about the exciting career opportunities here in Northern Ireland. We would encourage them to watch the videos and participate in the tasks to find out more about this fun and fast-moving sector.”

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Sep 28
0

Freshers offered vital advice on sexual harassment

By | General, News, Newsroom

Queen’s University freshers are being urged to join an online workshop and discussion about sexual harassment as they begin their first year at the college.

The Raise Your Voice project, run by a consortium of Northern Ireland’s leading women’s groups, is hosting a ‘Let’s Talk About Sexual Harassment’ event for first year students.

Roisin Muirhead, QUB Equality and Diversity Officer, said it was important to use online discussions to get the message out about sexual violence and misogyny at a time when face to face meetings have been severely curtailed.

She added: “Experiences of sexual harassment in all its forms can be extremely damaging and there are many barriers to students seeking support, whether it be a fear of stigma or simply not knowing how to report the incident. It is a pervasive and complex issue to tackle, but there is a growing student movement challenging the lack of understanding surrounding sexual consent. That is why we are working with Raise Your Voice to increase awareness on the issues of sexual violence and harassment.”

Helen Crickard from Raise Your Voice said: “The QUB workshop will be interactive, engaging and will provide an understanding of the devastating impact of sexual harassment. We want to explain that even the smallest incident can have life-changing consequences, it is not just about sexual violence and rape.”

A comprehensive student survey carried out last year laid bare the extent of sexual harassment in Northern Ireland’s third level education institutions with one in three students revealing they had experienced unwanted sexual behavior during their time at university or college. The NUS-USI kNOwMORE report, which received feedback from 2,200 students across Northern Ireland, called for improved Relationships and Sex (RSE) training in secondary schools and for additional support for victims and survivors of sexual assault.

Raise Your Voice is also hosting free workshops open to all members of the public, not just students, on Sexual Harassment on September 22 and on Consent on September 24, both from 7-8.30pm. A further eight online workshops will take place in October and November.

To sign up for the Sexual Harassment workshop go to: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/lets-talk-about-sexual-harassment-tickets-120210100647

and for the Consent workshop go to: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/want-to-know-more-about-consent-tickets-120240082323

Raise Your Voice tackles sexual harassment and violence across Northern Ireland by working in the community, increasing public awareness, educating organisations on best practice and lobbying for legislative advances.

The project is run by women’s groups including the Women’s Support Network, the Women’s Research and Development Agency, Reclaim the Agenda and the NI Women’s Rural Network and supported by LGBT groups such as Carafriend, Transgender NI and Here NI.

It is funded by Rosa UK Fund for Women & Girls under their Justice & Equality Fund and Times Up UK. For more information go to: www.raiseyourvoice.community

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