A call for volunteers from the IT sector

CODEIT UK - An innovative technology charity to help employment recovery in the UK following the Coronavirus pandemic

The pandemic:

This year, 2020, has seen the coronavirus pandemic turn our social and economic worlds upside down.

New words and phrases have entered our vocabulary, furlough, social distancing, and PPE just to name a few.

Sadly, many people have lost their lives or loved ones.

The impact of the pandemic and the subsequent lockdown has led to unprecedented numbers of job losses and closing of businesses and companies. For millions of households, this means uncertainty and strains on day to day living, and for hundreds of thousands, to a devastating extent. Remember, this is not about ‘numbers’ – this is about lives turned upside down and the economic impacts on so many children, parents, elderly and the young.

Road to recovery:

As the pandemic starts to recede and the country starts to recover, many people of all ages, experience and backgrounds may need help to secure their next role or change of career in the economic landscape of a world that will never be the same as it was before the pandemic. Although central and local governments are investing hundreds of billions of pounds into the economy, the government alone cannot handle the overall challenge, without a mobilisation of volunteers. Millions of people will need direct help and support to find their new jobs. While hundreds of thousands of citizens are volunteering for NHS and associated charities around healthcare and logistics, we need similar campaigns to help people acquire new skills or sharpen existing ones to recover from their job losses, too.

CODEIT UK:

A group of people with a variety of IT backgrounds and skillsets are forming an eLearning and mentoring volunteer charity, CODEIT UK, to help people gain skills and employment in the information technology sector. They are volunteering their time and skills to develop and deliver online and short courses, mentoring services, small group guided workshops on real-life projects, curriculum vitae services, job search and interview techniques. Coaching and mentoring for aspiring and current IT Entrepreneurs will also be offered. Our volunteers want to share their most valuable and influential assets: knowledge, experience, and quality time.

CODEIT UK is currently in progress to be established as a fully-fledged, nation-wide charity organisation, with a proposed initial offering to be released by October 2020, and a scalable growth kick off in March 2021.

But to get there, CODEIT UK needs more volunteers.

Can you help? Yes!

If can spare a few hours a week and you have technical or non-technical skills around Information Technologies for online or remote training and mentoring, on technical subjects or on curriculum vitae creation and review, job search and interview techniques, then do please consider volunteering to help people get back into employment, with a new or enhanced set of skills. Perhaps, you could devote a portion of your time saved by not having to commute.

Alongside information technology skills like Software Development, DevOps Engineering, Software Quality Assurance, Cybersecurity, CODEIT UK also needs volunteers in support areas such as marketing and communications, ethics and audit, public and corporate relations, legal and compliance, entrepreneurship, job search and career coaching. Some of these skills and time are needed for the charitable operations of CODEIT UK.

Remember, we are not asking for your money, just a few hours of your time a week and to share your skills to help others. Individually a few hours a week might seem a drop in the ocean, but as more volunteers join, together we will make a difference to people’s lives and their families.

To find out more and how you can help, please contact CODEIT UK in any of these ways:

• Email: volunteer@codeit.org.uk  
• Website: https://codeit.org.uk/ 
• Telephone: 020 7060 4065