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BBC STUDIOS PRODUCES ROYAL TOUCH-SCREEN QUIZ GAME
TO RAISE AWARENESS OF 'CARES' EMPLOYEE VOLUNTEERING SCHEME
24 January 2003:The Special Projects department of BBC
Studios has designed and built a bespoke touch-screen quiz game machine
for the first national convention celebrating the work of 'Cares',
the BITC employee volunteering initiative. HRH The Prince of Wales, President
of Business in the Community (BITC), will take part in the event at the
Walkers' Stadium in Leicester on Friday 24th January and will call
on employers, including the BBC, to 'raise the bar' and encourage
the participating companies to have 25% of their workforce engaged in
their communities.
HRH The Prince of Wales is expected to take part in
the touch-screen quiz game machine, which is designed to provide a fun
and original way of polling people on their views on the volunteer programme.
The questions are combined in to a general knowledge quiz hosted on the
giant wide-screen. Dave Mansfield, Supervisory Engineer, BBC Studios who
has created touch-screen systems for studio-based programmes 'The
War Report' , 'Dog Eat Dog' and 'All or Nothing',
was responsible for designing and producing the game.
The contribution of the touch-screen quiz game machine
is part of a larger BBC-wide initiative organised by the BBC's Corporate
Social Responsibility Centre to encourage and support employees'
volunteer work in the community. Sample research suggests 15-20% of BBC
staff are currently involved in programmes in their communities. Business
in the Community is now raising the benchmark to 25% and 'Cares'
is just one of the initiatives that can help the BBC to achieve the standard.
Yogesh Chauhan, Community Affairs Manager, BBC comments:
"The work that Dave Mansfield has done in creating the touch-screen
quiz game is just one example of how BBC employees can get involved in
charities and work in the community. There is much more that all employees
can do on the ground from skills training in radio and TV to clearing
a garden and painting a community centre. Initiatives like 'Cares'
already make it simple for businesses to get involved in volunteering.
We would like to meet the challenge to increase the number of volunteers
and make an even greater difference in our communities."
- ENDS-
About Business in the Community
1. Business in the Community was established
in 1982. It is a unique movement in the UK of 700 member companies. Its
purpose is to inspire, challenge, engage and support business in continually
improving its positive impact on society. Business in the Community works
globally through its partnership with the International Business Leaders
Forum. It works across the European Union as a partner of CSR Europe and
as the co-ordinator of the Cecile Network. Together, member companies
employ over 15.7 million people in over 200 countries worldwide. In the
UK its members employ over 1 in 5 of the private sector workforce. Further
information about Business in the Community can be found at the website
www.bitc.org.uk.
2. 'Cares'
is the Business in the Community initiative aiming to change the face
of volunteering across the UK. It has adopted a new approach linking the
private sector, community organisations, the public and government to
participate in effective community action.
- Established in 21 locations, plus those under development
- Over 350 businesses engaged
- 34,927 volunteers active over the last twelve months
- Over 100,000 hours given to the community in twelve
months
- Over 300 community organisations have participated
- Examples of Action days: July 2002 – Cares cares
4 the Environment, October 2002 – MAD4IT
3. National Action Day June
2003: why get involved?
Disabled people are 6 times more likely than non-disabled people to be
out of work and claiming benefits.
7 in 10 economically active disabled people of working age will have become
disabled during their working life.(Taken from the National Statistics,2002)
4. Cares Online is
a new extranet system designed to achieve three targets: to create ease
of access to volunteering opportunities; allow speedier administration
of local Cares partnerships, so enabling staff to have more time developing
operations; and thirdly, to develop a standard form of reporting on the
activities at local, regional and national levels as well as reporting
to companies on their activity levels.
The calendar is coded and people will not be able to volunteer automatically
for an opportunity if training or a criminal record check is required.
The system has been developed to be friendly for visually disabled people
with only a certain number of drop down menus being incorporated.
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