Students from London College of Communication provided free website design, build and publishing for 12 local charities through Talent Works.
As part of LCC’s dedication to learning by doing and our commitment to supporting our local community, 12 undergraduate students from 7 courses across the Design School were matched with local charities who each had a website created for them at no cost.
Thanks to funding from the Wakefield and Tetley Foundation the work was free to the charities, with LCC additionally granting a training bursary to each of the students who took part.
Students from BA (Hons) Design for Art Direction, BA (Hons) Graphic and Media Design, BA (Hons) Graphic Branding & Identity, BA (Hons) Design Management and Cultures, BA (Hons) Information & Interface Design, and BA (Hons) Illustration & Visual Media took part, starting the training before they began their second year.
Website design for Silverfit by Valentina Stanhartinger, BA (Hons) Graphic Branding & Identity student.
The students were trained in user experience design, technical skills and client management, with these skills immediately put to use create websites for a range of local charities – including charities who help women, older people, immigrants to the UK, long-term unemployed people and the Latin American community in London.
Many of the charities had no website or a site that was no longer suitable for their needs. By applying user experience design techniques LCC students were able to make significant improvements.
A representative from Aaina Women’s Group said: “The designer did a great job. She designed the website and gave us full training on how to use it”.
Southwark Everywoman’s Centre added: “We are happy with the new site and feel it is a big improvement as compared to the old site – visually it looks much better and cleaner and the navigation is easier.”
Website design for Carnaval Del Pueblo by Monika Adamczyk, BA (Hons) Graphic & Media Design.
The impact on the student designers was also significant, with all 12 reporting that the project had increased their confidence dealing with clients as well as giving them technical skills to design more websites in the future.
Matt Guy, who works in LCC’s Business & Innovation team, said: “Talent Works is a fantastic project that allows us to combine our commitment to support key local charities with delivering interesting and beneficial live projects for our students.
“Students gain real life experience of working with clients, which prepares them to become the future generation of the creative industries once they graduate from LCC.”
The full list of the charities involved include: Aaina Women’s Group, Burgess Sports, Carnaval Del Pueblo, Draper Estate TRA, English for Action, Menders Club, Southwark Everywoman’s Centre, Silverfit, South Bermondsey Big Local, Southwark Pensioner’s Centre, The O.B.C.,
Toucan Employment.
LCC’s Business and Innovation Team are running another phase of Talent Works in 2018. Second year students are encouraged to apply, and we’re looking for social enterprises in South London to be the clients. Contact Matt Guy (matt.guy@lcc.arts.ac.uk) for more information.
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