The Community NI website passed its first annual milestone last month; the first birthday for the site was marked by the release of the highest readership figures in the site’s history and the release of two new key technologies designed to add functionality to the resource.

The site has shown steady and consistent growth since its inception; it now spans several thousand articles, hosts a searchable database of sector organisations and serves as a key resource for organisations wishing to advertise situations vacant, events and key news items.

On average, seventy articles are submitted to the site per week for inclusion; the system developed for the resource allows organisations to submit their own basic articles, which can then be developed or edited by a dedicated Web Editor; the site contains ‘feeds’, designed to thematically link articles to relevant news items or previously submitted articles to the site.

Whilst previously, websites were used by organisations to simply advertise events or release information to the sector, the vision for Community NI is much wider; the inclusion of mapping functions on the site allows an end user from outside the sector to locate organisations geographically, and to plot the existence of sectoral groups; a user can locate the best support group or volunteering opportunity, just by searching through the innovative ‘SectorNet’ feature of the site for keywords or organisation name.

We want your input!

The site aims to be a community resource, with input from the whole sector. Your organisation can submit news, information, events and opinion pieces for the site for consideration, by registering for the site and using the links to submit news, or to submit an event. Please do!

Contacts: Ben Archibald, Web Editor