Weeknotes #48
In the last two weeks we got together as a team in Birmingham for an away day, longlisted the Digital Culture Awards entries, and two new jobs are open for application. Join us!
Top 5 tracks 2024
Every year for my birthday (except for 2022 when I forgot) I ask the team to send me five songs they’ve listened to a lot over the past year. They could be old songs they love, or new ones for 2024.
Listen to the 2024 playlist here (also 2021 and 2023 if you’re curious).
I love seeing the range of music tastes we have in the team (it’s a right mixed bag!) and hearing new music I wouldn’t normally find.
Digital Culture Awards
I had the privilege of chairing the Using Data category for the Digital Culture Awards. The panel consisted of Carl Stevens (Arts Council England), Adam Sykes (Digital Culture Network), and the fabulous Katy Raines (Indigo Ltd).
We really enjoyed longlisting the category. There were so many brilliant examples of how data is being used across the sector in lots of different ways. We whittled the entries down to the following longlist:
Corali Dance Company – Corali’s Peer Research into Gathering Feedback from Learning Disabled Audiences
Cumbria Museum Consortium – Helping Hands – Inclusive Volunteering Data Dashboard
Dorset Museum & Art Gallery – Dorset Museum & Art Gallery’s digital marketing strategy
Foundling Museum – Foundling Museum’s Ticketing Transformation
Hall for Cornwall – Using Net Promoter Score to drive meaningful change at Hall for Cornwall
Kerry Lemon Ltd – Mrs Roe
Noise Solution CIC – Beats and Stories: Demonstrating and improving outcomes
Octagon Theatre – Octagon Theatre’s data-driven learning cycle approach to campaigns
Royal Shakespeare Company – The Groundlings
Suffolk Libraries – Discover More – a wellbeing tool
The Barber Institute of Fine Arts – A Responsive Museum
York Unlocked – York Unlocked – Event App
The shortlist will be announced in early February anlong with more details about the projects.
Special mention to Ewelina Gomola (Project Manager) for organising such a streamlined scoring process and panel get together. It made the whole thing a pleasure to be part of.
If you’re interested in the longlists for the other categories, check out the awards section of the Digital Culture Network website.
Digital Culture Network Away Day
On the second day in Birmingham we kicked off the day with a practical activity organised by Katherine Brown (eCommerce Tech Champion). As well as a Tech Champion, Katherine is a practicing artist and it was great to dive into her creative world.
Starting the day in a creative way
Katherine provided a mix of charcoals, pens and pencils to make a mark and gave gentle directions and suggestions as we responded to the different seasons through a year. It was a really nice way to start the day, learn more about each other and be creative.
The rest of the day was all about the Digital Culture Network programme, exploring how it’s going and what we can do next.
Job vacancies
We’ve got two jobs out at the moment - this is your chance to join the wonderful Digital Culture Network team.
Accessibility Tech Champion
Firstly, the brilliant Roberta Beattie is moving full-time into the All in team so we’re in need of a new Accessibility Tech Champion. I’m sad I won’t get to see Berite every week anymore, but pleased she’s still with Arts Council England and doing a really important thing. They’re lucky to have her!
About the Accessibility Tech Champion role:
Locations: Hybrid working from any Arts Council England office outside London: so Birmingham, Brighton, Bristol, Cambridge, Leeds, Manchester, Newcastle, or Nottingham.
Salary: £36,987
Contract: Initial fixed-term contract until March 2026, with the possibility of extension.
Hours: Part-time (17.5 hours/week)
Application deadline: 9am, Friday 10 January 2025
If you’re passionate about accessibility, assistive technologies, and creating inclusive digital solutions, this could be the role for you!
To apply for the role you need to email Neil Rogers at RedCat Digital. He’s a right character, but has a great track record of finding excellent potential Tech Champions.
Communications Officer
Next, a brand new role - Communications Officer. This is a role across two amazing programmes, the Bloomberg Digital Accelerator Program and the Digital Culture Network. I’m really excited we’ll have a dedicated role in the team to share all the great stuff we’re getting up to.
About the Communications Officer role:
Locations: Hybrid working from Manchester or Leeds Arts Council England offices
Salary: £32,163
Contract: Initial fixed-term 2 year contract, with the possibility of extension.
Hours: Full-time (35 hours/week)
Application deadline: 9am, Monday 16 December 2024
Read the full job description and apply
The last few days have been a complete wipeout for me as I’ve been ill, apparently not COVID according to the tests, but certainly feels like it.
That’s knocked a few things off schedule but I’m hoping to get back up and running as soon as possible. Recording for episode 2 of the Digital Culture Podcast has been recheduled until the end of this week - chatting with the fantastic Ollie Couling (Digital Marketing Tech Champion).