Background
The Refugees Online intensive short training course was developed by UNHCR during the Spring of 2000.  The course offered free training in website production and online journalism to refugees and asylum seekers in the UK who have experience of writing professionally.

The aim was that skills learnt during the course will enable the trainees and their organisations to communicate with and build links between refugee communities in the UK.

Four courses were held in London during 2000, funded by the European Commission as part of the Refugee Integration Project.  The courses were taught by professionals who are experienced in website production and online journalism.  The trainees were taught to use Microsoft FrontPage.  Overall, around thirty refugees took part in the training.  There was also a one-day seminar and an end of course event.

This site was set up as a result of the project, to dissemminate students' work, to create links between refugee organisations across the country and to provide information for anyone wanting to do similar training courses.
 
Acknowledgements
The project would like to thank the following organisations for support during training courses:

• the Commonwealth Broadcasting Association for use of their London office and computer facilities for two of the courses
• The Reuters Foundation for use of their London training centre for two of the courses
• Guardian Unlimited for hosting visits for some of the trainees
• Microsoft Giving for donation of FrontPage 2000 software

This site now
No further courses are planned at the moment. However, the training model is available from this site for anyone to use.  You can also find links to other useful sites and projects.