Self-Positive IT Training is located in the Mill House hostel in Milton Road, Portsmouth. A group of clients have started producing a newspaper at the project and distribute this to other hostels and to any rough sleepers that they may know or meet. The newspaper carries an advertisement for the project and mechanisms are in place for rough sleepers to join a course. Many homeless people find it difficult to lead a structured and organised life, and the success of the project is in part due to the nature of the course structure.
Clients can start a course and just drop in whenever they want to work on the course material.
Clients can leave their studies and return weeks later to pick up from where they left off, or come every day and complete a course in 'record time'. Clients are given an Email address and so even if they move on for a time, the project can still keep in touch with them so long as they are able to access their Email - at a public library for example. The system seems to suit the needs of the client group and their success bears this out. Two of those Clients went on to full time emplyment and a place of their own to live, and one other is due to enter full time education on a computer course. By November 2000, almost 150 have accessed the project with over 80 having passed a course and 7 finding full time employment.