Calor Village of the Year Competition

Oake entered the Calor Village of the Year Competition 2004 and finished up winning the Information and Communication Technology category in the South West and Western England region beating villages from Cornwall to Herefordshire.

Somerset ICT Award

In September 2004 Oake won the Information Technology section of the Somerset Calor Village of the Year Competition.   The results were announced on 7 September at the AGM of the Community Council for Somerset at Burrowbridge Village Hall and representatives were presented with a certificate and cheque for £100.

In a written report on Oake the Somerset judges comments included ‘In terms of IT, what more can be said other than EXCELLENT in terms of accessibility, training and the overall quality of the facility’.  

Regional ICT Award for Oake

Having won the Somerset ICT Award, Oake was nominated by the Community Council for Somerset to take part in the national competition.

Two representative from Oake attended the national award ceremony on 7 December at the Millennium Mayfair Hotel, London .   The guest of honour, Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall (TV personality and farmer-chef), announced the results of the competition.   Prizes were awarded to villages in every region that excelled in various ways.    Oake received a framed certificate and £500 prize money.   The overall national winner for ICT was Bembridge on the Isle of Wight and the national Village of the Year for 2004 is St Neot in Cornwall .

The ICT section of the competition was judged by UKVillages.co.uk and a judge commented: “This was a strong region with many very well thought out entries all of which show the massive value that can be gained from creative use of ICT within the wider community; however Oake was the clear winner. This tiny community is an inspiration to others, showing common sense and structure as well as tremendous determination and imagination in its approach to the provision of ICT locally. Through access to funding, using local volunteers, piloting projects and learning from them Oake now has an outstanding example of an ICT project, offering local training courses in a bespoke environment. The entry demonstrates the social benefits of the village’s ICT projects, which have engaged the community in consultation both on and offline, and, as a consequence, the village has created a superb website which only cost £200 to set up. This was a wonderful entry and Oake is a very deserved winner of the Calor Village of the Year ICT award in this region.”