Amanda - recently redundant 
Amanda’s friends had always said that she was a good photographer and she enjoyed it, too.When she was made redundant she used her settlement to buy a digital camera, laptop and printer.This was the perfect time to take the plunge and start a new career. Taking the photos was no problem, but Amanda needed some help in learning how to download, edit and print them. After a couple of Laptop Learning sessions, Amanda’s career is set to fly high. 

Sylvine – an Intermediate IT user – age 30 
Sylvine has just started a new job in a retail food outlet. She is responsible for tracking safety dates on all elements of the food served. Each individual item has a ‘use by’ date so an item made from several ingredients (like a pastry) has its ‘sell by’ date calculated upon the individual items. 
Sylvine asked Laptop Learning for help in updating her Excel skills. Within three 1½ hour sessions she was creating complex spreadsheets and working with advanced formulae. She then wanted to work on one or two word-processing skills, and we are currently working on linking her tables to the spreadsheets.

Peter – now an advanced user – age 58 
Peter began with four lessons and now has a lesson every month to improve his IT skills. He uses most of the Microsoft Office suite, particularly for the production of flyers, leaflets and accounting spreadsheets. He has taken his skills to a very high level, and is learning every aspect of Excel and Word, together with much of Outlook and Publisher. He is also now beginning to use PhotoShop and other software.

A ‘hesitant’ teenager – age 13 
Luke hated IT at school, and his parents were worried that he would be left behind. After a couple of one-to-one sessions it became obvious that he was embarrassed because he thought his peers knew more than him. To hide his discomfort he pretended not to enjoy IT. Luke worked with Laptop Learning on creating interesting slide shows in PowerPoint. Soon he had created a 50-slide presentation to advertise his parent’s business. Luke then designed the website for his family’s business and is an enthusiastic high-flyer in class. He is also writing his first book!

Helen – a complete beginner - age 84 

Helen came for her first four lessons with Laptop Learning in 2007. She then bought a new laptop and was quickly able to email her family abroad, and send and receive pictures and other attachments. Today she is writing her late husband’s memoirs and also delving into her family history. From time to time Helen contacts Laptop Learning to refresh her skills. Her latest project has been to book air tickets to visit the family for Christmas.