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Local Web Site for Young People

STRANRAER Academy pupils have discovered the Natural Place to Surf with a new web site set to be launched on Monday.

The site is an innovative link-up with the Small Towns Initative's page on the net.

All of the content, including news, events, games and chat, has been devised by pupils at the school for youngsters from throughout the area.

STI manager Billy Mitchell told the 'Free Press' this week "I was aware that the content on our site, after talking to young people, was not really what they wanted to see.

"We met up with a group of pupils at the Academy and came to an agreement that if they provided all of the content on an on-going basis and also policed the content on the chat rooms then we would come up with the resources for the lay-out and the hosting".

The pupils took that proposal away and came up with a range of options that they wanted on their site. It is also hoped that the new site will help to further boost the number of visitors to the STI's site.

Mr Mitchell said "We keep a tab on the visitors to our site and since it was launched it has rose and rose until we hit a peak of 600 discreet visitors a week and around 32,000 hits a week.

"That has fallen back to 500 and we are obviously interested to get as many people as possible visiting our website".

Apart from school pupils and youngsters from across the area logging on to catch up with latest news and views, Mr Mitchell is also hopeful that the new addition to the STI site will encourage more interest from parents.