Charity – JMAC- The Blog Experience

St.Aidan’s SCIAF Fundraising week

Last week there was a very special event in St.Aidan’s High School. A fundraising week. SCIAF did a collaboration with UK Aid, every pound that is donated to SCIAF – UK aid will match those SCIAF donations. St.Aidan’s is giving £800 to SCIAF meaning SCIAF will get £1600 in total. The money is collected in R.E classes using the WEE BOX. Students donate money in return for certain activities in the classes for example watching a movie or extra study time.

The reason for this SCIAF fundraising week in September is due to during lent we were not able to do charity work because of the lockdown in March.

SCIAF – Scottish Catholic International Aid Fund – does many fundraiser and campaigns to help poor families grow their food, stand with communities to build peace and promote justice as well as educate the poor to help them fulfil their lives.

Mark booker, an education officer who would often come to the school to do retreats, is contacting the school thinking of ways how to do these activities due to the Covid-19 Restrictions. One of those retreats would be ‘care for the environment’ with 2nd year in return to raise money for SCIAF. The students donate money before–hand as payment for the retreats which then the money will be donated to SCIAF.

St. Aidan’s has been doing charity work for years now, they have been successful to fundraise a very large amount of money to various charities and we are looking forward to work with many more charities and organisations in the future.

Tin Tuesday

“We want to make everyone feel included at Christmas, we send them a Christmas card to wish them a merry Christmas”

The RE department in St. Aidan’s have started it create Christmas parcels for local parishes filled with tins, sweets, and essentials. Pupils have also been donating money. With the help of all the WPS classes, Caritas pupils, and the school as a whole they aim to send 100 parcels to local community.
Mrs Hynes said “We need to remind ourselves Christmas is about receiving presents but also about giving. The parcel give everyone the opportunity to give something. We’ve had some people bring in bags of shopping.”
Caritas student Hollie Conlin said “We want to make everyone feel included at Christmas, we send them a Christmas card to wish them a merry Christmas” This thought is shared throughout the school and the students are getting ready to deliver the parcel.

SCIAF Real Gifts

This week St. Aidan’s High school Caritas class promoted and sold SCIAF Real Gifts during a Christmas themed staff coffee morning. The pupils served mince pies, coffee and tea to the large number of staff who visited during their Christmas lunch to show support.

Purchasing a Real Gift provides something vital for people living in poverty in Africa, Asia or Latin America such as emergency blankets, seeds or even a goat. Whilst also giving a thoughtful gift to someone in your life. The pupils raised around £180 from this event.

Macmillian Coffee Morning

Macmillan cancer support is one of the UK’s biggest charities and provides specialist health care, information and emotional and financial support to people affected by cancer. Macmillan have a free phoneline, online community, and many other resources for those affected with cancer.

Fundraising is crucial to an organisation like Macmillan. On the 26th of September 2019 the s6 year fundraising committee hosted 2 coffee mornings, one for staff at break and one for S6 at lunch.

Staff and students brought in home baked and bought cakes, biscuits, and even tablet for the event. For £3 staff were able to go into the coffee morning at break and feast on the treats brought in with coffee and tea to match.

S6 years got their turn at lunch. For £1 they came in, got a sticker, and had their coffee morning in the hall. Everyone was able to help themselves to cakes, tablet, and biscuits. Many didn’t expect to spend their whole lunch there but soon nearly the whole of S6 year was in the assembly hall.

What started as a coffee morning with some music in the background soon turned into an impromptu S6 year lunch party. With music playing a couple S6 years danced as they walked leading a few to begin dancing at the back of the assembly hall. By the end nearly everyone was up dancing. Miss O’Neil and Mrs Devlin soon joined in. Miss Conley even showed up just in time to be sung happy birthday. The S6 year coffee morning finished with a raffle with 3 students walking away with a prize.

Nearly £600 was raised for Macmillan and it was enjoyed by everyone. S6 year student Samantha Reynolds said “It was a great day for a great cause and seemed like everyone had a brilliant time at the coffee morning and we raised a lot of money for Macmillan as well as hosted a raffle “