Whalsay School held its annual YPI final on Friday 2nd June. YPI stands for Youth and Philanthropy Initiative. The Initiative, which was started in Canada by the Toskan Casele Foundation in 2011, encourages pupils in a whole year group to research social problems in their community. They then identify a local charity that is working to tackle their chosen issue. Contact is made with the charity either by the pupils visiting the charity or a representative coming into school to talk about their work. Pupils then work on a presentation informing their audience about the work of the charity and advocating for it to receive a grant of £3000 which, in Scotland, is funded by the Wood Family Trust.
Friday’s final marked the end of this process for the S4 RME class at Whalsay School. Four groups of pupils pitched for different local charities: Alzheimers Scotland, Clan Cancer Support, Dogs Against Drugs and Shetland Foodbank.
The Final was attended by Lynsey Brosnan from the Wood Foundation who sponsor the YPI awards in Shetland. The three judges were Marie Manson (Chair of the Parent Council), Moira Dally (former school DSMO and current SQA invigilator), and Eyvor Irvine (CDT teacher at Whalsay School). Garry Spence (Head Teacher) welcomed the audience and commented on how well the four groups had engaged with their charities this year.
The pupils in the four groups delivered some very informative and passionate presentation on the work of their charities and explained the impact a £3000 grant could make on their activities. The pupils advocating for Shetland Foodbank spoke about the food collection they had organised for the charity. Alzheimers Scotland had visited the school to deliver training on supporting people with dementia and the impact of this was clear in how passionately the group spoke about this. The pupils speaking for Clan Cancer Support had been the only ones able to organise a visit to the Charity. On the back of this, they had organised a Bake Sale which raised £175 for the charity in about 30 minutes! The Dogs Against Drugs group had to reshuffle their presentation due to pupil absence but the remaining pupils acquitted themselves very well and spoke enthusiastically in favour of the charity.
When the judges had reached their decision, Mr Spence thanked all those involved in the Final and the YPI process. Eyvor Irvine gave feedback to the groups, commenting on how well informed they had been and how challenging it had been for the judges to reach a decision. She then announced that the winners of the £3000 cheque were Brenna, Charlie and Owen who were advocating on behalf of Alzheimers Scotland.
