Instead of donating to 3 charities this month, we are concentrating all our efforts onto one project. Not only that, but as a member of Bitc (Business in the Community), Currencies Direct have decided to not only donate our money this month to one charity, but also to donate our time!
Bitc introduced us to Hampstead Parochial Primary School, who are a small C of E parish school that is one of the least funded schools in the Borough of Camden with one of the highest levels of special needs and English as a second language.
The school spends all of its funds maintaining the old Victorian school building, which leaves nothing in the budget for any extra curricular activities. Unfortunately, Christmas decorations and a Christmas Party fall into this category.
We have volunteered to decorate the school hall and stage and to organise and hold 3 back to back Christmas Parties so that every child in the school gets to dress up, play games, and visit Santa to receive their Christmas gift! Phew! Did I mention the school has over 200 children? The parties will be on Thursday 17th December, and there will be 10 volunteers from Currencies Direct who are taking part.
We are all very excited about the parties at the moment, but to be honest – I’m getting very nervous too and I think that children can smell fear!!
We are building a small grotto on the stage and then turning the main hall into a ‘Pirate Christmas Treasure Island’ with face painting, dressing up, pass the treasure and many other fun activities for the children to partake in! The plucky volunteers are: Sara Cuthbert, Ignacio Hernandez, Jose Ivars-Lopez (aka Santa), Phil McHugh, Claire Kelly, Frances Barrance, Deepak Goyal, Shelley Cox, Barbara Manko, Nic Gidaracos.
This is the first time that Currencies Direct have been involved in a project like this, and if it goes well it could pave the way for a more structured volunteer programme.
We have had some sterling help from people in the office who have obviously donated money, but also helped with wrapping presents.
I also need to give a big thank you to Tomas at C3 Imaging Ltd, Peter at Trebuchet Design, Alice and the team at The Gate, who have all been generous in their support and helped to give the party accessories and design a more professional look and feel that we could ever manage on our own.
Watch this space for more details.The countdown to Christmas has truly begun!
