Autumn Term Fundraising Round-up!

Written by Mrs Rosie Lake, Charities Co-ordinator.

This year the parents and girls at Godstowe have really excelled themselves in their charitable giving. I have been overwhelmed by their kindness and generosity, and they have helped to make my job as Charity Co-ordinator at Godstowe an even more fulfilling one than last year!

In the summer, the Ready Steady Godstowe Challenge, brilliantly organised by Miss Hearnshaw, saw families travelling 27,588 km and raising £3220 for the Ruth Strauss Foundation.  

Harvest Festival in the autumn was so well supported that we managed to send 714 kg of food to the Chiltern Food Bank. They were delighted, as the need this year was greater than ever.

The girls raised £4259 for the Indiability charity, which supports the SKSN school for disabled girls and boys in Jodhpur, not to mention their amazing designs for the new Common Room that we intend to create with that money. My plans to go with Pete in February half term to oversee the design may be on hold, but I really hope to be able to see it for myself someday soon.

Lodge raised an amazing £300 for Children in Need at their Mufti Day in November, where several members of staff also volunteered to have cream pies thrown at them to help the fundraising effort!

Next, we had a fabulous event, despite the restrictions of lockdown, in support of the Wycombe Homeless Connection Big Sleep Out At Home 2020 and the girls (and some staff) were ingenious in the ways they invented to sleep in unusual or uncomfortable places and outfits. This raised a fabulous £4356, which included over a thousand pounds from Team Kane and almost another thousand from the FOG Christmas raffle.

Finally, the icing on the cake has been the gifts given by generous Godstowe families to the Wycombe Refugee Partnership. I have today dispatched dozens of sacks of gifts to twenty families and groups of young people who have lost their families, and I was once again quite blown away by your thoughtfulness. I was given literally hundreds of presents for children of all ages, and the girls really enjoyed wrapping them. There was also a very generous cash contribution from several families to go into the Refugee Partnership account.

What an end to the year! I would like to thank you all very, very much on behalf of all those organisations.