Lower School pupils complete Future Fridays with Wings of Hope achievement awards

This term, the Lower School have been working towards their Wings of Hope Achievement Awards (Junior) . Wings of Hope is a Children’s charity that sponsors schools in India and Sierra Leone, but also seeks to empower children in UK through upskilling them and making them more capable of giving back and developing empathy.

They worked teams of around six on a project to develop a fundraising event based on one of nine themes – such as innovation, events, arts and crafts.

The pupils were supported with a launch event, delivered via Teams by a representative of Wings of Hope, and received mentoring sessions as they worked. Each team was also assigned a mentor from the teaching body at St Mary’s to support them in their decision making, but also to facilitate logistics.

They have kept a diary of the process, giving evidence of their work which they will ultimately present in a scrapbook, presentation or video diary to receive their certificate of success.

This wonderful programme has allowed the girls to knit together the skills they have learned during the Futures Fridays initiative throughout the year, such as teamwork, finance, confidence, entrepreneurship.

A word on some of the fabulous fundraising events that the girls put on:

One MIV group wrote and presented a theatre show in the Delscey Burns Theatre, linked to the Alice in Wonderland characters. Writer and co-star Jemima K-U (MIV) describes the experience thus:

‘I had the idea to do a play because it was something I knew I would enjoy, and everyone in my group was very keen on the idea as well. I thought it would be a great opportunity to raise money for charity while doing something I love and something the rest of my group also enjoys. Although it was quite an ambitious idea, we worked extremely hard to create this story from scratch. I do not regret sticking to our original idea, as it challenged us creatively and allowed us to produce something we are all proud of.

On the night of the performance, everyone was buzzing with excitement but also extremely nervous. We were shocked when we peeked out from behind the stage and saw students and staff in the audience. Although we were very nervous before going on stage, once we started performing, we loved every moment of it. I am incredibly proud of everyone’s effort and so glad that everything ran smoothly and that everyone enjoyed the experience.’

Another group of MIV girls planned a pre-theatre ice cream stall, open to the whole school and staff. Their wares included a variety of ice creams and sorbets, along with a cornucopia of toppings. They had to manage food safety, hygiene and allergy considerations, as well as other valuable lessons such as taking card payments and giving receipts.

Demand was high and the group served a huge number of customers in an admirably professional manner. One of the group, Rithanna F (MIV) commented, ‘Yesterday we sold ice cream to raise money for our form charity Wings of Hope who support schools working with underprivileged children. We chose to sell ice cream and sorbet because we thought it was a nice way to raise money on a hot day. I enjoyed all the making and serving, especially the whipped cream on the ice cream, because it was really fun!’

One group invoked their inner Betty Crocker and mass-produced bottled cookie mix. They took hygiene standards and allergen awareness very seriously in their improvised kitchen and produced a very popular product that received gleaming reviews and sold out in less than 24 hours.

The LIV teams had two main initiatives. One group sold delightful handmade craft items such as personalised notebooks and cross stich badges, while the other went an entirely different route and organised a mass water fight with pupils from all years and numerous staff members having a whale of a time, whilst cooling down in the heat of that particular week.
‘Sustainable Styles and Sweets’ combined pre-loved clothing sales with bags of mixed sweets to great effect, and another group organised a whole site Scavenger Hunt with prizes kindly donated by some SMC parents.

‘Wear the Change’ designed and produced trackies, which reached very high sales figures, and finally, ‘Calne Creations’ put on a tote bag designing workshop where customers from both schools sat and had a very enjoyable and calming time designing a bag that they could then take away with them.

Overall, the initiative was a huge success and when the final donations are counted the girls are likely to have raised over £1000 for their chosen charity. I would like to take the opportunity to thank all of the girls, parents and staff who have worked so hard to make this so successful.

Mr Dan Curran, Head of Future Fridays