Where Next?
Senior School Charitable Work
Students and staff at Brentwood School participate in charitable work throughout the year.
Houses are encouraged to support, visit and raise funds for local charities. This helps to give our students an insight into the issues in their area and inspires them further with how they can help to make a change.
Our students have taken on fundraising events due to simply being inspired or having a personal connection with a charity. For example, student Clarise C’s walking challenge raised over £2000 for Little Haven’s Hospice and Sixth Former Jess E cut her hair for The Little Princess Trust, a charity which supplies wigs to girls who have had chemotherapy. Jess raised over £2800 for Saint Francis Hospice, a charity close to her heart.
Our community continued helping organisations throughout the pandemic. Our House weeks went virtual, with Houses such as Weald setting up JustGiving pages to fundraise online and our community also donated to the John Killilea Foundation for our virtual Sports Day, which was a great success.
The School has made some fantastic connections with local charities. Our Food Bank Challenge saw every form in the School collect over 40 boxes of essential and luxury items for the Brentwood Food Bank, which helped local families through a very difficult time.
Our students commitment to the charity programme is impressive and there have been some inspiring fundraising events take place, despite the setbacks of the last academic year.
Key moments such as the Christmas Fayre also allowed all six Houses to raise money for their chosen local charities, some of which included Essex Wildlife Trust (West House) and Little Haven’s Hospice (Weald House). Each House raised just over £300 for each charity, which was an impressive feat for one lunchtime!
Year groups choose a National charity, and as a School, each term we focus on choosing an International charity. By dividing up our areas of raising awareness and resources, students are able to learn about the multitude of charities and causes both near and far.
Despite setbacks, the Brentwood School Community raised over £10,000 during the last academic year. And now that we are back in School, we are continuing to help those in need.
VSA
The Voluntary Service Activity, or VSA is formed of Year 9 to Upper Sixth pupils and meets at the normal activity slot of 3.30pm - 5pm on Fridays. The VSA seeks to widen students’ awareness and interest in a wide range of community and international initiatives. These range from how to contribute to conservation, attempts to reverse the effects of global warming, help the elderly or those with specific needs, as well as learn key skills such as sign language and first aid.
The Michaelmas term’s programme includes workshops on global issues led by our Senior Leaders, formed of Upper Sixth students. This allows students to be aware of the various issues at hand and how they can influence change. For the remaining two terms, staff lead Friday activities in small groups, consisting of visits to local care homes, teaching First Aid or Sign Language and expanding our community garden.
Students are assigned a uniform, in order to further emphasise their identity as a VSA member, as well as being more practical than school uniform. The VSA is ever-expanding, and we are excited for another year of outreach and volunteer work!
Prep School Charity
At Brentwood Preparatory School, pupils are encouraged to be enterprising and develop their own ideas and sense of responsibility. They learn to contribute to the wider community and through many pupil-led fundraising initiatives, their eyes are opened to the world beyond school.
Last academic year Brentwood Preparatory and Senior School pupils and staff raised over £19,000 for a wide range of charities. Preparatory School pupils raised £8737 in total for charities including the Royal British Legion, the Red Cross, MND, NSPCC, Sports Relief, Kids Inspire, Crisis at Christmas, First Step as well as numerous others.
Christmas performances raised over £960 for Little Havens Children’s Hospital and Christmas Jumper Day raised over £650 for Save the Children. Harvest festival donations went to the Harold Wood Food Bank and pupils were brought a bandaged bear to School for Children in Need and raised over £340.
Other highlights included raising £1492 for the Watoto Choir by holding various fundraisers, dressing up for World Book Day, which raised £537 for the Harold Hill Food Bank and Brentwood Foyer Federation and raising £1155 from the sale of School Disco tickets, which was split between GOSH, St Francis Hospice, Lord's Taverners and Brooke Animal Hospital.
Our most recent Macmillan Coffee Morning raised £120.
