Olive pupils spread winter warmth to local community
As the winter nights drew in and the temperatures plummeted, pupils from The Olive School, Birmingham helped spread optimism throughout their community by supporting local people through its Winter Gift Programme.
At The Olive School, Birmingham, we pride ourselves on making a positive difference to society. We are committed to playing an active role in our community and helping others. This winter, we stepped up our efforts to support the most vulnerable people in our community.
The Winter Gift Programme is an annual campaign which sees pupils and staff from every Star Academies school unite to participate in a broad range of charitable giving, acts of kindness and volunteering; all with one simple aim – to make sure no one faces the challenges of winter alone.
Following the launch of the program, we set out with the aim of fulfilling 3 pledges; Food for all, Gifts for all, Warmth for all.
Pupils from all year groups, parents and members of staff took huge pride in gathering gifts that were distributed to various members of the community.
Our phenomenal Parent Council spent almost an entire school day in assembling and organising the hampers, ready for distribution.
Our Food for all pledge saw us deliver food items and other household essentials to vulnerable members of the community through our school foodbank. Pupils from Year 5 showed outstanding leadership in braving the cold to set up the foodbank and help deliver food items to members of the community. It was a distinct pleasure to see the joy they expressed in welcoming visitors who wished to access the foodbank.
Our pledge to provide ‘Gifts for all’ saw us deliver gifts to patients at Birmingham Children’s Hospital. Members of staff at the hospital were incredibly grateful for the gifts and were sure they will be very well received by the children at the hospital.
This pledge stretched beyond the hospital to key workers at the local fire service and police force. Our pupils were very passionate about expressing their gratitude to the services for the outstanding work they do. Pupils helped deliver gift hampers to Hay Mills Fire Station and Stechford Police Station.
The Olive School, Birmingham is also aware of the loneliness faced by elderly in the community. We therefore helped spread some joy to the elderly at our local care home, Newday Nursing Home. Pupils helped put together some wonderful gift hampers that were delivered to the home. We hope these gifts helped put smiles of the faces of the elderly in the community.
Finally, our ‘Warmth for all’ campaign saw us help to provide warmth for the homeless in Birmingham. Pupils in Year 6 kindly donated various items of bedding that were donated to St Basils charity for the homeless. The charity will stock these items and use them when allocating accommodation to the homeless.
Rifat Batool, Principal at The Olive School, Birmingham, said: “Our annual Winter Gift Programme not only supports the most vulnerable members of our community, it also affords our pupils the opportunity to develop their leadership skills and to experience the personal satisfaction that comes from demonstrating kindness and helping those less fortunate. It gives me an enormous sense of pride to see our pupils, parents and colleagues embrace this invaluable campaign with such incredible compassion and generosity.”
Maham Salman Anwar from Year 5 said: “Taking part in the Winter Gift program helped me feel happy about myself because I was able to do something nice for other people which made them happy”.
In true display of our value of ‘Teamwork’, it was fantastic to see the whole school family come together with the goal of providing ease to others during these incredibly difficult times.
We hope this program has helped our pupils expand their leadership qualities and see first-hand the positive impact of helping those less fortunate than us.
Added By: Enamul Rahman | Date Added: 14th Feb 2024 | Posted In: Latest News