Fundraising

Welcome to the launch of St Wilfrid’s Fundraising section of the website. As you all know, St Wilfrid’s is having a new site constructed but the grant awarded for the new build does not include the cost of a school chapel or business centre (we have yet to decide firmly on a name for this dynamic area).

This newsletter is a way of informing and updating you of our fundraising efforts and how you can help us by various schemes we are launching now and in the future.

The Chapel

The chapel is, of course, intrinsic to the heart of our school’s ethos and is to be the central feature of the new building. Prayer and praise are woven into the very fabric of daily life at St Wilfrid’s and the chapel will provide a modern, attractive location not only for school liturgies, but for the local community to meet together to join in worship with our staff and students. Together with our local catholic communities, we need to raise the capital for this chapel and its fittings ourselves at a cost of £370,000. One of our ideas is to create a wish list where people can purchase the contents for the chapel as a donation or in remembrance of a loved one. We would love to hear from you if this is something that would be of interest to you.

The Business Centre

We also need to secure £410,000 for our Business Centre. Here, local businesses will work together with the school to educate further generations and help skill the local community. This collaboration will also provide the opportunity for our teachers to further their professional skills and awareness of business. The centre will become a bridge between the worlds of work and school, benefiting both. It will be a place of connection, growth and excitement!

Ways you can Help

We know there are many families and individuals who wish to help us realise our vision and we are truly overwhelmed by people’s support and prayers thus far.

We would like to hear from you if you have any ideas on how the school could fundraise. Also we would like to build a School Alumni so any details of past pupils (with their permission!) would be gratefully received.

Buy a Brick Campaign

We would like to offer parents, students, parishioners and local businesses the opportunity to buy a brick to help fund the chapel and business centre. An application form is enclosed with this newsletter and is also is available on the school website to download. You can buy as many bricks as you like and your name will be included on a plaque to be displayed in the reception of the new school.

Contributions can be made in four different price ranges: £1.00 for students, £3.50 for adults; £5.00 for families. We have a fourth option for those who cannot afford these prices and we would gladly accept
what you can give. This option is also for those who would like to give more for their brick, should they wish to do so . There is also the option to Gift Aid your donation. (See on Page 4 for more information on Gift Aid.)

In addition to this, for every pound spent on a brick 1 House Point will be awarded to the relevant students School House.

Eg. Family brick = 5 house points
Student Brick = 1 house point

Please remember you can buy as many bricks as you like!

Recycling a Mobile Phone

What do you do with your old phone when your replace it? We are working with a company who will donate money to our fund in return for old mobile phones. Ideally the phone and battery will be in working order but they do donate smaller amounts for damaged phones.

Apart from obviously raising money for the school fund you will also be doing your bit for the environment - there is no environmentally safer way to trade in your old mobile.

So we are asking all parents, students and staff to please look around at home for any mobile phones that you no longer use.
Please could parents sign the consent form, giving your permission for the phone to be donated to the school, accompanying the newsletter. Each phone that is sent in will generate 25 House Points towards your students School House so please make sure you send in your child’s name with the phone.

Students can bring the phones to the School Administration Office and hand them in to Mrs Brill, for the attention of Sarah Gildea, Fundraising Co-Ordinator .

Fundraising Search Engine

You can now raise funds when you search the web!

We have registered St Wilfrid’s with a search engine which allows us as a school to receive money simply by using it.

Use EasySearch every time you search online and it will give 50% of the fees paid by its advertising sponsors to St Wilfrid’s Catholic School.

EasySearch is powered by Yahoo!, the world's second largest search engine. It works just like any other search engine, bringing you fast, accurate results every time, but ‘easysearch’ gives the school something back!

When you search the web with EasySearch you'll generate around a penny for St Wilfrid's Catholic School with every search you make. It doesn't sound like much, but the pennies soon mount up and, individually, you can raise £25.00 a year - or more - just by switching your normal search engine to EasySearch!

The address is http://stWilfridscrawley.easysearch.org.uk

Please make it your home page and help us raise funds!

Online Shopping

We have recently set up a St Wilfrid’s fundraising Web Shop which means that every time you shop online each of the companies listed will donate money to our cause.

The website address is: http://www.simplefundraising.co.uk/1511

There are already over 200 retailers who are giving us their support including household names such as Tesco, HMV, Carphone Warehouse, Disneyland Paris, Esure and many more.

Best of all, it will not cost you any extra as these companies will pay us from their own profits. Furthermore, virtually all of the companies involved offer online shoppers incredible savings and offers – so we all win!

Not only does our fundraising website enable us to raise money, it’s also useful for you as well.
For example:

· Use our website to order your weekly grocery shopping from Tesco and they will donate £2.50 for each delivery.

· Take out an insurance policy with E-Sure and they donate up to £40

· Buy a contract phone from Carphone Warehouse and they will donate £20.

We never know details of your purchases just how much the company donates.