Students boost charity profile in eight-week challenge

IN eight weeks, five students from University of Bath raised the profile of a local charity that has been able to extend its service as a result of their help.

Home-Start North Wiltshire, which supports families with children under five-years-old through challenging times across North Wiltshire including in Melksham, was the chosen charity for the students to support as part of the Rotork Community Challenge, with the aim of raising the profile of the charity in eight weeks.

The students held a stall in Melksham town centre, gave away gift bags and flyers around local shops and created a presentation of their journey and video content.

One student who took part, Kaveesh Sharma, said, “The Melksham marketing campaign took place on Saturday 26th of November to Monday 12th December. In a team of five, our objective was to advertise Home-Start North Wiltshire and its service as much as possible. In order to do that we held a stall in Avon Place on High Street, with gift bags to give away. The tote gift bags consisted of things like pens, books, Home-Start charity’s flyers and Christmas decorations.

“Alongside spreading awareness through flyers, which we also distributed to shops around town, we gave a little summary of what Home-Start does to people who came to the stall. We saw a very convincing amount of engagement from the town, and we thoroughly enjoyed talking to people. We had some very wholesome interactions with people, moreover, one of the families recently got in touch with the charity to seek help, giving us a sign that the campaign had a positive effect on the community.”

Home-Start fundraiser Joanne Kent said, “Thanks to funding from the Henry Smith Charity, we’re pleased we can now extend our service to Melksham for the first time. The students did a brilliant job of helping us raise Home-Start’s profile in the town!”