500 together

Donation 192 has gone to help an Afghan teenager, who plays in the member’s local cricket club, in his attempts to reunite with surviving members of his family. After Afghanistan fell to Taliban rule in 2021, the boy was forced to flee the country when his older brothers were killed, serving in the national army. He spent weeks hiding as Taliban members entered his village and called at his home. He spent the next six months travelling to Europe and arrived in the UK in March 2022, after a difficult and dangerous journey, and he was dispersed to Sheffield and placed in foster care. After 10 months he was given refugee status in the UK. His parents had stayed in Afghanistan to look after his young nephews, but in 2023 they both died, leaving the nephews homeless and without support, and dependent on food from the local mosque. Money was sent back to a neighbour who eventually took the boys in and cared for them, providing money could be sent for all their needs. Friends who are supporti...

We are pleased to be back with news of donation 191. As you know, any paying member can make a nomination for an individual, a family or a local organisation to receive a donation of up to £500.   This week someone asked for £140 to help a  single mother, who lives in Sheffield with a young child, who really needs financial support from a family reunion solicitor to help her appeal her application to get her older son to the UK. We understand how difficult these applications are and we’re happy to help with these appeal costs and hope she is successful in this initial stage of the process, allowing her to pursue the next steps. We very much hope she can eventually be reunited with her son.  

  We are pleased to kick a new year off with news of donation 190. Our £250 donation has gone to help The Edge centre offer more invaluable support to help people manage their debts and work towards becoming debt free. The Edge centre in Jordanthorpe was started 3 1/2 years ago to offer face to face support with people's benefit, housing, debt and form filling needs.  https://www.facebook.com/p/Edge-Centre-Jordanthorpe-and-Batemoor-100082577201472/ Since then it has grown both in the numbers coming ( up to 25 clients over a 2hr session), the number of support workers ( 4 to 8) and the range of assistance on offer.  They have noticed the need for face to face debt work is growing and so in June they teamed up with Christians Against Poverty at the Food and Community Trust to offer comprehensive debt support. So far they have seen one person become debt free and are working with several more. However,  in order to continue to have access to this expert support from the...

  We are pleased to be able to share one last donation we made this year, bringing our total of donations to   189 . Earlier in December one of our members nominated the charity Sheffield Churches Council for Community Care (SCCCC) asking if we would make a donation to help their important work supporting older isolated people in Sheffield. In December they were taking part in  The Big Give  matched funding campaign, aiming to be able to provide one to one befriending and support to even more older people, by recruiting more volunteers to help meet the increasing demand. They are currently supporting over 200 older people through befriending but have a waiting list of over 300 people waiting to be matched. They are keeping in touch with them with regular phone support and also sending them post via a penpal scheme whilst they recruit and train more volunteers to help meet the demand. We donated £250, which was matched within the Big Give campaign so £5...

This week we have made a timely donation to help a family through the Christmas holidays.     One of our members asked us to help with some much needed support for a family with 3 kids, 2 of whom are autistic. The youngest is particularly sensitive and dysregulated, and managing their behaviour is hard. Having received some specialist support the family have been advised to get some resources for the kids to help them feel calmer - headphones, weighted blankets and boxing equipment.  Dad works 12 hours shifts but they're still struggling to pay the bills, so buying extras like these just is not possible for them. The local organisation supporting the family also told us the mum really needs some specialist support to help her over the next 2 weeks, and want to provide her with a few hours of specialist PA support too.  Christmas is such an exciting time for so many, but for many families with autistic children it can often be the worst school holiday to cope with....

With donation   187   we have been able to help a family nominated by one of our members. The family of 6, E, N and their 4 children,  have lived in a two-bedroom council property for the past five years.    After the birth of their first child, E suffered with post-natal depression. N had to stop working to care for her and their baby. The post-natal depression remained an issue following the birth of their second child and N had to remain at home to care for E and the young children.   During the time that N was unable to work, the family started to fall behind with their rent building up substantial rent arrears and struggled to make ends meet. As soon as he was able, N returned to work and has worked full time ever since in a bid to try to lift his family out of financial hardship. Despite N working all the hours available to him and a top up  from UC, the family remain in financial hardship.   The family have not had any spare money for years...

With donation 186, we are getting in the festive spirit!  Throughout the year we make so many varied donations, often offering a little help to individuals and families in crisis. Equally important are these kinds of donations - ones that help give people a treat, a much needed escape from their daily challenges.  Our friends at Shelter told us that over the past number of years they have arranged for their clients - children and families - to attend the pantomime over the Christmas period. They have funded this in previous years through some of their project support, but unfortunately this year that has not been available to allow them to book tickets for the performance.  Our member explained that in the past many of the families who have attended had never experienced going to any kind of performance at a theatre and this is a magical event for them to attend. Last year they took 16 households, 30 children and 19 adults.  Everyone had a fun filled time which is re...