Gold-i Innovation Fund

The Gold-i Innovation Fund was set up in 2015 to help charities and organisations in Surrey to do something innovative or remarkable, with clear benefits for people in the local community.

Grants support charities seeking funds to push the boundaries within their organisation – whether this is:

• offering a new service to help improve the lives of existing beneficiaries;
• an innovative technology based project which will drive the organisation forward;
• a specific, new area of research; or
• to introduce a new initiative which will help to make the charity’s services accessible to more people.

The Mane Chance Sanctuary in Compton, founded by actress Jenny Seagrove, was the first recipient of funding from The Gold-i Innovation Fund. A grant of £2,500 was provided to help fund bursaries for the charity’s pioneering Chance 4 Trust (C4T) Programme – a unique therapy which involves working on a one to one basis with a specially trained C4T practitioner and with the horses at Mane Chance. Tom Higgins, CEO, Gold-i commented:

The C4T programme is hugely inspiring and I am very proud that we are able to support them with our first donation.

A further grant was awarded to Gosden House School in Bramley – a special school for children with learning and additional needs. £2,000 was given to equip the school’s first library for its Secondary department, which has been designed, and will be run by, a group of Year 11 students. The grant has supported the purchase of a laptop computer, barcode scanner, barcoding technology and new books. The Year 11 students will also act as role models to younger students, teaching them how to use the equipment.

It was inspiring to see how much pride the girls had taken in creating the library and I very much look forward to re-visiting the school when the library is fully operational.

– Tom Higgins, CEO, Gold-i