We are pleased that we could support 54 local organisations in our most recent round with providing £360,164 in grant funding.
The round included the Woking Council Community Fund. This is the first time we have managed the Community Grants Programme for the borough council. The Fund awarded £144,694 to 21 groups. Our family of Donors awarded a further £21,000 picking up 3 applications which could not be funded by Woking and topping up another application which had been partially funded by Woking.
We are still seeing a huge level of demand for projects addressing health and wellbeing in all its forms, 47% of awards went to address this issue including isolation and loneliness and mental health. The impact of the cost of living crisis is being felt not only in practical difficulties but in the knock-on effect on mental wellbeing as communities cope with these challenges
A few quotes from some of the groups funded in this round:
Guildford Shakespeare Company
GSC are thrilled to be awarded this grant. By linking primary school children with a care home, participants share their experiences and stories, as they convert Shakespeare’s words into their own. The age-gap complements each group through companionship and respite, combined with a real desire to listen and engage – principles that both ages readily offer and accept.
KERRIE DRISCOLL, GSC Creative Learning Producer
The Mary Frances Trust
We are delighted to have received this vital funding from The Gatwick Foundation Fund via The Community Foundation for Surrey. The funding will give an opportunity for asylum seekers to learn some basic English, alongside this we will be providing them with some emotional wellbeing support.
Christine Schauerman, Programme Manager, Mary Frances Trust.
St Catherine’s Hospice
We are incredibly grateful to the Community Foundation for Surrey for working with their donors to support St Catherine’s Community Clinical Nurse Specialists with a £7,000 donation. This support will help people facing the end of their life in East Surrey, spend their final days in the comfort and familiarity of home – pain free, dignified, and comfortable. And this hospice care will extend to their loved ones helping them to feel supported, reassured, and better able to cope with the demands of caring for the person they love.
Laura Kelly, Head of Partnerships at St Catherine’s
Canalside Community Fridge
The fridge is has a visibly positive effect on everyone who uses it. It has been fulfilling its explicit objective of using surplus from Woking’s stores, but it is also alleviating food poverty in the town, for example, supplying local schools with items for breakfast clubs; combatting loneliness and encouraging the community to come together through volunteering and using the fridge. As one person said “it is a stigma free place and I enjoy being here.
Gerry Mitchell, Co-Director
You only need to hear some of the stories of connection and interaction with the people we support from the practitioners as they return to the office at the end of each day to know what a difference this grant will continue to make.
Victoria Goody C.E.O
Look Good Feel Better
We are absolutely delighted to have received funding for 12 of our face-to-face workshops for women with cancer at our Guildford and Redhill venues, helping them to face their cancer with confidence, to make friends, and most of all to Look Good and Feel Better.
Ian Daniels, Director of Fundraising
Intergenerational Music Making
IMM are thankful for the support we have received from Community Foundation for Surrey in helping us to continue the intergenerational work we are currently delivering to tackle loneliness and isolating whilst improving the mental health and wellbeing for all generations.
Charlotte Miller, Founder and Director of IMM
