If your class needs some inspiration, perhaps they’ll find it here…
Students at Batley Girls’ High School took on the challenge of raising awareness this year without raising money. Here are a handful of examples of the work that they did.
Donate a Book
Students in 9HCO opted to support their local Children’s Society by organising a “DAB day”. DAB, or Donate A Book, day saw the students collect nearly 140 books in support of their charity. These books were gifted to their local charity branch book shop for them to sell.
They further raised awareness around Easter with a scavenger hunt across the school, hiding 20 eggs with facts relevant to their charity. Students in this class also sought to raise awareness with lower year groups, delivering two assemblies to Year 7 and 8 respectively. What set this group apart was the way that they had evaluated their impact, which was significant, as they reflected that they had reached over 450 students in school as a result of their efforts – a fantastic result! They were commended highly by the judges for the range of social action activities they planned and delivered through the year, and for the way they linked each activity back to their charity.
The Great Batley Bake Swap
Food insecurity is an issue that impacts many in the community around the school, and students in another Year 9 class at Batley Girls’ opted to collect food for their charity by doing a bake sale food swap – students from all years through the school brought in food for the foodbank in exchange for a cake. In the end, the students in this class collected 4 bag-for-life bags full of food to donate to Batley Foodbank.
Going the extra mile
Students in 9JRA wanted to do something special, and they chose to run a mile in support of their charity. “We really want to help children” said one of the presenting students, adding that they’d opted to run a mile because it would challenge them, and they wanted to be challenged because “Forget-me-not looks after people who face challenges every day”. They shared their social action activities with the audience, which included their run, a collection of pre-loved items, badge making, and writing a poem in support of the charity that incorporated the charity name, as seen here
A Little Goes A Long Way
Students in 9ZRI got creative with their social action, opting to compose and produce a song in support of their charity, Fusion Foodbank. The students chose to do this as they felt it would be a good way to raise awareness, but also hoped their song would boost morale among the volunteers who were supporting the foodbank by sorting donations and packing food parcels. “Our form wanted to do something really unique” said one presenting student, “We live in a really deprived area, and we really wanted to help”.
Name the Teddy Bear
Students in 9KEC chose to raise awareness for bed poverty. Their presentation, which explained how getting a good night of sleep impacts on children’s development and education, demonstrated the students’ compassion and concern for young people facing this problem. To raise awareness for their charity, they opted for a ‘name the teddy bear’ competition, adding “we thought a teddy bear social action activity was a good idea because a lot of children like to sleep with a bear when they go to sleep.”
Practical advice and support
Students in 9EPA opted to support Leeds Women’s Aid, and used their presentation as an opportunity to encourage their peers to learn about the safety features of their charity’s website, ensuring that anyone who might need support could do so without increased risk of harm. The students chose to create bookmarks in support of their charity, putting these in school library books and in classrooms to spread the word about how to get in touch with Leeds Women’s Aid. They further used their classroom door and walls as an opportunity to raise awareness, with examples of coercive control stuck on the wall in the form of text message scenarios, explaining how each was an example of coercive control. It was their hope that they could raise awareness for what it is, how to spot it, and what to do if you’re on the receiving end of this form of abuse.
Supporting Single Parents
9APO partook in several social action activities, adding “there’s no such thing as too much social action” as they outlined the various ways they’d sought to raise awareness for their charity, which supports single parents. This class:
- Were successful in getting the school to observe Single Parents’ Day in March, getting students to write messages of gratitude to their single parents
- Wrote a letter to their local MP to raise awareness as to the stigma that single parents can receive (and even got a reply from her!)
- Created an informative leaflet to circulate amongst their peers about being a single parent and the difficulties faced
- Wrote and performed a play to Year 8 and Year 9
This group further impressed their audience at the Final by delivering their case study example of single parenthood in the first person, and asking members of the audience to stand up as a visual representation of the different types of family in the community, with a view to decreasing stigma.
Handmade flowers and empowering messages
9AGA supported the domestic abuse charity Pennine Domestic Abuse Partnership (PDAP). Beginning their presentation with a series of statistics that set the scene for why they chose this charity, the students captured their audience as they outlined the multiple ways in which they raised awareness for their charity. This included decorating their form door with charity information including the helpline number, making posters to spread the message around the school, advocating for their peers to speak to their student mental health champion – a member of this presenting group, and creating paper flowers for students that also included empowering and supportive messages on them to hand out to their peers.
Further guidance
Hopefully these examples demonstrate the scope and scale of social action activity, and provide your class with inspiration and motivation to get started! Don’t forget to encourage your students to use their own skills and talents when it comes to social action planning, using their coursebooks for further inspiration.