In March 2020 we launched the Community Response Fund available for Oldham, Rochdale and Tameside & Glossop groups from the voluntary, community, faith and social enterprise (VCFSE) sector working on a COVID-19. We are delighted to announce that we were able to fund 64 groups distributing over £46,000.00.
See below the groups that have been awarded the fund and the difference it made to the Borough.
Unity School Support for African Families was awarded £1,000.00.
Their aim and purpose is to support parents from BME ,asylum seekers and refugees where majority of them English is not their first language. They educated and encouraged parents on the importance of understanding the UK school curriculum in order for them to be able to support their children with their school work. They offered one to one educational support to the children and parents and also kept parents posted on government guidelines as they developed at this time of COVID-19 in their native languages. The project involved the distribution of study resources and materials to African children, also offering advice to their parents on how best to support their children with their school work during the lockdown period. In addition ,the project aimed at educating the families about the spread and control of COVID-19 and the protective measures and guidelines set by government. However, the families had hardships with accessing traditional African delicacies from the food banks and the majority of the children did not have access to computers for their school work at home.
Community Response Fund - Projects funded in 2020
Organisation | Amount Awarded | Project |
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10th NE Manchester (Holy Family) Guides | £200 | Paper, printing, craft, certificates, other materials and Girl guiding resources for new members and badges. |
17th North East Manchester Guides | £110 | We plan to spend the money on a zoom membership to give us extra time in our online meetings as well as buying materials to deliver activity packs to girls who cannot join zoom calls in order for them to not miss out on earning any badges. |
Age UK | £1,000 | Expand to work at new premises and to expand its catering capacity including to buy additional equipment to keep food at the correct temperature in order to be able to work safely with the increasing number of orders it is receiving. |
Al Adab Community | £200 | Since the 21st of March we have responded to the current pandemic in Oldham by providing essential shops for the vulnerable, we have continued to provide Calpol for children, we have provided essential PPE to schools, care homes, The Royal Oldham Hospital and to key workers across the entire Oldham borough. in the past four weeks now, we have turned our attention to providing food bags to those that are financially struggling. we have reached over 200 families with our food bags and hundred others with PPE and medicine. |
Carry on Delph | £200 | Supplies of food and other essentials for the foodbank including printing of leaflets and posters for distribution within Delph. The foodbank is located in The White Lion, Delph. |
Catherine Florence | £200 | Deliver relax kids’ sessions for children to ease the transition back to school. |
Chadderton Boxing Club | £900 | To support the local response in providing meals to families including fuel to make deliveries, protective clothing, hand sanitiser, telephone calls and the wear and tear of the vehicles. |
Create Oldham | £1,000 | Create safety visors for medical staff and front line workers in response to COVID-19. |
Depaul UK | £1,000 | To deliver wellbeing workshops to groups of people or for those who find this challenging and on an individual basis |
Diane's Bee Chat Project | £119.90 | Running free online video bee chat sessions twice a week. People take part and learn about beekeeping. |
Dovestone Women's Institute | £650 | Fuel costs during shopping and prescription collection and delivery for clients referred to Dovestone WI by Oldham Council / Place Team East. |
Dr Kershaw's Hospice | £875.30 | To recruit more nurses in the following weeks to come and to provide each of them with the much-needed PPE equipment to keep them safe. |
Europia | £200 | Online support around benefits, additional language support and more. |
Failsworth Brownies | £130 | To continue to provide online activities. |
Failsworth Care | £200 | Restock items and help to continue to providing food drops which is taking the pressure off the central Foodbank. |
Failsworth Rainbows | £200 | Paper, printing, some postage, craft and other materials, certificates, Girl Guiding resources for new members and badges to continue providing activities over August and until the group can meet again. |
Firwood and District Residents Association (FADRA) | £1,000 | Fuel, transport costs and telephone call to support FADRA volunteers to shop for vulnerable residents. |
Fortnightly Family Fun Friday | £1,000 | Provide sport sessions, movie and board game nights |
£929.42 | To create 100 activity packs which will be distributed to local families within the areas that Fullcircle deliver weekly Junior Youth Clubs in (Chadderton North, Chadderton South and Sholver and Moorside). | |
Ghazali Trust | £1,000 | To set-up a dedicated phone line to help support people with the critical advice to help them manage through the COVID-19 crisis. |
Greenacres Community Association | £1,000 | Greenacres Community Centre and Oldham Play Action Group are working together to respond to requests to support people self-isolating including elderly residents, isolated families with young children and residents with other vulnerabilities, coming in from the crisis hubs. |
Greengate Trust | £1,000 | The staff team are working tirelessly to ensure that no family is left without food, essentials such as nappies as well as activity packs for the children. It is currently supporting 18 families in Oldham and 31 are awaiting their initial visit. This would have normally been a home visit, but it is now arranging these over the phone to ensure it is reaching those vulnerable families. The grant will fund staff time, mileage and expenses such as increased mobile usage. |
Home-Start Oldham, Stockport & Tameside | £1,000 | The staff team is working tirelessly to ensure that no family is left without food, essentials such as nappies as well as activity packs for the children. The grant will be used to fund staff time, mileage and expenses such as increased mobile usage. |
Hope Hill Foundation | £1,000 | We are planning to reach out to to families who have babies/children/ children with disabilities to provide them with ‘starter packs’ that contain food items, nappies, wipes, toiletries, sanitary products, baby milk, breast pads. Due to COVID-19 we have witnessed that families have been struggling to have these basic items |
Inspiring Futures Partnership CIC (Inspire Women Oldham) | £1,000 | To support of women and their families by developing and maintaining a closed Facebook group ‘Inspired Magic’ for peer support, buy kit and data bundles for women who are now isolated, facilitate online connection, develop and deliver Facebook Live and connecting sessions and develop and deliver web-based coaching sessions, both group and 1:1. |
Making Space | £1,000 | To help people with dementia and their carers stay connected to loved ones and keep receiving vital support from Making Space services. Purchasing tablets and sim cards will help a number of the people who do not have the technology to take part in the online Making Space services. |
Men Behaving Dadly | £997.97 | To create weekly craft/boredom busters/challenges bags for the dads/male carers and children, this will enhance our weekly zoom sessions. |
MyColdhurst | £1,000 | Put in place a distribution network of food and essential items that will be delivered to many older people and vulnerable members of the community who are likely to be in the most deprived category with regards national and local statistics. |
NEON | £999.79 | To purchase 10 x computer tablets to reconnect with regular users who have been unable to use the centre due to lockdown. It will target three main groups - its men’s group, its knit & chat, and its Wednesday cooking group. |
Oasis Hub | £1,000 | Bringing the community together through a cookery group to increase skills, confidence, healthy eating and to build relationships. |
Oldham Althletic Community Trust | £1,000 | Food for Thought project - providing free fresh fruit and vegetable boxes to those aged 70 and above, in Oldham. Working with Oldham Council and Action Together to ensure this initiative compliments, rather than duplicates any current available service. |
Oldham Boxing and Personal Development Centre | £937.50 | The continuation and scaling up of meals on wheels service will provide access to nutritious warm meals for those affected by the COVID-19 crisis, particularly the homeless and young people on free school meals vulnerable/elderly people in Oldham. |
Oldham Community Broadcasting Ltd | £1,000 | To contribute to the production and broadcast costs to enable the use of the power of radio to reach local residents with vital health and wellbeing information. This will support both the Public Health England ‘Stay Home, Protect the NHS, Save Lives’ campaign and local information such as Oldham Council and local health service campaigns. |
Oldham Greenhill Community Sports and Recreation Club | £950 | To recruit a member of staff to contact and support people from the community who are struggling due to COVID-19 isolation. |
Oldham Helping Hands | £200 | Delivering food parcels 7 days a week, on average to at least 8 people per day. |
Oldham Play Action Group | £1,000 | Oldham Play Action Group has been working effectively with Greenacres Community Centre over the past six weeks to address requests and referrals coming in from the East Oldham crisis hub responding to needs of people self-isolating, including elderly residents, isolated families with young children, residents with other vulnerabilities. The group has been dropping of food items, cleaning products and baby items and collecting prescriptions. |
Outta Skool | £900 | To design and create 200 units of the StayIn StayActive game. Each game will consist of 25 activity playing cards. |
£200 |
Our churches have been closed since mid March. We produce sermons and others information at least once a week. This is circulated via the internet to those of our members who have access to the internet. However many of our people do not have internet access. We produce similar material and send this out by post. This helps us maintain contact with this group of people who are already isolated. |
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Pennine Mencap | £1,000 | Providing food parcels, toiletries, household goods and support by paying electricity/gas meter cards etc for disabled adults who are isolating at home for 12 weeks. This will also include providing telephone, text and online welfare checks, as well as physical checks where needed. |
Planet Mercy | £1,000 | Provide food parcels to 80 families on its service user list. Purchase a phone to take calls from victims of domestic violence and those suffering during to self-isolation. |
POINT | £1,000 | Invest in equipment for two staff, who do not remote work, to access the equipment they need to maintain delivery of services which provide vital support to families of children and young people with SEND. To create bi-weekly virtual meetings to support the Autism Girls Group and weekly parent carer support meetings / helpline calls. |
Radio Carvell | £995 | To fund additional IT support and the associated licencing costs at a time when its major fundraising events have had to be postponed and or cancelled due to the restrictions. This will enable it to take telephone and email messages and convert them to audio files for broadcasting using email and internet software. |
Reel Education Empowering Lives | £999 | To allow Connected Parents to access telephone call support and attend an online group delivered via Zoom / Facebook live, providing a Connected Parents Pack including health and wellbeing links for new parents and Baby Connect Club Kit. This will be used with the online sessions and enable the group to support the health and wellbeing of both parent and child |
Relax with Lucy & Co CIC | £300 | Provide a workshop specifically for pregnant ladies. |
Saheli Women's Group Oldham | £992 | Enabling a team of volunteers to collect shopping, prescriptions or complete other errands and be available on the phone for a chat. The team will put together a number of isolation kits to include hand washes, sanitiser, toilet rolls and other items that are hard to locate. |
Salvation Army - Eden Project - Fitton | £1,000 | Help the mental health of residents of Fitton Hill by keeping in contact with people from all over the community with activity packs, competitions and little life hacks to help them with any issues they may have. |
Spoons Charity | £780.99 | Working with the neonatal unit and NHS colleagues to provide iPads that can be used to facilitate interaction between the family and the NHS staff caring for their baby. Particularly when the family are self-isolating. |
St Barnabas Church, Clarksfield, and the Barnabas Community Project | £200 | The cost of photocopying and paper, envelopes, and stamps to send detailed transcript of a Church service to each member. |
St John the Bapstist Chuch | £200 | Many of our members are self-isolating and/or following Government guidance to stay at home. They cannot come to the Church so we take the Church to them in different forms. |
St Thomas Church Moorside | £200 | The church began by sending greetings and information to 40 people. It is now in contact by post with almost 70 people including members of the congregation, and others who attend the various social activities that take place in the church hall. The fund will buy postage stamps, envelopes, paper, printing inks and greetings cards. |
St Thomas Young Ladies Enterprise | £200 | To make the space available as safe as possible for groups and their members. To ensure that the space is as clean, hygienic and as risk free as possible. This means the purchase of many more cleaning products, hand gel/sanitiser/soap paper towels and personal protective equipment (masks/gloves) etc than usual. |
Starling | £1,000 | An online wellbeing support service for 25 of our most vulnerable and isolated young people. The service will include 10 online wellbeing workshops delivered over Zoom/Facebook Live which can be attended by participants whilst they are isolating. It will also include the provision of wellbeing boxes that will contain a range of arts and crafts materials that the young people can use to get involved with the workshops and continue to use at home. |
Support and Action for Women's Network -SAWN | £1,000 | To purchase a phone for a helpline and a Zoom package to remain in touch with the group online by providing the service Monday to Friday 9am-5pm. |
Team Hill Charitable Trust | £950 | Working with Oldham Council to shop and pick-up prescriptions for the older people and vulnerable within the borough, helping people to attend hospital appointments as the usual transport is not available, calling people who are self-isolating and picking up food donations for the Foodbank. |
The Flowheshion Foundation | £1,000 | A bi-lingual experienced call handler (who has a degree in psychology) will provide over the phone support, comfort and be a link between the women, their families, loved ones if need be. During the period of isolation. |
The Period Poverty Project | £1,000 | To purchase a large number of menstrual products, to distribute to the increasing number of individuals who unfortunately do not have access to them during this time. |
Tough Cookies Ed CIC | £550 | To be able to support young people during this crisis by creating a number of self-care kits for young people. |
UK Education & Faith Foundation | £1,000 | Since COVID-19 UKEFF has changed its strategy and opened a helpline to deliver food, advice and cash top-ups for utility bills for the people who are vulnerable and needy in our society. |
Unity School Support for African Families | £1,000 | Continue supporting parents and children with their education during lockdown. Majority of its parents are asylum seekers and refuges and English is not their first language so it is difficult for them to help their children with their homework at this time. |
Werneth and Freehold Community Development Project | £1,000 | Two trained multilingual workers will support people via telephone calls and WhatsApp and do follow up work to support families and individuals in crisis. |
WIFI North West (Wellbeing improvement fitness initiative) | £1,000 | Cooking meals for other organisations within the Social Action Fund Community of Practice. For example, provision of a hot, nutritious meal for 25 to support Street Angels ongoing provision. The offer is extended to other partner groups within this group. |
Wild Things Performing Art CIC | £200 | We are unable to operate our usual service due to COVID-19 and therefore I am having to teach online, currently for free. The grant would able us to do this. |