March 2021

In the week commencing 16^th March 2020, the coronavirus crisis came in force to the UK, and schools were formally closed by the Government on Friday 20^th March.  Schools remained closed throughout all of the remaining months of the 2019/2020 academic year, meaning First Give could not deliver their full programme.

As schools closed, it felt important that First Give ‘do its bit’ to support teachers and young people.  Within two weeks of lockdown being announced, they developed and launched ‘Helping from Home’.

This is a three-lesson mini-programme which was designed for students to complete either alone or with the support of a parent/carer or for a teacher to set a class as a project.  The programme used editable PDF documents which meant it didn’t rely on printed materials.

Helping from Home led on to a monthly competition where First Give awarded a prize of £200 to the most innovative and impactful social action carried out by a young person.  They had some really wonderful stories come out of Helping from Home, which underlined to First Give how keen so many young people are to help others in their communities.

School closure 2021

With schools once again closed and the lockdown harder to bear due to winter and a year of restrictions, First Give launched Helping from Home again.  This time, the prize money was increased to £1,000 and not limited to one winner a month.  Again, some truly inspirational young people stepped up to support their local communities.