Red Kite Family Centre’s special award for inter-generational project

THAME’s Red Kite Family Centre will be among charities to receive funding awards from the High Sheriff of Oxfordshire, Richard Venables, at a special Awards event in Oxford on Tuesday, February 12, 2019.

Oxfordshire Community Foundation (OCF) has recently made £34,525 in grants to 12 different charities working to bring together people from different backgrounds – people who may not have culture, economic background or age in common, but can share friendship through shared interests and activities, of which the Red Kite centre is one.

The event will be held at the Tap Social Movement – a brewery and social enterprise in Oxford that employs ex-offenders, helping them back into society when they are released from prison. Guests from the charities receiving grants will have the chance to meet the generous donors who gave funds to OCF to make their projects possible and will speak about their work at the event.

The Red Kite centre will receive £2,100 towards their project, Growing Up Together, an intergenerational project in Thame where the youngest children learn together with the oldest residents. The project supports both generations to learn new skills with support from local artists. The project will also increase volunteers within both organisations to enable continued intergenerational community visits.

Other Oxfordshire charities to receive awards include:

• Sonning Common Green Gym, which draws volunteers from across the
community, taking referrals from the Oxford Health NHS Foundation
Trust. Volunteers undertake practical nature conservation activities to
help the local environment and to improve their physical and mental health and fitness.

• My Life My Choice, whose Gig Buddies project matches beneficiaries with
a volunteer who loves the same kind of ‘gigs’ (eg football matches, the
cinema, museum, concerts etc) so they can go to these gigs together.

• Oxford Hindu Temple, which has created a ‘Making Music Together’
project to harness linguistic, vocal, poetic and musical traditions. This will
culminate in events for Indian Republic Day, Holi and Basant, and Eid.