Inspirational children collect ‘avalanche’ of food and goods for the homeless

By Darcy aged 11 of Ashcombe Primary School and Jill Dando News Centre students from Worle Community School

Inspirational Year 6 students from Ashcombe Primary School in Somerset collected an avalanche of food and goods to help the homeless.

It was part of the school’s amazing project ‘Is home where the heart is?’, which focuses on the homeless within Weston.

They knitted scarves and blankets, before receiving a letter from homeless shelter Somewhere To Go, asking for donations, and the students obliged, collecting food from local stores.

Asda, Waitrose, Costa, Farmfoods, Next, Proper Job, Weston Hospice, Co-OP all gave pupils help towards the project.

They also spent a day walking from their school to Weston beach so that they could experience what it was like to be homeless, finishing off with a soup lunch as served in a homeless shelter.

Joan Eales of Somewhere To Go said: “The students have been amazing. They have contacted loads of local organisations in order to obtain goods for the homeless people in Weston, and they’ve donated these to Somewhere To Go. 

“They’ve come up with the most incredible amount of goods and donations. We are stunned with what they have produced and what they have made themselves by knitting. We are so grateful”.
Student Darcy said “It was really interesting and exciting learning about the homeless, and then collecting food for them”.

The students are following in the footsteps of famous Weston journalist Jill Dando, who always cared about her community and never forgot her roots, collecting money for charity and helping the homeless within her home town.