Last week the PMO Internal Strategic Programme team spent our Charity Day at MK Snap, a Milton Keynes (MK) charity for adults with learning disabilities.
I genuinely can’t say enough good things about the experience: the fact that we get paid to go and support a charity of our choice; the teams approach to it; the MK Snap as an organisation and (most importantly) the staff and the learners that we worked with.
From the outset, the welcome was brilliant. A couple of the learners took control of the welcomes and there was a quick establishing names, where we were from and whether anyone was an Arsenal fan (unfortunately none of us were although there was one Fulham fan, which was met with a degree of disapproval!)
Angela Novell (MK Snap’s CEO) then took us through a history of the Charity and some of the pressures that they have faced in recent times as result of COVID and how, the charity and it’s learners, they are still recovering from the impact that had. Angela mentioned that they haven’t got all learners back as some are still too anxious to leave their homes.
After a tour of the site and the gardens (and a welcome brew), we were assigned work in the garden, which we all threw ourselves. To be fair there wasn’t that much to do, given that it’s really well tended by the staff, volunteers and learners however, we appreciated feeling productive. MK Snap, like lots of charities, open up their doors to companies like ourselves however, the down side for them of these days is that it can distract from the job at hand, which is looking after the learners in their care.
After we’d finished the gardening we were asked if we’d like to work with the various groups and activities that they were running for the rest of the day. MK Snap run varied programme of activities for their learners and we happened to be there when sports, computing, arts and yoga and horticulture were on the timetable. I seriously could not have thought of a better way to spend the day as the banter, camoraderie and caring that came out of those sessions were something that I’ll remember for a long time.
Not many of us were local to MK, coming from places as diverse as Scotland to Southend, but if there is anyone local to MK Snap that would like to get involved in volunteering https://mksnap.org/get-involved/dragon/, I genuinely can’t think of a nicer place to spend your time. CityFibre has a ‘Charity Day’ scheme and encourages it’s staff to take advantage it, even if not local to MK, to enjoy giving something back and making some new friends along the way!
Find the photos from the CityFibre team at MK Snap here: https://mksnap.org/gallery/volunteer-gallery/
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