The Russell Kin Trust are pleased to announce the first round of 2025 charitable donations. The charities this period are Scene and Heard, The Wave Project, Phyllis Tuckwell Hospice and The Pears Cumbria School of Medicine.
Another year, another start to our grant making periods and another opportunity to support a range of small charities. This period we have had the privilege to meet and support two new charities with two interesting projects that focus on community health. We also welcomed a retuning charity as well.
The first new charity that we were recently introduced to was The Wave Project, specifically the project based in Polzeath. The project seeks to help children and young people’s mental health and well-being via surfing. The surf therapy courses not only teach participants to surf but also provides therapy in a relaxed and non-clinical environment. Working alongside surf instructors and volunteers children learn to surf on their terms and challenge themselves in the surf to build confidence and resilience.
The second new charity we meet this period was The Pears Cumbria School of Medicine, a new medical school based in Carlisle, collaborating with Imperial College London. Health coverage in Cumbria and surrounding areas has been limited, The Pears Cumbria School aims to set up a new medical training centre in Carlisle. The school would train clinicians to work in the local area with a focus on community health, building a sustainable NHS workforce for the northwest. As the school will support patients across a vast area with limited public transport options the faculty decided that cars would be needed to reach patients. To aid in this endeavour our grant will be used to lease four MG cars as well as provide driving lessons for clinicians. An overlooked area when supporting community health, clinicians need to be able to reach patients wherever they live. Alongside leasing the car’s the grant is also being used to pay for driving lessons for the clinicians, helping to ensure their mobility and availability in the area.
We were also pleased to support Scene and Heard once more this period. Based in Somers Town in London, the charity seeks to make ‘every child seen, heard, and valued’ using theatre and drama. The grant will be used to support their Playmaking One project, where the children work with a mentor to write and put on their very own play. After nine weeks of after-school classes the project ends with a showcase of all the plays that have been created during the project. We were fortunate enough to attend one of these showcases and had a fantastic time.
We would like to congratulate all our recipients this period and wish them much success with their projects.