Category: Charity Insights 2016

St. Anne’s Community Services – who, what, where and why?

I thought I’d dedicate my first blog post to explaining at little bit about my internship, and the organisation that I’ll be working with over the coming weeks.

St. Anne’s Community Services is a charity based in Leeds that provides a huge variety of services to many groups, from the homeless to those with mental health problems, from asylum seekers to people with substance abuse issues. In 2014 (see my previous Charity Insights blog posts!) I carried out a project at St. Anne’s that was focused on Alcohol Related Brain Damage, or ARBD, in the homeless. I really enjoyed working with the team at St. Anne’s and really admired the (often difficult) work that they do, so it’s no surprise that I’m back again!

This year, my project is focused on Spice, a synthetic cannabinoid that, until May 26th, was classified as a ‘legal high’. Before this date, it was legal to sell Spice in the UK, so it could be purchased on the internet and even in shops. Due to increasing concerns about the effects of Spice on both the physical and mental health of its users, on May 26th this year it became illegal to sell it, or to possess with intent to sell.

Spice comes in hundreds of different varieties, is relatively cheap, and can have a huge range of effects, most of which are not desirable. These range from black-outs, anxiety and a racing heart to seizures, psychosis and even death.

So where does my project come into all this? During my time at St. Anne’s in 2014 I spoke to quite a few service users who had mentioned Spice. I didn’t know what it was, so decided to investigate. After speaking to the staff and doing some research of my own, I realised just how serious this problem was, especially amongst the homeless. Worryingly, because Spice has only begun to be abused relatively recently, there is little or no data available on its use, long-term and short-term effects.

During my internship this year, then, I will be gathering information from service users at St. Anne’s (who are homeless or what we call ‘vulnerably housed’) about their experiences with Spice. In addition, I will also be working closely with the staff to gauge their knowledge and experience of the drug and its effects. The aim is to help St. Anne’s understand how and why the homeless are using Spice, if they contact the emergency services as a result, and how they are obtaining it now that the law has changed. We also want to ensure that the staff have all the knowledge they need to identify someone who has taken Spice, and ensure that they receive the appropriate care. It’s a challenging area, but it’s so important that we learn more about this really worrying trend.

If you want to find out a bit about the effects of taking Spice, watch the episode of ‘999: What’s Your Emergency?’ that was broadcast on 11th July 2016 on Channel 4. It shows how the emergency services are trying to deal with the devastating effects of legal highs, and is a bit of an eye opener. Take a look.

Save the Rhino: The Importance of Image

Save the Rhino is a small charity which has a vision for all five species of rhino to thrive in the wild for future generations to enjoy. They do this by funding a variety of programmes in Africa and Asia. I have been working part time for Save the Rhino for three weeks now, totaling six days and you’d be surprised at how much you can learn in so little time.

My passion is conservation and once I had already experienced other routes of conservation, such as field work and zoo programmes, I wanted to turn towards charities. I’m lucky enough to have two supervisors which allows me to focus on two areas of charity work, these are events and corporate relationships. This means I have a large variety of tasks, every day is different, so no excuses for boredom!

However, what has struck me is the importance of large events for small charities such as Save the Rhino. That may seem obvious to you but I don’t think you realise quite how prepared we are. The London Marathon is Save the Rhino’s largest event and even though it is not taking place again until April 2017, my first task when I sat in that office was to update the London Marathon webpage and everyday since, there has been a task dedicated to it.

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If you didn’t know, Save the Rhino is famous amongst the London Marathon runners because of its iconic and pretty awesome rhino costumes (if you want that extra challenge when already running a 42km race). They weigh 8-10kg and you can’t see far ahead as the rhino head obstructs your view.

My work at Save the Rhino hasn’t been marked by the tasks that I’m doing but about the image a charity creates. The London Marathon is so important to Save the Rhino not only because it raises important funds but also because it follows their image of endurance and extreme sports, ultimately this comes through in all the work that I do with Save the Rhino – this is what everything revolves around.

St John Ambulance – First Week

Hello from sunny Bristol!

St John Ambulance (SJA) is the nation’s leading first aid charity, training over 400,000 people on life-saving first aid skills every year. SJA volunteers provide first aid cover across the country for all sorts of events, big and small, as well as working alongside the NHS in responding to 999 calls.

I have been with the organisation for over 14 years now, starting at the age of six when I joined as a ‘badger’ (the name for SJA’s youngest members). I then became a cadet at the age of 10 and I am now currently an operational first aider, helping to provide first aid treatment to thousands of members of the public at various events. Each year SJA as an organisation treat many thousands of casualties, with the South West Region treating over 2400 patients during the 5579 events covered in 2015.

The aim of my project is to analyse the injury data from the events covered in South West Region during 2015 to identify any patterns or trends in injury occurrence which may help SJA to reflect how volunteers are trained going forward. I also intend to identify high-risk events where particular injuries occur, with the vision of providing more specific training to volunteers in these areas, allowing for the optimal care and treatment of our patients.

During my first few days so far I have been using SJA’s online platform ‘DIPS’ (Duty and Information Planning System) to trawl through hundreds of events covered by Central District (one of the five districts that make up South West Region) and extract the information I need to fulfil the aims of my project. Having created a spreadsheet of the data, I have been able to present this data visually in the form of graphs and charts, which will be included in my report detailing the results/findings of this project. Tomorrow, I need to contact the unit managers across the South West region to ask for their first aid training programmes (so I can compare the first aid taught to volunteers against the typical injuries treated) and also create a survey that I plan to distribute to volunteers to gain an insight into their experience of treating patients whilst out on duty. Hopefully this will allow me to analyse the results of the survey as I enter the second week of the project.

The week so far has certainly been insightful. It is interesting to see the different types of events covered by SJA and the areas that are ‘higher risk’ for more serious injuries. It has also been an opportunity to experience working in an office environment on a 9-5 daily basis. Although having known some of the staff here for many years, there are still new people I meet each day and I’m made to feel very welcome (I was even given my own desk space, computer and had a swipe pass made, so felt just like one of the team!).

To complete this post, here’s a recent throwback to when I made my SJA debut at Lords. Today is the first day of the England vs Pakistan test match at Lords Cricket Ground, which is where you’d probably find me (if I were not in the office here in Bristol!), helping to provide first aid cover for the 29000 spectators at the home of cricket!

Lords Pitch Side

 

My first week at Anthony Nolan

Anthony Nolan save the lives of people with blood cancers or blood disorders by matching individuals willing to donate their blood stem cells or bone marrow to people who need lifesaving transplants.

I first got marrow (2)involved with Anthony Nolan through Marrow at Imperial. This is Anthony Nolan’s University Branch and we run recruitment events to sign people up to the register, fundraise and spread the word about how easy it can be to save somebodies life. Next year I will even be taking the plunge along with a whole group of nationwide marrow volunteers and jumping out of a plane to raise as much money as possible. It’s a society well worth being a part of.

The goal of my charity insights project is to increase new donor engagement with Anthony Nolan particularly to increase interaction with young men online. This group is targeted because 50% of donations come from young men while they only make up 15% of the register. In 2015-16 only 27% of all online applications came from young men. This needs to be changed by creating engaging content on platforms that young men are influenced by.

During the first week I have been analysing the current research Anthony Nolan has done as well as looking at different methods by which they could increase awareness around the charity. This could be done through livestreaming events and looking for vloggers/bloggers who may be willing to discuss Anthony Nolan with their audience.

I also have used the opportunity to explore different aspects of the charity. On Tuesday I had the opportunity to meet a donor and it was inspiring to meet someone willing to do something so selfless. Later that evening I had another interesting experience in the form of a spit kit social. To add people to the register they must first be tissue typed which requires a spit sample. At the social the tubes required for this are individually labelled by volunteers before being packed up and sent out. I didn’t appreciate the effort required until I’d labelled and packed a bag of 70 kits!

I have learnt a lot about the charity in this past week and what impressed me the most was how much everyone I have met cares about the charity and not only the patients that they aid but the donors too. Great care is taken of the donors from getting a visit from a volunteer during donation to travel and accommodation for them and a friend being paid for and follow up phone calls a few days and weeks after donation.

Anthony Nolan has been an amazing charity to work for. Before the first day I was nervous as I knew the style of working would be very different to anything I had experienced before but as soon as I arrived at the office I was put at ease by the friendliness of the staff and I soon adjusted to the offices way of working (though I’m not sure me or my bladder can get used to drinking so many cups of tea). I look forward to the next three weeks.

Future Frontiers

Since my last post, lots has happened. In fact, time has flown by and I can’t quite believe it’s my final week.

Alongside my projects, I have been helping to organise one of our coaching sessions for sixth former’s at a local law firm. Normally, we train students to be our coaches but in this unique case, we have trained lawyers. The students seem really keen and this week they were having speaking on Skype with all kinds of professional experts as part of the program; solicitors, aerospace engineers, robotics engineers, graphic designers. The program has been a real success.

Task 2: Coach Quiz 

Over the past couple of weeks I have steered away from task 1 as I awaited the decision to purchase the necessary software. Instead, I have been working on creating an induction quiz for new coaches to complete as part of their training.

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It’s a fairly simple quiz. Coaches are verified using their email and simply cannot move on until they get a question correct. At the end, the completion of the quiz is logged so future frontiers can keep track of who has completed it.

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If you aren’t authorised to complete the training, you will see this message.

authNames are stored alongside the email addresses to give a personalised greeting.

incorrectA user can’t move on until their answer is correct.

correctyOnce the question is answered correctly, the next button appears.

doneWhen it’s finally over, the coaches will see this well deserved ‘well done’ message.

But all this is pretty useless unless somebody can keep track of who has done the quiz! That’s where the control page comes in.

control panel

On this page you can see a list of all of the coaches who have been asked to do the quiz and whether they have completed it or not. As you can see, all coaches have an email address and full name, giving me the ability to make the personalised greeting message shown above.

The page makes it possible to do the following

  1. Log in/ Log out securely so that only those authorised to access the page can
  2. Add a new coach to the list
  3. Delete a specific coach from the list
  4. Delete all coaches who have completed the quiz from the list
  5. Search the list. For example, for coaches working in a specific school:search

I’d like to add more functionality to the control panel. For example, being able to add or remove questions, or being able to ‘undo’ a deleted coach. Alas, this project has been forced to be put on pause while I work on task 1 again.

Technology specific detour: For anybody interested, I decided to use PHP, MySQL and Javascript/JQuery for my quiz. Having little to no experience with back end web development, I knew that there was lots of support online for these and, as I had a fairly short time period, decided this would be the best option. Now that I am more familiar with the concepts, I hope to move on to some more modern technologies in the future…

 

Internship at London Wetland Centre – continuation.

I am in the middle of my internship at London Wetland Centre. I have finished sampling in the field and now I am moving on to data analysis and writing my report for WWT about ladybirds at LWC. Fieldwork was quite intense, it took 9 consecutive days of sampling, interrupted by the moody weather. Still, on most of the days I managed to sample throughout the whole day, but sometimes I had to stop after 2h due to rain. I must admit that I really enjoyed fieldwork – I was outside all the time and in the very pleasant surroundings, which fully compensated the repetitiveness of the actions that I had to undertake to collect enough data. Also, the working environment at London Wetland Centre is very good. Everyone is really nice and engaged in their work.

The choice of the right method that would enable me to achieve my aim, was occupying me for the first week of my internship. I eventually decided that for this habitat the best method would be so-called tree beating. This means that in order to sample I was holding a beating tray underneath a tree branch while hitting the same branch with a stick for a certain number of times and then examining what species of ladybirds, if any, were captured on the tray. I was also looking at ants and spiders that are natural enemies of ladybirds and at aphids that are ladybirds’ food. As sampling was going along, I noticed some limitations to my method, which I will now have to consider in my report. For the last part of my internship I will focus on analysing collected data. I will look at the proportional abundance of different species in ladybirds community at London Wetland Centre and the effect of the presence of aphids and natural enemies on the abundance and species richness of ladybirds.

While I was doing my fieldwork I got a chance to see how many visitors LWC has every day and what a wide range of activities is offered to them. I understood how important role LWC plays in educating people about wetlands and natural environment in general. They offer plenty of interactive educational tools for kids to learn about the most interesting species inhabiting wetlands, but also to learn about sustainable ways of living and the consequences of people’s irresponsible actions to the environment. My work also generated quite a lot of interest. Many visitors, especially children were intrigued by what I was doing and I had to answer loads of questions.

However, London Wetland Centre is important not only for its educational role, but also for improving the quality of Londoners’ lives. This peaceful area with thriving wildlife provides a great place to rest from the noise of the city. There are many bird watching points and a lot of benches all over the place where you can sit if you are tired of walking and simply enjoy the nature. LWC truly is a wonderful place!

(Unfortunate) First Week on the Job

My first week at Pure Leapfrog.

The first days were filled with the excitement of new days, people, and feelings as I was, for the first time, thrust into life as an “adult”. I have never held down a full 9-5pm job and Pure Leapfrog will be my make or break foray into life as a worker bee.

When I first walked in the startup vibe was impossible to miss. The long labyrinthine route to the little nook in Shand Street that gave way to a cavernous work-space remade underneath a working train line (Oh there goes the 4:30 train). The place is makeshift, and endearing in the way that only a place made by people can be. As I settled into my desk space surrounded by startups, and cool young people engaged in their passion and desire to change the world for the better, a message pops up on my phone “Leave vote gaining”. I push it aside and get ready for the tasks at hand.

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During the week, I had to adjust to the people, and picked up the habit of tea drink (see Image above) and talking politics with my co-workers.

I was tasked with creating an infographic/map for the company that clearly demonstrates the state of community energy today. In addition, I have to work with a team mate to prepare a dossier for the CEO to aid in attracting funders for a meeting in two weeks.

I threw myself at these tasks(at first).

Nonetheless, the week progresses, holes appear in roof of the workplace letting water from the harsh rain above pour into our work space (see below attempts to fix the issue) as if mirroring the holes that have appeared in my enthusiasm and drive allowing the laziness and drift to seep in. Nonetheless, progress is good and tasks are being completed.

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It is now the after on Thursday 23 June 2016 and my tea has run out and so too have the tasks for the day. It is 4pm and the late day procrastination has set it and with it the discussion of the future of the United Kingdom’s place in the superstructure that is the European Union (EU).

I overhear a conversation between my co-workers and decide to ask: “Hey guys isn’t weird that this whole campaign has been called ‘Brexit’, as if to frame the choice in the voters mind to leave?” My co-worker replies “Huh, I’ve never thought about that… though I do think it stems from the fact that people are being asked whether they want to leave.” I counter by mentioning ” Wouldn’t it have been better to call the vote ‘Bremain’ to frame it as a choice of whether to STAY or go rather than to GO or stay?”. “After all one only needs to read a page of Daniel Kahneman’s Think Fast, Think Slow to see how susceptible we are to framing and conditioning”. She looks at me puzzled and says “Huh, I’ve never thought about that. Anyways I don’t we will vote to leave” . That was where we left that conversation.

It is Friday morning and we all know just how wrong she was. The pound risen then fallen, the markets swooning, and financial experts nervously muttering “Is this another Lehman”?

What about Pure Leapfrog, this charity nestled amongst the many startups on 26 Shand Street. What of my dreams of innovating within the community energy sector and trumpeting the advantages of community ownership and initiative. What of my CEO, and co-workers? And indeed, what of these now embittered unions?

I turn to my fellow co-worker and ask looking for reassurance, “What do you think will happen?”

He looks back and says “What right-wing government has ever voted for community energy?”

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Introduction to Future Frontiers

Future Frontiers is a charity which trains up undergraduates to become careers coaches for pupils in high school and sixth form. The coaches run an 8 week programme for an hour a week with the pupils and guide them towards having a clear career goal in mind. Midway through all of this the children speak to professional experts, via Skype, and ask them questions about the career they are considering. The programme has caused a great increase in academic progress for the majority of participants.

At the end of the programme the pupils and coaches produce what we call an ‘academic plan’ which outlines what the pupil has to do academically to reach their dream job in the future. At the moment this is all done in paper and the bulk of the information is lost over time. Herein lies my first task: creating a digital version of the academic plan to aid manageability and so we can store the data over time.

Task 1: Academic Plan

Now this is where I could probably include a bunch of technical jargon. I’ll try not to do that, partially because anyone familiar with the inner workings would soon start to wonder why anyone trusted me with anything technical in the first place. This is what I am trying to recreate:

academic_plan

My first idea was to create the academic plan as a web page which could then be downloaded as a PDF once the necessary information had been filled in. This is what I spent my week working on, researching existing software I could use to export the page as PDF and anything else which would make my task as easy as possible.

I found an online piece of code which was actually really handy for what I wanted to do called Cloud Formatter. It was all going quite well and according to plan, until we discovered Adobe Acrobat Pro. Basically, it’s a piece of software which is going to make my job easier by allowing me to easily create fillable PDF forms and store them. It meant my existing work was redundant, but this is probably for the best seeing as I was stuck figuring out why my web page was starting to look pretty good, yet my PDF… was not.

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So at least that’s one headache I have managed to avoid.

 

 

First week at the London Wetland Centre

WWT (Wildfowl & Wetlands Trust) is a conservation charity that aims to sustainably manage and protect wetlands and species associated with this particualar type of habitat, as well as educate people about the importance of wetland environment. The charity runs 9 nature reserves across the country and one of them is located in west London. What I like about LWC (London Wetland Centre) is the fact that there is such a nice nature reserve in this big city and also that WWT fantastically combines their scientific mission with being very open to the public.

First day of my internship at (LWC) started with a short induction. I have already been introduced to the main bits during my last visit here when I met my supervisor to discuss the Charity Insights application, so the induction was pretty straightforward and I could move on to the implementation of the plan of my internship. My project is basically an ecological research, which aims to determine the structure of ladybird community at LWC and investigate the competition between invasive harlequin ladybird and native ladybird species. It will help WWT with keeping record of the biodiversity at LWC.

I started with doing preliminary observation – I was walking around LWC and carefully examining the vegetation in terms of presence and absence of ladybirds. I was marking on the map sites where I spotted ladybirds and I will return to these sits later on to do the quantitative sampling for my project. Spending the whole day in the wetland area gave me the feeling of the atmosphere at LWC. It is quite a busy place, there are a lot of school trips, families with small kids and older people – everyone coming there to enjoy the wildlife.

After completing preliminary observation, which gave me a good idea of the habitat that I will be studying, I was sat in the office to design the methods for my research. It is an interesting experience, as I have never worked in the office before, so it is a completely new working environment for me.

I think the beginning is the most difficult stage of my project – deciding on the right procedure to collect the precise, accurate and useful data that will allow me to answer the research question and then first day of sampling, when I have to implement the procedure that I wrote down and discussed with the supervisor into practice. But I am really looking forward to collecting the data. I want to see if my hypotheses are true and I am going to spend the next week outside in this beautiful place. I hope the weather will be good!

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Charity Insights Participants 2016!

charities

This year, the bar for the standard of Charity Insights was raised yet again, with our applicants proposing some excellent projects. As a result, we had to make some tough decisions to get from our pool of over 40 applications to the smaller number of bursaries available. After a highly competitive process, we are very happy to announce that we will be awarding 22 Charity Insights bursaries to students this summer!

This year’s participants are:

It has been amazing to hear from all the students about the range of projects they will be undertaking this summer and, of course, their progress will be recorded right here on this blog.

Good luck to all this year’s Charity Insights participants!