We are delighted to share a blog written by student Amelie Boyer from St Clare’s Oxford, who is part of a team delivering a Global Goals project for the 2019-20 Global Goals Competition.
Their project is among over 957 social action projects currently running as part of the GSL movement and we are excited to be supporting them to design and lead positive social change in their community.
This journey with GSL has sparked our enthusiasm, improved our team dynamics and most importantly shown us that we can truly create change together if we work hard.
Project Overview
We are a group of students in Oxford and were all deeply shocked when we grasped the magnitude of homelessness in the city. We couldn’t look away anymore and started collecting food donations all over our college and went to the city center to hand them out every weekend. We set up boxes, took them to the city center and borrowed a shopping cart from Tesco’s to distribute the donations.
After the first year, we gained a better understanding of the issue and connected with more individuals by attending lectures about the issue in Oxford University and raising awareness. We have now established a permanent collaboration with Crisis, a national Charity which included a Christmas project, collecting sanitary products, clothes and food where we ended up filling more than 30 boxes as Christmas gifts.
We have now set this Project up as a CAS activity that we are leading at our school, to get more people involved and have a greater impact.
Our Journey
We still can’t believe how much our project has grown, that we have met so many organizations and established cooperation’s, have talked so much about this issue and have reached so many people. We grew together a lot as a team and every time the logistics of collecting hundreds of items a week seemed impossible and stressful, we reminded each other why we are doing this.
We do it because we all care so much about these people and want to acknowledge our privilege responsibly. It is extremely stressful to gather all the donations from all over the campus, register them and then check their expiry date, sort them out, stay in contact with Crisis and work on new ideas and go to the city center every weekend while doing the IB. We have now managed to realize what our strengths are and now we divide the workload efficiently and always motivate each other.
The Next Chapter
All in all, this has been one of the greatest experiences in our lives. We finally feel that we can have a real impact and have learned so much about ourselves in the process of building this project, which applies to all of us team members. It is so important to realize how lucky most of us are and take responsibility in giving to others in need.
We encourage everyone, no matter how young or insignificant you feel to try to be part of creating a change in some way, no matter how small it might seem to you. Don’t let anyone tell you that you are an unrealistic dreamer or are too young to care about these issues. As Steve Jobs said “the people who are crazy enough to think that they can change the world are the ones who do.“
Social Media Channels
The 2019-20 GSL Global Goals Competition is now open and runs until June 2020. If you belong to one of the 700+ teams of students currently delivering a social action project as part of the competition we would love to hear from you and feature your blog and project photos on our website to inspire others.
