Newsletter
Carol singing at St. George’s Church.
St. George’s Church in Edgbaston (at the junction of Calthorpe, Highfield and Westbourne Roads) are holding two carol services over the coming weeks as follows:
- Light Up The World – Tuesday 4th December 2012 at 6pm.
- Office Carols Service – Thursday 13th December 2012 at 1:15pm-1:45pm.
All are welcome to attend and refreshments and mince pies will be available afterwards! Our Chief Executive Martin Holcombe will be attending to speak about Birmingham Settlement and collections will be made to support our work. This is a great opportunity to attend a fun event while also supporting Birmingham Settlement.
Tristan’s story: Gaining new knowledge from a work experience placement.
“My name is Tristan and I have been on a six week placement at Birmingham Settlement. It has been a great experience learning new skills and meeting new people. I have done a wide range of admin duties and have worked with the Fundraising and Communications team mainly. I use a database called Harlequin to input data entry like client donation sheets for Gift Aid. The duties I have been doing include:
- Learning what Gift Aid is,
- Inputting new donors on the database,
- Gift Aid donation sheets in a spreadsheet,
- Making judgements about what information to include.
- Mystery Shopper feedback sheets in a Word document,
- I put letters and booklets in envelopes to be posted,
- I also phoned some of the charity shops to get information for donor sheets,
- I learned about the importance of financial codes/campaigns for post etc to help monitor/report where money has come from and gone,
- I got taught how to upload pictures and videos on the blog and on the Birmingham settlement website as well.
- I learned about ways of Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) including adding links and tags to posts to the blog.
- I learned about customising privacy settings and using features such as ‘embargo’ to decide what people can see.
- I learned about different tools and software to help set up and run a website.
It has been a worthwhile thing to do. I have enjoyed my time here and I have gained some new knowledge about the different systems they use in the office for each team as well.”
Birmingham Settlement attends the Freemasons Lodge of Happiness Ladies Evening.
Worshipful Master Steve Tector with Chris Doolan and Laura Kemp
The local Birmingham Freemasons Lodge of Happiness invited our Chair of the Board, Chris Doolan, and Fundraising Officer, Laura Kemp, to join them at their Ladies Dinner Event.
The event was held at the Freemasons Lodge in Edgbaston and saw members of the Lodge invite their partners and wives along to join them for an evening of dining.
We were privileged to be a part of the event, and to represent Birmingham Settlement. Worshipful Master of the Lodge, Steve Tector, previously owned a printing business through which he came to know of the Settlement. We were delighted to be able to take the floor for a few minutes to tell everyone a little about our work and our history in the city, and everyone responded by donating a very generous £352.00 towards our work.
The Warwickshire Masonic Charitable Association has been supporting the work of Birmingham Settlement since 2007 and to date have donated almost £2,000. We’re delighted to have such a great relationship with the group and hope it continues for many years to come.
Settlement Stories – Annual Review 2011
In 2011 we had the pleasure of working with lots of people in lots of situations. Looking back on the year, we decided that our annual review should concentrate on telling some of the stories from people we’ve met who’ve inspired us, helped us or simply made us smile. Download our Annual Review 2011to read more about the all the fantastic things that happened to us last year!
Give your unwanted items to a Settlement Shop near you!
Our seven shops across the city are desperate for new item donations. If you have any unwanted clothes, books, toys, etc lying around your house, please come and drop them into us! In particular, our shops in Erdington and Newtown need additional donations as soon as possible. If you’re having a house clearance and have a lot of items to donate we can arrange for the items to be collected for you. We also have a constant need for carrier bags for use in our shops, so please give your spares to us as well! If you are interested in donating items please contact the shop closest to you directly – see our shops page for details. If you’re a UK taxpayer (pay income tax or capital gains tax) be sure to ask for your items to be Gift Aided – this means we can claim the tax back and earn an extra 25% on your donation at no cost to you!