A six-week £15,000 crowdfunding campaign
to maintain Escape Youth Services was achieved earlier this week, providing the best possible Christmas present for the hundreds
of youngsters benefitting from the five-night-a-week provision.
Staff revealed the news to members at their Christmas parties on Tuesday, leaving the youngsters jumping
for joy, while manager Sian Snowdon said she had been “humbled” by the level of community support.
initiative has been backed by a series of fund-raising initiatives in recent weeks driven by the 11-strong staff team. A three-day pop-up shop raised over £1,000, a craft stall at
the Hawick Community Council Christmas market generated £250 and a two- day Santa’s Grotto last weekend realised around £800.
The good news continued this week with the Co-op Foundation’s Warm and Well Fund agreeing to match-fund donations, alongside an existing match fund through the Aviva Community Fund, meaning that all gifts are now trebled.
fund closes, the aim is to now smash the £20,000 barrier.
Speaking on Wednesday, Sian, who has been at the helm of Escape for 17 years, said: “When we launched the crowdfunding drive in November, we were very nervous about what lay ahead. But we have been humbled by the level of support.
“We faced a funding
dip of three to six months before our next round of funding comes through in May. We have other funding applications pending, but
I have never experienced a period like this for obtaining funds.
She added: “Many
organisations are in the same boat at the same time, with everyone starting
up again following the pandemic. For the funding we have accessed to begin in May, we were one of 100 successful grantees from 1,000 applications.”
Assistant manager Andrew Shields said: “Since we returned to face-to-
face youth work after the pandemic, our attendance numbers have jumped. Our numbers for our P6/7 night on a Tuesday in particular have skyrocketed.”
Escape Youth Services was set up as a charity in 2004, before opening as
a youth café in February 2005 at Buccleuch Street. Just months after opening they were hit by the serious flooding in the Sandbed area.
After briefly moving to premises in Commercial Road, they found a new home at the former Hawick
Youth Centre building in Havelock Street in 2015.
Sian said: “It cost around £150,000 to operate the service each year, including staff salaries, and leasing and maintaining the building. The £15,000 allows us to maintain our five-night weekly service, but to achieve our new £20,000 target would allow us to introduce extra group work and address needs within local schools.”
Andrew added: “The crowdfunding was slow initially, but we received
an anonymous £1,000 donation, closely followed by an incredible £2,000 donation from Emtelle. This really gave us the belief that we could achieve our challenge. We have also been touched by all the donations from across the community, including The Hawick Paper.
“It is community recognition of what we are doing.”
Sian said: “There is
no doubt our presence at the former youth centre has also played a big part. There is a real community affection for this building, which has a real history attached to it. We have also received lots of feedback both on Facebook and on our crowdfunding page.
A cookbook – created by staff and members – launched by Escape last month has also sold out, generating a further £500.
Sian added: “We are still on the lookout for any new board members who would like to support the work we do, while in the New Year we will be launching a new Friends of Escape Services which we hope parents will join. This will allow us to establish helpers for some of our community fund- raising events.”
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