On Friday 2 May, Year 12 (A3) pupils slept out for one night on our floodlit astroturf in order to raise funds for YMCA Bournemouth.
On one of the warmest nights of the year to date (though still rather chilly at 5am!), one hundred and seven A3s collectively raised £11,541 through this charitable endeavour. This is the fourth year Bryanston has supported this charity event and numbers supporting the initiative continue to grow each year.
YMCA Bournemouth works hard to raise awareness about homelessness locally and tackles the hardships of homelessness through various support schemes. In order to raise understanding and much-needed funds, it encourages young people ‘to sleep out for one night so that others do not have to’.
We welcomed YMCA representatives at the end of last year to deliver an Assembly on homelessness amongst young people in our area. This had a real impact on our pupils and kickstarted the charity support for 2025.
Our Whole School Walk launched the YMCA fundraising, with 10 rowers running the 10km and raising money through sponsorship. Others baked cakes to raise money at checkpoints on the walk.
On the night, pupils were required to make individual cardboard homes to sleep in, provided by YMCA Bournemouth. Event sponsor Steele Raymond and Head Richard Jones judged the making of the cardboard homes and ranked the shelters for best effort.
Tim Stone, Chairman of Steele Raymond, helped judge the competition and commented:
- First place: ‘The Box Cave’ – led by Sarah. “This was an excellent example of careful, well thought through construction, together with some nice finishing touches. In particular, it was a stand-alone construction and did not use any other external items like goals or perimeter netting.”
- Second place: ‘The Shelter Shaylas’ – led by Tara. “This was a very well-constructed stand-alone shelter.”
- Third place: ‘The Hippie’s Hide Out’ – Josh. “This stood out as it was a well-constructed stand-alone shelter for one! Josh mentioned that he uses similar methods when camping out at festivals and it was a really good example of solo camping on a budget!”
Head Richard Jones also helped judge the competition and ranked his favourite shelters:
- First place – a shelter with fairy lights, by Poppy, Jenna, Jasmine and Sancha.
- Second place – a shelter by Sarah, Claudia and Anna.
Catering organised for hot chocolates to be delivered later in the evening and provided biscuits before bed, and Steele Raymond sorted a delivery of Domino’s Pizzas.
Head of Charities and Outreach, Hannah Fearnley, commented: “A sense of community is at the heart of a Bryanston education and this project has had a huge impact on our pupils. They have raised awareness about homelessness in young people of their own age and have made great efforts to raise money to provide homes for those in need. We have surpassed last year’s total and indeed every other school in our area – this is a great achievement, and we hope it will make a meaningful difference. We’d like to take this opportunity to say a huge thanks to our Bryanston family and friends for their support of the pupils.”
YMCA Chief Executive Gareth Sherwood called Doc Fearnley at the beginning of the week to congratulate Bryanston, commenting on our record-breaking fundraising amount of money raised by any school.
