Personal Group Update

We asked our lovely friends over at Personal Group to give us an update on their exciting plans for Memusi:

The last few months have been nothing short of astronomical for Personal Group. Just when we thought things couldn’t get any better, our Memusi Committee have proved us wrong!

The Committee is made up of staff who have been on trips, are going to volunteer or just want to make a difference here in Milton Keynes. The purpose of the Committee (headed up by Andy Finikin), is to raise awareness and funds at the Personal Group office to help Memusi in any way possible.

The vision of the committee was small to begin with- just to raise awareness. But over time the team has seen fantastic efforts from the likes of Liz (secretary) Anne- Marie (finance) Vijay, Kerry, Bu, Lucia, Rebecca, Katie and many more that have changed the way we support Memusi.

Thanks to the Committee we have a variety of streams. The streams are areas we know that we can make a difference in - so far we have the Sports Stream, Female Hygiene Stream, Schools interaction and Pen Pals stream and the Container Stream.

The two streams that have really taken off are the Container/Library and Female Hygiene Stream. The first plan is to get a container that we can ship off to Memusi and thanks to The Peel Group, this dream has become a reality! We have started a collection of books that we hope to continue so that when our next trip goes over in October, they will be bringing a fully functioning library with them in the form of a container full of books and goods not only for the school but for the community as well!

Female Hygiene was an area that came up in general conversation with Matthew, so we wanted to help in this area based on very simplistic values. With further exploration and development this stream has now become one of our Memusi constants for our trips. Volunteers from the committee started off with a donut sale to raise funds in order to create packs for the girls in school. Normally, the girls would run the risk of becoming victims, missing out on school or just not knowing what is happening to their bodies. We wanted to help raise awareness and thanks to the fantastic work of Kerry, Rebecca and Lucia, over 700 pairs of underwear were donated in the space of one week! On the most recent trip Sara, Katie, and Caitlynn took time to sit with the girls in school and talk over feminine hygiene and explain how to use their packs that had been made by Personal Group staff.

Our Sports Stream has also been a huge success. Our June group of volunteers brought out some fantastic sports equipment as well as football kits sourced by Dave Walker provided by MK Dons - watch this space for more fantastic sports developments in the coming months on the sports front.

The initial goal from the Memusi Committee was to raise £6000-£8000 this year. Whilst the donations are well underway and our target is set to be smashed, the committee has achieved much more than donations. The achievements could be measured in volunteer hours from the committee, female hygiene packs made for the girls. But what it boils down to is that this group of very inspiring and special individuals are raising awareness and making a difference.