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Jack Petchey Awards

Girlguiding London South West is one of the organisations that benefits hugely from the Jack Petchey Foundation, something that makes a big difference to our girls. The Foundation was started in 1999 by Jack Petchey to raise the aspirations of young people and to help them take advantage of opportunities and play a part in our society. As a hugely influential business man who started work (somewhat illegally!) at the age of 12, Jack is a great role model for any aspiring young business person – more details can be found on the Foundation’s own site – www.jackpetcheyfoundation.org.uk

Every Unit has the chance to nominate a girl or leader between the ages of 11 and 25 for an award and once a year we have a LSW ceremony to congratulate the winners where they are presented with their medal and certificate by an upstanding member of one of our boroughs – Wandsworth or Lambeth. Below are a few pictures from our 2011 ceremony, and click here for details of our 2013 ceremony in the Royal Festival Hall. Each winner receives a cheque for £200 to spend on and with their unit, choices have included trips to Chessington World of Adventures, new tents for camp, horse riding and any other number of special treats! This year one of our Streatham Units took a trip to the South Downs Way – click here for their story

Jack Petchey doesn’t just benefit the units directly, but has a wider positive impact on Guiding in London South West.  We also nominate our leaders for awards as without them we wouldn’t be able to carry on our work. These leaders can then apply for grants of £500 to help on a special project or event.  With past grants we’ve bought some new camp equipment and tents to furnish our Battersea site at Cudham campsite, and run some fantastic events including dancing days, craft days, trips out to London attractions and everything in between! Between our districts, we can apply for up to £4,00 a year which is a fantastic extra to keep our units going and keep on doing more and more exciting things to benefit our girls.

The 3rd part of Guiding that the Jack Petchey Foundation has helped is our international side. Our Croatia team who travelled in the Summer of 2011 benefited from the volunteering award, and our Romania trip in 2013 has also benefitted.

Overall, in the last years we have seen some fantastic award ceremonies at both Wandsworth and Lambeth town Halls, an amazing joint ceremony with London South East at the Royal Festival Hall, had some extremely worthy winners, and have used our grants from the Jack Petchey Foundation to the max!

Clapham & Clapham Park Winners

 

Streatham Winners