AGENDA
We did it!
Solar panel success and an arts festival
‘Our charity single helped pay for the school’s solar panels’
O
ur children’s school, Barn Croft Primary, was facing funding cuts and a budget deficit – it didn’t have
enough money for basic items such as art supplies, pens or paper. I hadn’t been involved with the PTA much before, but I felt really annoyed about the situation, so I went to a meeting with my partner, artist Hilary Powell, to see if we could help. We’re filmmakers, and we run a
Community Interest Company called Optimistic Foundation that has crowdfunded solar panels on 16 houses in our street. We suggested to the PTA that we could do the same for the school, which would save thousands in energy costs. To raise the money we needed, we
came up with the idea of recording a Christmas single with all the pupils, and trying to get it to number one. Hilary chose the song You’re the Voice by John Farnham, because the
lyrics are all about empowerment and sticking up for something that’s important to you. A neighbour helped us make a music video showing the pupils singing and holding banners protesting against the funding cuts. It’s hard to resist giving to cute little children singing and saying they need money for their education. Additionally, we made a short
documentary explaining why we felt it was important for people to donate to our cause, ran Facebook ads and set up a crowdfunder. Some members of the PTA were quite well connected in the media, and they helped get the song onto radio and TV, including BBC London, ITV, Channel 4 News and Al Jazeera. Soon people were donating from all
around the UK, not just the local area. We watched in awe as the single reached number 19 in the iTunes charts. Within a month we had hit
our crowdfunder target of £50,000! We linked up with Solar for Schools, a social impact business that develops solar projects in schools, and they provided additional funding and took care of the solar panel installation process. Frustratingly, it then took about a
A neighbour helped us make a music video showing the pupils singing and holding banners
protesting against the funding cuts
year to get the panels installed, because the council owns the school building and was initially reluctant to allow it. In the meantime, we installed solar panels at three other schools in the borough and initiated conversations with yet more. The panels at Barn Croft are finally in, and this month we’re going into the school for a special celebration. The children are going to sing the song again in assembly, and we’re going to play a video that will remind them how they took action and made this happen. It’s all down to them. Dan Edelstyn, former member of Friends of Barn Croft, Walthamstow, London (213 pupils)
School Fundraising AUTUMN 2024 11
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