School is sowing the seeds of hope

HOW DEDICATED STAFF ARE USING SPECIAL FUNDING TO GIVE CHILDREN A CHANCE

- By EMMA GILL

WHEN staff noticed items were going missing from a primary school, they thought little of it.

A highlighter, some pens, a glue stick, all basic items children typically use in class. But when they discovered who was taking them and why, the reason was heartbreaking.

After some gentle questioning, headteacher Razia Shah discovered the child loved to draw but had nothing at home to use - no colouring pens, no paper, nothing.

She quickly supplied the youngster with a pencil case containing everything they'd need to get creative at home.

It's knowing the children and community so well that Razia says makes St Augustine’s CE Primary School in Monsall, North Manchester, what it is - a safe haven from their often poverty-stricken home lives in one of Manchester's most deprived neighbourhoods.

Staff see the children who have very little in their lunchboxes - “a very sad lunchbox with a bun, maybe a bit of rice”.

They see the children’s shoes that are falling apart. They see the kids still wearing hand-me-down fleeces and jumpers given to older siblings when the school needed to boost ventilation during the pandemic.

But most importantly they can do something about it thanks to funding they receive through the INEOS Forgotten 40 Project, a charitable initiative hoping to improve the lives of children growing up in some of the poorest parts of the UK.

The name Forgotten 40 refers to the estimated number of children living in poverty in the UK alone, predicted to be growing towards 40%.