Monday 9th May to Friday 13th May marked the 'Make Poverty History' week in Slemish College.

Mr Bennett, with the support of the Geography department aimed to raise awareness on this issue throughout the school.   During assemblies on Monday and Wednesday, he showed different videos that helped to explain why we are pushing for poverty to disappear this year. 

He also outlined 3 ways that students in Slemish could support this very good cause:

• On Monday every student in school was given a white band that they could wear all week to show their support.  They were encouraged by form teachers to write a comment and their name on this band.  These bands were collected in during assembly on Friday and are going to be put together in a collage which will be sent to Tony Blair. 
• On Friday the school is operating a non-uniform day where we are raising money for some of the development projects run by Tear Fund.  At breaktime the sixth form are helping to provide fairtrade tea, coffee and juice to students.
• Finally, all the students are being encouraged to wear a white T-shirt.  They will then help to take part in a photo shoot in school where we aim to shape the students into the shape of Africa. 

We in Slemish have supported the Make Poverty History from the beginning and we hope that our small part will help to raise awareness on what is an important global issue.  

Thanks to everyone who helped to make the week such a success - special thanks to Mr Bennett and the sixth formers who helped him with the Fair Trade breaktime on Friday.  The issue of poverty across the  world was delivered all week to the kids in school and hopefully to parents and friends beyond school!  We even managed to raise £800 for development projects. 

Email me if you would like to see our video or any of the pictures and resources we produced during the day.

© T Manson 2005

Contact me at webmaster@thinkgeography.org.uk