March brings the close of TEP’s CSR year and with it a huge sense of achievement. This year, despite the obvious challenges, TEP has raised a fantastic £5,471 for our Charity of the Year and smashed our target by 218%. When teamed with TEP’s match funding the final amount reaches £7,971.
Our chosen charity was Claire House Children’s Hospice, following the loss of a staff member’s child. The hospice helps seriously and terminally ill children live life to the full, creating wonderful memories and helping to restore a sense of normality to family life. The money we have raised for Claire House will ensure one child receives 1-2-1 nursing care, round the clock for a full week. It will also pay for a Butterfly Coordinator to be available for a whole month. Also, it will fund three full counselling courses for bereaved parents and three sessions of support for siblings. All of these services are incredibly important and give parents not only peace of mind that their children are in safe hands but support families’ emotional wellbeing and ensure everything in this difficult time is made that much more bearable.
When it came to fundraising, being under lockdown may have stumped us at first but we soon had our first activity set up. In May our staff took part in Claire House’s Step-Up Challenge and climbed the equivalent of the three peaks from the comfort of their own home. Combined, our staff climbed 442,200 steps.
Throughout the year we hosted various quizzes, which included the Wheel of Fortune-Trivial Pursuit showdown, a Fright Night extravaganza and the Ultimate Landscape Management Friday Fundraiser with prizes kindly donated by Lunya.
In September we held a ‘Design-a-Tote’ competition with the winning bag designs being printed and sold for charity. The winning entries; Megan aged 7, Hannah aged 10, and staff member Emma Parker can be seen in the image below (left to right).
To round off the year we held our annual TEP Christmas raffle, which always goes down well. Last but by no means least, Director Katie Shilcock took on a 5k every day challenge, swimming, running or cycling 5k every day for the whole year. On top of this, her challenge raised over £3,000 thanks to the generous donations from friends, family, colleagues and clients.
TEP’s CSR commitments aren’t restricted to fundraising, we also set targets for volunteering, professional engagement and pro bono work. Volunteering proved the most challenging aspect this year, with social distancing preventing a lot of our usual activities. However, staff came together and used their volunteer day to help create Grow Your Own Kits for the children at Claire’s House. Each kit contained a guide and materials on how to grow pea shoots, which went down a storm with the children and their families.
Many of our staff throughout the year have also engaged with professional institutions. For example Joe O’Reilly regularly contributes to Lancaster University’s Mentor Scheme, Tom Popplewell is a member of the Dioceses Advisory Committee and Tim Johns provides support to the PlacED Academy in Liverpool. TEP also dedicates its time to promoting climate action through online events such as Beyond Business as Usual with Hope for the Future.
Our pro bono support also includes landscape design work for Hill’s Foundation 200, which has pledged to provide 200 modular homes for homeless people in the Cambridge area over the next five years. TEP is committed to supporting Foundation 200 to achieve its goal, helping to reduce homelessness across the UK, as well as creating safe and sustainable places to live.
As well as everything we’ve already mentioned, last year TEP launched its Environment Grant. A fund established by the company to offer financial support to activities that can further the environmental profession and raise awareness of environmental issues. We had so many fantastic applications and in November of last year, the CSR Team awarded two Grants. One to St Basil’s Catholic Primary School in Widnes for a wildlife garden and wildflower meadow and to PhD candidate Richard Bentley, who is researching the impact of the soundscape on our perception of quiet, which will contribute to the protection and promotion of quiet green spaces.
For more information on all our CSR activities check out our archives.
