We’re delighted to introduce Gympanzees, our first official Company Charity!
Gympanzees is based in Bristol supporting people up to age 25 with disabilities and their families in the whole region covered by our Space Programs. They currently run at pop-up venues during school holidays and are fundraising to buy a building to give them a permanent home. This will mean that they can provide play, exercise and friendship opportunities to children with disabilities and their families all year round. This is sorely needed.
They are aiming to raise £2.2 million for Project Home. This will enable them to open their new facility, the first of its kind in the UK. They will own the building which will have specialist rooms filled with accessible exercise and sensory equipment.
This year, we will be dedicating all our fundraising efforts to raising money to support Gympanzees.
Why is this facility so important? There are 66,000 children and young people with disabilities living within an hour of Bristol. 77% of them cannot access regular leisure facilities, so they can’t play, exercise, or socialise in the same way as their peers. We all know it’s a good idea to exercise, the inability to exercise has huge consequences for children. Because they never get tired out, they often don’t eat or sleep well. A session at Gympanzees can change all that making family life so much better as well as improving the strength and muscle tone of the children.
Whilst the children are playing, the parents, carers and siblings can either join in or meet up in the café. This provides them an opportunity to relax and socialise as well as enabling them to build up the vital support network they need to help them cope with the pressures having a child with additional needs brings.
Gympanzees can make a huge difference – and we want to help!
Our team are looking at lots of ways to help raise money for this incredible cause. We are entering a team into their charity Golf Day and one of our members, Ricky, is taking on the Three Peaks Challenge in June (if you would like to support his efforts, he would be very grateful! You can sponsor him here ).
You can find out more about Gympanzees and the wonderful work they do on their website here.
Watch this space for more on our fundraising efforts.
