St Albans Bach Choir chooses DS Achieve as Christmas Carol Concert charity

On Saturday 10th December, we were delighted to attend the St Albans Bach Choir Christmas Carol Concert, as the choir’s chosen charity. The choir performs regularly in the Cathedral and Abbey Church of St Alban, often supported by professional musicians, and Saturday’s concert was a sell out event! Representing DS Achieve was Michelle Bolton (Head of Ops), Gillian Warwick-Thompson (Chair of Trustees) and Abbie Hollick (Trustee - and SABC choir member).

Among the beautiful songs performed by the choir, Michelle took to the stage, armed with a microphone, to tell the audience a bit about DS Achieve - who we are, what we’re about, and what we deliver for the DS community, and why. Admittedly, she was a bit nervous, but thankfully it seemed to go ok!

We were grateful for the opportunity to share our messages on the huge potential of people with Down Syndrome and hopefully also bust a few myths, and the cherry on top was the £310 donated by the concert audience. Every penny will go into the services we deliver and will make a difference.

A huge thank you to St Albans Bach Choir - and to Abbie and fellow choir member, Rebecca Turner (mum to one of our Young Achievers, Alice), for nominating us.

Family fun at the DS Achieve festive party!

We had an absolute blast on Sunday at our family get together!

Thank you to everyone who joined - it was great to catch up with so many of the families we work with and to be able to bring everyone together for some festive cheer.

The Hilltop Community Centre thankfully offers a great space, so we were able to pack in lots for everyone to enjoy:

• soft play and a sensory area

• a crafts area to make reindeer food and decorate gingerbread men

• an activity area with giant Connect 4, Ball in the Bucket, Ring the Bull and Splat the Rat games

• a ‘selfie’ area with Instagram frame and lots of props

• the dance floor, complete with disco ball and festive pop playlist, played at a low sound level

• the refreshments station with squash and treats, where members of our team served tea, coffee and hot choc (with marshmallows!) to parents

We were incredibly lucky to have professional photographer, Stephanie Belton, capturing the fun and special family moments. Check out her brilliant photos of the event to see what we got up to.

We’d like to say a HUGE thanks to the team that made it happen:

• the brilliant volunteer team on the day: Ariella, Charlotte N, Teresa, Jake, Charlotte B and Max

• and an even more ENORMOUS thanks to Jo Walker, our wonder Events Coordinator, for planning, organising, project managing and delivering the event. It wouldn’t have happened without Jo, and we are now worried about how high she has raised our standards for social events. You can never leave now, Jo!

We want to acknowledge and thank Hertfordshire County Council for their funding contribution towards the event. It was very much appreciated.

If there is anyone we don’t see beforehand, we hope you have a wonderful Christmas.

We are looking for volunteers to work directly with children and young people

We are looking for volunteers for two of our programmes, working directly with babies, children and young people with Down Syndrome.

Both programmes involve weekly sessions, during term time only. You don’t need to be there every week - just let us know what works for you.

No experience required - just enthusiasm and enjoyment from working with children.

Training and support will be given.

Exciting new DS Achieve partnership with Hertfordshire Libraries

DS Achieve is delighted to be one of three organisations partnering with Hertfordshire Libraries to deliver their brand new Youth Volunteer programme 'My Voice'.

'My Voice' is a two-year project, generously funded by Arts Council England, which will provide opportunities for young people aged 14-24 years old to join the Hertfordshire Libraries youth volunteer network in libraries across the county. The three partner organisations are The OLLIE Foundation, Herts Sports Partnership and DS Achieve.

The DS Achieve partnership with Hertfordshire Libraries means that library staff will receive specialist training from DS Achieve's expert Down Syndrome advisors to support young people with Down Syndrome to volunteer and gain valuable learning and development opportunities, including life skills and work experience.

Specialist DS training for library staff is commencing this term, with volunteer opportunities for young people with Down Syndrome to start from spring 2023.

Seeking a new Treasurer

DS Achieve is looking for a new volunteer Treasurer to join our existing Board of five Trustees. Our ideal new Treasurer will have a background in finance with a relevant accountancy qualification. We are a small local charity that prides ourselves on good governance and maintaining robust financial procedures and the Treasurer will take a lead on financial issues for the team. If you enjoy being part of a small, friendly team and want to volunteer some of your time and skills to a great charity this is the role for you.

For full details click here

To apply please send a relevant CV to info@dsachieve.org . For further information or to discuss any aspects of the role please contact Gillian Warwick-Thompson, Chair of Trustees either by email as above or by phone 07826 086511.

We are recruiting!

We are looking for a fantastic new Assistant Leader for our Young Achievers programme. The role is supporting our Young Achievers Group Leader and the majority of the role (3.5hrs) is on Saturday afternoons (with another 1 hour to be worked flexibly during the week).

Have a look at the role profile HERE and if you think you might be the perfect candidate, please get in touch! Send us your CV to info@dsachieve.org with a covering email to say why you are interested in the role.

We hope to hear from you soon!

Welcome to our new Trustee Selena Chapman

Welcome to Selena Chapman who is our newest appointment on the Board of Trustees.

Selena and her husband Neil have two children – Isobel (who was born in 2014 and has Down Syndrome) and George who is a couple of years older.

Before children, Selena headed up the Marketing and Communications teams of non-profit organisations including Marie Curie and Southbank Centre; held Trustee positions; provided voluntary consultancy to small enterprises and gained an MBA from Cranfield.

Currently she works part time heading up the communications and marketing team for CDP, a global non-profit that drives companies, cities and governments to reduce their environmental impact.

Selena would like to use her skills to support DS Achieve’s Marketing and Communication strategy going forward.

Oh what a night... Empowerment Group night out for mums was so much fun!

On Friday evening, we hosted out 'Ultimate Mum's Night In' for our DS Achieve mums in a cosy lounge at the beautiful Torrington Hall in St Albans. It was all about putting mums first and helping them to feel great about themselves.

Let's face it, mums are usually bottom of the list when it comes to being a priority and this can be even more the case when you're the mum of a children/children with additional needs. Our Empowerment Group aims to help parents build their confidence and resilience and look after themselves, so they can better support their families.

So on Friday, the amazing Lisa Wisdom from Style with Wisdom delivered a Style Party for a group of mums which involved fizz, fashion, and lots of fun.

Check out the photos to see what the ladies got up to....

Thank you so much to the organisations that supported and especially to @Sadna Akhal for donating the beautiful balloons!

We are recruiting a Young Achievers Group Leader!

We am delighted to share the exciting news that Avril Prosser, our fantastic Young Achievers Group Leader, is expecting her second child, due in September. Huge congratulations to Avril and her family.

This means that Avril will take Maternity Leave, starting in September, and we need someone to cover her role for the period she is on leave (up to 12 months). We are keen to hear from anyone who thinks they could do a fantastic job for us while Avril is away.

If you are interested in applying for the position, please read the role profile below and get in touch with your CV and the reasons why you’re interested in the role on info@dsachieve.org.

The application deadline is Friday 2nd July.

Role profile

Governance update

Welcome to our latest governance update giving you an insight into our behind the scenes work so far his year. We ended our 2021 financial year with our finances in a strong position thanks to our successful grant applications and the generosity of our donors. The Trustees have set a fundraising strategy and a robust budget for 2022 aiming to deliver a strong range of services for our beneficiaries this year and beyond.

Another financial year end meant it was time for finalising our Annual Accounts and writing our Trustee Annual Report. Rachel Angus, our brilliant Treasurer, keeps amazing records for us throughout the year and did not disappoint with her prompt production of the accounts and draft report ready for sign off by our March Trustee meeting. Due to our strong income over 2021 our accounts now need an Independent Examination and we are grateful to our outgoing examiner Juliet Thomas and our new examiner Ed Reeve for volunteering to step into her shoes this year. We are in good shape to meet all the Charity Commission requirements for our financial monitoring which is a key duty of the Trustees.

The start of a new financial year is also an opportunity to reflect on what is working well and what areas of our services can be further developed. Our exciting new Resources into Schools project has now been successfully launched and the Trustees are planning for the development of a new service for parent carers later in the year. Setting our strategy and designing our services is a very rewarding part of our governance processes.

Overseeing service delivery, compliance and managing risk are also important Trustee duties which keep us busy throughout the year. Our rolling programme of risk monitoring and policy reviews feature in all our Trustee meetings as do updates from our Head of Operations, Michelle Bolton, helping us to monitor and measure our impact. Part of our measurement includes assessing how well we operate as a Board of Trustees and our recent self-assessment highlighted our strengths and also identified scope for some improvements. As a first part of our development we are delighted that we will be able to welcome a new Trustee, to our existing team of four, at our May Trustee meeting which will mean more capacity, new perspectives and some fantastic complementary skills. Look out for an announcement soon!

As ever we would love to hear from you if you have any questions, comments or feedback on any of our services. Please do message us or email us at info@dsachieve.org