Fabulous initiative shown by a group of intrepid Year 6 pupils who were inspired to set up their own business venture to help raise funds for Phab Club – a fortnightly youth club experience for disabled teenagers which during normal times, is hosted at St Helen’s and offered to girls in Upper School as a co-curricular activity. Not deterred by Covid-related challenges, the newly formed ‘Phab Junior Team’ started a personalised pencil business, called The Phab Wrap and have so far raised £150 for the charity.
The Phab Wrap allows you to directly order every day school supplies, like a pencil, and customise them in beautifully coloured tape. With the support of their parents the girls came up with the business idea and even designed a website to sell their products.
With 150 pencils sold so far, and determined to raise as much money as possible, they wrote to the local press to publicise their efforts. Here’s what they had to say…
“Dear Northwood News,
We are writing to you today regarding an exciting story we think would inspire tons of young readers if provided with the opportunity of being featured in your newspaper.
After considering over 15 major newspapers we chose you to support us and our Northwood community. The reason why we believe this is the right story for you is because, unlike nearly all of the articles we’ve seen, we are in fact five 10 year olds ready to take our organisation to the next level. This is our story: our dream has always been to help others who couldn’t help themselves, and fortunately for us, 2 months ago, this dream came into practice in the best way possible.
After remembering about our school’s charity (St Helen’s Northwood) Phab which stands for People Have Abilities, we knew that this would be the perfect chance to put our passion and entrepreneurship to the test – this is how we formed The Phab Wrap. The Phab Wrap is a unique business which allows you to directly order customizable accessories and have specially made tape come with it. With over 150 pencils sold in the last month we have raised over 100 pounds in sales and with your help, hope to do much more.
With our enthusiasm and your resources, we believe that we CAN become the best we can be. As children we have no idea how far this journey goes – all we know is that if we do manage to get an article of ours into your newspaper, we would be forever grateful to you and your team. Additionally we have created a website to correspond with the current Covid-19 rules and would love for this link to be featured in the paper if possible as well. After all, we are not in this for the money, we are in this to help the disabled and their families and support them to strive in whatever it is they may want to pursue.
It really is amazing how something as small as a pencil can make a massive difference to someone’s life.”
Yours faithfully,
Ria, Laila, Illakkia, Sierra, Simran and Rachel – PHAB Junior Team
Andrea Cawthorne – Year 6 teacher and Head of Phab
The MyNorthwoodNews article can be read in full here.
A special mention to Mrs Cawthorne for supporting and encouraging the girls throughout this process. Congratulations girls, this is an incredible achievement!
