Cheadle Arts is entirely volunteer run by a fantastic team of very hard-working local people. We have put an enormous amount of effort into delivering a full and varied programme of the arts based around exploring an issue that affected the town – the loss of our beloved Stunner.
But this post is not to blow our own trumpet, it is to recognise the new volunteers who stepped up in many and varied ways to help us pull off our ambitious project. Our grant funding required us to support the creation of new volunteer opportunities and contribute to the growth of the voluntary sector.
This is how Sharing the News contributed to the local voluntary sector.
Creation of new volunteer roles
We only have a small committee, so it is really useful to have two new volunteers that bring specific skills and networks:
Lee Munro has been a fabulous addition to our team this year. He joined us to help manage the Photography Competition. Already signed up to help next year, Lee is a new volunteer on the Cheadle Arts Committee
In addition to taking on that task Lee generously provided us with some amazing photographs to use on the web site and social media.
Lee was also recruited as a volunteer with Cheadle Scouts, helping them with their photography badge. Great work Lee. This is also a new volunteer role supporting another volunteer-led organisation that has arisen directly as a result of Sharing the News.
Lee Munro’s professional work can be found at https://leedmunro.com
We’ve recruited Grace Brown as a new volunteer onto the Cheadle Arts Committee as a result of the Sharing the News project.
Grace has brought lots of energy to the project and her school connections have been invaluable.
“Thank you Cheadle Arts Festival! It’s been amazing being part of it!, posted Grace on Facebook.
Great to have you on board Grace, looking forward to working with you again next year.
Volunteering to help us with events
Keren from Gelato & Cakes helped to promote and manage the children’s art competition that was part of the project.
We are also grateful to Grace for liaising with the primary schools and collecting their entries.
We had a HUGE number of competition entries this year!
Thanks also to MJS Transport for sponsoring the prizes for the Children’s Art Competition.
We were thrilled that Cherianne Dawn volunteered to run a workshop that combined art and wellbeing. This is the first time that she has done that and by all reports people had a great time.
Thanks go to Cherianne and her friend for getting involved and giving up their time.
Other workshop volunteers included:
Paul Lucas delivered a musical workshop; Sue Robinson ran felting; Catherine Doel tutored a watercolour workshop; Kim Greenwood offered her Japenese decoration-making.
Ian Naylor and Charles Walker volunteered an evening to teach Figure Drawing.
Paul Lucas volunteered to be the subject. Having Paul in his town crier costume gave us the perfect opportunity to discuss our theme of Sharing the News.
Volunteering to bake, serve and tidy up
Anita and Stephen recruited 9 different volunteers to help out with our refreshments and catering. A few events featured home-baked cakes or pie and pea supper – all were delicious and very popular. The volunteer servers were super efficient and made sure that no trace was left at our venues. This count does not include the people who baked and served cakes at the Moorland Voices event at St Giles the Abbot – again, very popular cakes – sold to support this voluntary organisation. Refreshment sales are vital income to show as matched-funding, so we really appreciate everyone’s effort.
Tickets and Tech
We’d like to thank Lisa at Kenral for volunteering to stock the surplus copies of the newspaper in her shop, plus manage paper ticket sales for us. And thanks to James Walker for volunteering to manage the online ticket sales for us.
Tamar was on tech, and James at The Bakers handled the Open Mic Night.
We couldn’t do it without you ❤️
Supporting other voluntary organisations
Cheadle & District Community Choir reported 9 new people coming to the Open Evening that we featured in the newspaper and promoted in the programme of events.
“It’s great to have the numbers growing in the choir, particularly as there is now a full row of men and a good number of altos joining us with the harmonies”, said James, one of last year’s new recruits.
Cheadle & District Community Choir will soon be taking Christmas carols to local care homes and singing in the Christmas lights switch on run by Team Cheadle. So, we are very pleased to have supported raising volunteers for these activities.
Cheadle Arts committee volunteers in action
