Locally owned and run. Engaged with and supporting our local community.
We pride ourselves on supporting our community and since our Club opened in 2017, thanks to our wonderful members and staff, we’ve raised over £30,000 for local charities. We engage with our community in three main ways:
- Directly supporting local charities financially.
- Helping local charities and community groups to raise funds themselves (donating prizes, etc.), especially (but not only) when fund-raising has a sports/health focus.
- Supporting local schools in squash/tennis/getting active (schools coming in to use our facilities, Bedford schools’ squash tournament, etc.)
Local Charity Fundraising
We ask our members to select two local charities each year, and these are the charities that we support via events and other fund-raising activities such as coffee mornings, quiz nights, sponsored exercise events and our annual charity Summer Ball. The selection process takes place in July-August each year and the selected charities are supported for 12 months. This year (2023-2024) the charities chosen by our members are FACES and St John’s Special School in Kempston.
FACES (Family and Children’s Early-help Services) is a well-established, local and independent charity offering practical and emotional support to families under stress. They support local children and families faced with difficult issues such as mental and physical health problems, domestic abuse, poverty, child sexual exploitation and behavioural issues via a range of quality-tested services and family support groups, many led by a team of dedicated volunteers. They do this by recruiting and training volunteers who work alongside their Practitioners in delivering a unique menu of tailored services directly to a family, in their own home.
St John’s School and College in Bedford is part of Bedford Inclusive and Training Learning Trust. It caters for pupils who have severe and complex learning difficulties, from Early Years through to post-16.
Their curriculum is personalised and is divided into different pathways to ensure each pupil receives the curriculum best suited to their needs. Staff provide learning opportunities to ensure pupils achieve highly, develop their skills and personalities to enable them to become the best. The school aims for each pupil to become as independent as possible, develop effective means of communication, build self-esteem and confidence and form positive relationships with others.
The facilities at St John’s include a hydrotherapy pool, an Interactive Sound and Light room, dedicated ICT facilities, nature garden, rumpus room and a food technology room. Pupils are encouraged to think, explore and participate in the world around them.
Support for Charities and Community Groups
We regularly support local schools, charities and community groups by providing prizes for events, competitions and raffles that they may be running. We allocate a budget each year for this purpose, and it is allocated on a first come, first served basis. Generally to obtain support, groups have to be reasonably local to the Club.
Junior Engagement in Squash and Tennis
We have a mission to revitalise squash in Bedfordshire, help drive tennis participation in the town, and help young people to get active in this screen-obsessed age. With this in mind we have a participation programme where we work with local schools to get them into the Club and using our facilities. We also run and financially support a performance programme for our squash and tennis junior members to help drive excellence.
