September kicks off a busy time at Pecan and this one was no exception. We have started new training in our employment support, seen a rise in the number of shoppers at Peckham Pantry and hit the ground running with Harvest in the Foodbank. Our HOurbank is running a second round of Creative Writing Workshops and our Women’s team moved location in Lewisham at the end of September.
Peckham Pantry
The Pantry continues to see a rise in members signing up and we had a record 46 shoppers in our session towards the end of the month. We are increasing our orders for food every week and the shelves are increasingly empty at the end each session.
Southwark Foodbank
September at the foodbank saw the start of Harvest and we have had an incredible response from a number of schools and churches, who are celebrating Harvest and collecting food for the foodbank. This will bring a much needed boost to our stocks in the warehouse, which ran low over the summer.
This month, we also have a number of supermarket collections and are in the run up to our National Collections at Tesco for Christmas on the 21st, 22nd and 23rd of November.
We held our regular Foodbank Friday collection at London Bridge on the 27th September and raised £2 333.13 for the foodbank! Thank you to all who supported us!
Employment
This month, our Journey2Work programme is running IT skills training to help those who need to improve their IT skills to help their employability. It’s a course we hope to repeat, as we have had a positive response and recognise the need for better digital skills in many of or clients.
September also saw a good start with a number of job starts.
HOurBank Creative Writing Workshop
The Creative Writing Workshop has been a wonderful success with a steady core of people attending for the whole 8 weeks. We will be running the workshop again in October, so if you are interested in improving your creative writing skills, then get in touch with HOurbank to sign up!
The dates for the next 8 week workshops are: Date: Every Thursday from 17th October – 12th December Time: 10am – 1pm Location: Pecan, 121 Peckham High Street, SE15 5SE
The sessions are FREE. If you wish to continue, we will invite you to join HOurBank
Please email hourbank@pecan.org.uk for more information and to register your place or see the website for more information:
The Lewisham Women’s Space relocated to a new premises in Lewisham on the 23rd September.
If you would like to get in touch to find out more about where the space is and what services we offer women, please contact Sophia sophia.benedict@pecan.org.uk
Staff
At the start of October, we said goodbye to Janine, our dedicated employment engagment broker. She has worked tirelessly with the employment team and has spent many hours on outreach making connections with employers. We wish her all the best!
Events
We will be releasing an events newsletter in January, with our whole line up of events for the year, so if you would like to receive that newsletter, get in touch.
If you have an event that you are taking part in and would like to nominate us as your charity, and for all event related enquiries, please get in contact with carey.evans@pecan.org.uk.
Volunteer Opportunities
The Southwark Foodbank is looking for volunteers to participate in our Christmas supermarket collections at Tesco on the 21st, 22nd and 23rd November. If you would like to give a few hours of your time, please get in touch with Rose at foodbank.support@pecan.org.uk.
The Peckham Pantry is looking for friendly, helpful volunteers to help run our community pantry on Wednesdays for 3 hour shifts, one in the morning and one in the afternoon. Food Safety Level 2 is desirable but if you do not have it, we will provide the necessary training.
Our reception is manned by volunteers and we are looking for more people willing to give a morning or afternoon of their week on a regular basis to be a part of the day-to-day running of Pecan’s office.
If you are interested in finding out more information, please email Beatrice at beatrice.ocero@pecan.org.uk
