Welcome to the latest Faccts Cast Autumn 2008

Over a surprisingly sunny and chilly autumn there has been a full diary in the life of Faccts.

Junior schools:
Regarding our various Christian lunchtime clubs that run on a weekly basis in all the junior schools in Fleet it has been rather slower start to the new academic year. This is due to the fact that schools have so much to achieve in the first half term of the New Year and getting permission for our clubs to continue has taken slightly longer than normal.

Church Crookham Junior School (CCJS):
This club has been run over the last 18 months or so by Pat Bishop and Julia Davidson on Tuesday lunchtime. Pat and Julia have done a fantastic job and the club grew from strength to strength. Due to Pat moving up North in a few months time this club has had to cease. We sadly say goodbye to Pat (Julia will still be on team) and thank her for all the fantastic service that she has given to FACCTS. Pat: You will be missed!! The good news is that Church Crookham Baptist (CCBC) has been running an after school club for a while now on a Thursday at their premises. This has been going well too with parents from CCJS dropping their children off there on a weekly basis. As with all churches, FACCTS is in good relationship with the team at (CCBC) and they have recently decided to partner up with us and become official FACCTS Associates. Therefore this will be the first FACCTS junior school club to be run on a weekly basis after school. In official school terms this is called an ‘Extended schools’ programme. So we are expectant for great things here.

All Saints:
Isobel Norton and team have been running the lunch time club here for many years. With the start of the new year it has taken a while to begin the club again but again the good news is that this club will be starting after the school half term. Thank you Isobel and team for the great work you are doing at All Saints.

Heatherside:
Sharon Gardner and Ken Evans and team have also been running this club for many years at Heatherside and it too has had some changes. Namely the day has now changed from a Tuesday to a Thursday. This will also begin again after the school half term. As usual Fleet Methodist Church and wider team will be running the Christmas presentations with the Year 6’s in early December.

Elvetham Heath:
There has not been a club running here for a while but the Church on the Heath (CoH) and Faccts has been doing various things there over the last year or so. David Price, the minister at (CoH) has a team that will soon start a new Faccts club at this school.

Velmead:
In short the Velmead team are continuing to do great things – thank you!

 

Secondary schools:
Calthorpe Park:
The autumn term has gone well at Calthorpe with much going on.
How could we not begin this brief report by not mentioning our coffee mornings?! These are continuing to be an oasis for staff on a Monday morning and many a good conversation and resounding: ‘Thank you’s’ abound. As always most of our planning happens in these mornings. This term we are hoping to do a round of RE lessons and a few assemblies. A new initiative started this term on a Wednesday after school. This is the new extended services club that Faccts and the FLEX team are assisting Calthorpe with and it is going very well. Once again a great opportunity to simply meet a big need in the school and serve with no other agenda than to simply be a helpful asset to Calthorpe.  Mr. Tommy Taylor, Mischa and June Bing (FLEX) currently run this 3 hour club and work well together as a team. Clare has been building good relationship with staff and students and taking opportunities such as helping with various school events such as the ‘homelessness’ day at Calthorpe. The 180 (formally known as CU) club is going very well. Run by Mr. Bill Starring and Mischa every Thursday after school in the English Dept. This is growing by the week and is always well attended. Other opportunities are coming up in the near future that we as the Faccts team are looking forward to.

 

Court Moor Secondary:
Wait for it ... Yes!! The coffee mornings here got a BIG cheer when it was mentioned at the first Court Moor staff meeting of the term that Faccts was returning with the usual treats every Friday!  Being the start of the New academic year we have not been doing much schools work as such here as, like all schools it takes a while for the initial dust to settle. After half term many opportunities will begin. The club 180 (same as Calthorpe) will be reopened on a Friday after school. Clare and I are really looking forward to this as it is always well attended. We have many assemblies planned before Christmas. Clare and the FLEX team will be starting an extended schools club that will run on a Monday after school. Finally there are many other opportunities coming up in the future – it should be a good run up to Christmas.

 

Farnborough 6th Form CU:
This 6th form college and Basingstoke are the main placements that year 11 leavers in Fleet attend. We have good relationship with the 6th form CU team here and join their very Large CU as often as we can. We are also planning, God willing, a joint Youth Event in Fleet with this CU team and the various Youth Christian groups in Fleet for the middle of 2009. It is really inspirational to visit the Farnborough 6th form CU (almost 100 students!) that runs every Thursday 12:15pm to 1pm. Please contact Mischa or if you would like to join us for a visit.

 

Work Experience:
The week beginning the 18th October saw our first local year 11 student join Faccts for a week’s work experience. Richard Wilson – the Head Boy of Robert Mays – found us on the internet and being a strong Christian contacted us for a week’s work experience in schools work. It was an absolute pleasure to have Richard and we had a really full week’s work for him to partner with that he thoroughly enjoyed. In the not to distant future Faccts will hopefully have more young and vibrant Christians like Richard join our team.

Team Training:
This is the 3 year degree that Mischa has just begun at CYM up in Oxford. This is known as a placement degree where lectures are held fortnightly and much of the theory and youth work practice are developed. It is interesting to note that Matt Luscombe, the full time youth worker at Fleet Baptist Church is in his second year of the same degree at Oxford. Becoming more professionally qualified as a youth worker in this day and age is a necessity and this is the main reason that Mischa is doing this degree while continuing to work full time for Faccts. The good news is that Mischa has committed to serve with Faccts for the next 5 years.. God willing. Clare has also completed a counselling course at Waverley Abbey over the summer that will enhance our work in secondary schools as we hope to begin a mentoring scheme in the new year. Clare has also just completed the First year schools work training week up in Derby run by Scripture Union UK. The bottom line is that we as the Faccts team are constantly looking for ways to improve the quality of the various services that we offer to our local schools.

 

Faccts Strategic planning day:
This was held at our HQ: Living Stones in the middle of September. The Director for Youth For Christ Camberley, Bernie Comissiong, was our guest speaker for the day and a fantastically fruitful time was had. Mischa, Clare and the Faccts Directors were in attendance. The main point of the day was to look ahead for Faccts for the next 5 years. A vast an exciting range of ideas and challenges  emerged from this Saturday and we will be compiling a report soon to explain where we hope to be in the next 5 years.

 

This brings our autumn report to a conclusion.

Thank you again to our many faithful partners may God bless you abundantly.

By Mischa Constant

 

 

 

 

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