Earlier in July, five team members from Aico - the UK market leader in domestic fire and carbon monoxide protection - volunteered to carry out works at Woodside Primary School in Oswestry, Shropshire.
The team spent the day redecorating the school’s Wellbeing Centre to provide a much-needed meeting space to support the general wellbeing of pupils.
Woodside Primary School has long strived to provide excellent support and facilities to help maintain the wellbeing and confidence of its pupils, however delays arising from the Covid-19 pandemic put plans to redevelop the school's Wellbeing Centre on hold.
Aico’s community liaison, Jane Pritchard, who is also a governor at Woodside Primary, recognised the urgent need for the Wellbeing Centre to be completed to help provide children and their families with key early intervention services.
Through Aico’s Corporate Social Responsibility Initiative, known as Aico in the Community, the five volunteers helped the school by decorating the interior of the Wellbeing Centre to provide an open and safe space that was ready for immediate use.
Woodside Primary School headteacher, Claire Bennett, said: “Our school community saw the potential to develop this building into Woodside Wellbeing Centre, a bespoke space in which we can support children and their families in an early help context. However, recent price increases and limited availability on resources and contractors has meant a delay in the redevelopment of this building.
“In order to make use of this building as soon as possible, a team of volunteers from Aico very kindly stepped in to support us. We are so grateful to Jane and the Aico team for volunteering to come in and get the interior of the building painted. They have done a brilliant job and their hard work means we can start to make use of this space as soon as possible to support our children.”
Aico has said that it will continue to work with Woodside Primary throughout the summer holidays to make further improvements to the Wellbeing Centre and its outdoor surroundings in readiness for the next academic year in September.
Aico community liaison and Woodside Primary governor, Jane Pritchard, commented: “As a governor of Woodside Primary School, I have seen first-hand the importance and need to provide a suitable environment in which students can be supported.
“We look forward to the Wellbeing Centre developing further soon, but hopefully this temporary refurb will help somewhat in easing the pressures of providing a suitable much needed space. My colleagues at Aico are looking forward to more days in which we can help by volunteering our time at the school.”
