Set up by Didcot First in 2021, the Didcot Powerhouse Fund is a Donor-advised Fund working closely with local businesses and donors around the town to tackle inequality and deprivation within the Didcot Garden Town Area of Influence.
In its first year of operation, the Fund distributed £95,000, with grants ranging from £400 to £13,000 to 17 organisations for projects which met their 2022 theme of ‘Supporting Children, Young People and Families as we Emerge from the Pandemic.’
Although Didcot is perceived as an affluent area, there are areas within the town and the surrounding villages where pockets of extreme economic deprivation occur, putting those areas below the Oxfordshire average and in some cases, placing it in the lowest rankings within the UK.
With the new year now upon us, the Didcot Powerhouse Fund’s theme for 2023 is ‘Supporting Mental Health and Wellbeing in these Times of Hardship’. Applications from local organisations for grant funding for projects that will help to address this theme opened in January 2023. When applying for a grant, your organisation will be assessed on the impact it will have on a critical area of need in the wider Didcot area and must meet key funding criteria including:
- Joint bids are encouraged as partnership working generates greater impact.
- 90% of the qualifying grant beneficiaries will live within a geographic area specified as the Didcot Garden Town area of Influence.
- Bids will address the annual Fund theme of ‘Supporting Mental Health and Wellbeing in these Times of Hardship’ and need to meet the published eligibility criteria.
- Grant recipients will be asked to provide evidence of the impact achieved from the grant they receive.
Decisions on grant funding are taken by an appointed Grants Panel comprising of people who know the area well and who are committed to supporting the community across education, health, housing, youth, and communities. The Grants Panel works closely with the Oxfordshire Community 90% of beneficiaries of the Fund must live inside the Didcot Garden Town Area of Influence. To check if your area is within this, please see the Map in the FAQs of the website didcotpowerhousefund.co.uk.
The money awarded during 2022 supported a variety of projects from parent and baby groups to supporting children’s educational transition from primary to secondary school. Other projects included helping children to learn to read, providing a climbing wall at the Harwell Primary School, providing bursaries to assist young people from less advantaged backgrounds to participate in camping and other activities with the 12th Didcot Scouts, to supporting the Oxfordshire Foster Carers Association train carers and young people to learn Makaton, which is a universal language using speech, signs and symbols to empower and enable language development and communication confidence for young children and those with learning difficulties and speech delay.
If you are a business owner and would like to support the Didcot Powerhouse Fund by donating this would help to make a difference to the work that can be achieved in the local area. Business donors and fundraisers will receive recognition for giving through the Didcot Powerhouse Fund website, the Annual Impact Report and a newsletter which is published three times a year. Social media engagement opportunities with the Fund are also available.
One such individual donor is Lord Vaizey of Didcot who is also the Fund’s Patron. He raised an impressive £20,837 inclusive of Gift Aid when he ran in the October 2021 Virgin Money London Marathon.
To find out more about donating visit didcotpowerhousefund.co.uk/why-donate or simply scan the QR code with this article.
DBM is Didcot Baby Mondays and GWP is Great Western Park (GWP) Babies and Toddlers Group, both of whom were 2022 grant recipients. The mum and baby with pushchair + mum with child on swing were just images I captured (with permission) at Ladygrove Park last summer to illustrate the life of Didcot for our website.
