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Fundraising Article

If you’re going on a volunteer trip or if you just want to get involved with a good cause, fundraising can always come in handy. Here at Gap Year, we thought we could put together some new and innovative ideas to save you some time. It might sound lame, but fundraising really can be fun, (no pun intended).

I thought I’d try some of these out and raise some money for the Betania Foundation. This is the charity that helps the Roma community. (Page 11 Project Romania)

Dip in to  your friends pockets

Not literally of course. Sponsoring only works if you know a lot of people that are willing to support you.

I ended up using the North Sea as a hangover cure on New Year’s Day. Running into the sea. Just think, English weather in winter, and jumping in to the sea. Cold wouldn’t cover it. But who out of your friends wouldn’t sponsor you to see the pictures of that? Trust me it was well worth it. Some of the people doing it raised over £200 for their charity!

Take it to new heights

I’d like to state, for the record, I am incredibly scared of heights. Yet I found myself jumping off Newcastle’s Tyne Bridge onto a tiny little wire in the air. Must admit, I was one hell of an experience, and now I can tick it off my bucket list, bonus. But there was another couple hundred pound in the fundraising jar for some people who joined me.

One tip for sponsoring, get a sponser form, and put a high number at the top of it so people will follow on from it. If 50p is the sponser above then people won’t feel so bad writing low money. Make it £10, it doesn’t have to be a real sponser, it can be a little

white lie.

I won’t tell if you don’t.

Make it an Event

Good old fashioned bake sales. Who doesn’t love cake, biscuits and a nice cup of coffee? If you go to college or university this could just be perfect. What student can afford a Starbucks now? Really?

Some people will just hear the word ‘fundraising’ and ‘char

ity’ and be willing to throw anything they can your way. I managed to talk myself into a free hall where I could run a table top sale. In just three hours the group I was with managed to raise over £300.

All we had for the table top sale were old toys, books, some DVD’s. Nothing major, just like a car boot sale.

We ran a raffle that day, getting free prizes from local companies; even our local MP offered up some House of Commons whisky for us. Classy! And the only other things that were making us some money was from bake sale and old things we found in our garage to sell – nothing special just car boot style bits and pieces.

With every event we had posters up in the local shops around the town and posted them through people’s letterbox near the event.

Others on my fundraising team ran pub quizzes and sold tickets, which the pub let them do for free. All they had to do was think of some questions. Some did themed charity balls at £25 a ticket, not too bad when the hall was free.

SELL

Loads of companies will buy old stuff that you don’t even use anymore off you. Bags2School are a company that will pay 50 pence per kilo for your old clothes, might not sound like much but when you approach all your family, friends and neighbours it really adds up. I made £160 for my charity.

You’ll all have seen the adverts for Mazuma Mobile and Music Magpie, and I dare say you will all know about the wonders of Ebay. It’s really not as hard as it seems to make some extra cash for a good cause.

It really is so easy to fundraise now, write to local companies tell them what you’re doing they are so often willing to support you with prizes, or sometimes even a cheeky grant here and there.

There are loads more of fundraising tips on

www.gapyearmagazine.co.uk

Dos and Don'ts of Teen Holidays Article

Tips from experienceI thought it would be a good idea to visit Queen Elizabeth sixth form college, in Darlington[r1] , to see what their experience with holidays were, and I spoke to Ryan, a 17 year old student, He’s just booked a holiday to Greece with 18 other people. This will be their first holiday abroad, and I thought it would be good to hear what they plan to do while they are away.
Their plans all seem to be normal, beach in the day-time and then clubs on the night.
But because they’ve realised that as they have paid for all inclusive meals and drinks, it might not be clubs on the night and in fact they’ll save so much money just staying in the hotel bar[r2] .
Ryan and his friends are staying in a four star hotel in Greece, Hotel Louis. And they agree, staying in the hotel is always a better plan than going somewhere you don’t know and then having to make your way back to your hotel.
As they were a big group, they got a special deal for flights and hotels, because they’re giving so much custom to the store. This is always a good tip when you’re booking, and it’s good to be in bigger groups when you’re away too. The bigger the group the less likely it is for things to go disastrously wrong.
There’s a million things you can do that don’t revolve around drinking, Sun Sea Sex and Suspicious Parents isn’t exactly a good representation of young people who go on holiday.
Are you forgetting escaping the wonders of British weather?
Sitting by a beach or a pool all day can't be too badEspecially when it’s scorching hot. In recent a survey 38% of you said the beach would be you’re first choice, as opposed to clubbing. I think you know there’s a million ways to have fun when you’re on holiday without going stupid and doing something you’ll regret[r3] .

 

Before you say it; I know.I know exactly why you would want to go on holiday without your parents. You want to go to clubs and get wasted, I know because in a recent survey 46% of you said that was the main reason for actually going away...
Drinking when you’re on holiday is all well and good, trust me when I say it, but sometimes it’s just not worth it:
I don't want to feed you a load of horror stories...That’s not what my incentive was, honestly holidays abroad without your parents can be brilliant, but you just need to be careful.
In June 2012 a 19 year old, Ian Knox, suffered a fatal fall from a balcony from having a few too many down the club, and trying to make it to the pool.
I’m not saying don’t drink when you’re on holiday, hell no, but not to the extent where you could fall off balconies.
Going to clubs is another thing; just imagine trying to get home from an unknown club when you have no idea where you’re going...
And there’s always the good old drink so much that you end up throwing up all over you’re going out clothes: don’t lie, it’s happened to all of us at some point.
it's a good idea, while you'redrinking ...I spoke to Jenny, she’s a 19 year old student at Leeds Met university, and last year she went on to Spain and ended up coming home with a tattoo, and a much lighter purse: "It's not that I dislike tattoos, it's just I don't really want a cheap tattoo of a flower on my ear for the rest of my life.” Jenny is currently training to be a primary school teacher, which won’t be easy to get a job in with a tattoo.

Project Monitoring week 6:

In the final week of the magazine post production, I was already finished my products, as I worte in week 5's project monitoring. I have uploaded all of my work, including another version of the front cover:

 

As I was finished with my other products I decided to create an alternative front cover, just with a different image to the other front cover. This was to give options of imagery on my front cover, as all of the sell lines and masthead etc stayed the same.

Project Monitoring

 

5

4th Feb

1 Start importing images onto indesign and creating the double page spreads. 2 Carry on working on the double page spread this is when I will start to add in breakout boxes, masthead, kickers and the body of the article. 3 Using my knowledge of media constraints and making sure that I haven’t breeched any of the PCC’s rules. I will look over the constraints work I have already done, and will check each rule, and my own work so far to make sure that I haven’t broken any. I also made some ‘golden rules’ alongside my constraints work to insure that I haven’t broken any of my own, personal rules. 4 Project Monitoring & finishing the work on the PCC’s rules and my own rules from lesson 3. Homework 1: Finish off the first draft of my double page spreads, adding in the body of the article and the other elements of a double page spread that I didn’t finish in lesson 2.  Homework 2: Create second drafts of each page; start on corrections and finishing touches. Homework 3: Subedit every second draft of the pages.

 This week I have completed all of the double page spreads, the content page and another mock up of the front cover:

 This is the second draft of the magazine front cover: I branded the magazine so that every page has a boarder.  I have also added in more colour, as opposed to the picture below of the first mock up; where the text was completely plain white.

I have also researched the PCC rules, and made sure I have complied with each one I have finished this document and have posted it to my blog. I looked on the website, to see each rule. I have done everything in my schedule that I planned to do this week.

I have also chose the imagery this week, and said why I didn't use or did use the images I took.

PCC Rules

Have my products complied with the rules of the Press Complaints Commission:

Accuracy

When writing my articles I checked over the notes from the interviews I conducted: to make sure that I had not gotten any of the facts wrong. When the articles were finished I asked the interviewees if they could read the article, to make sure I had not written anything that could be considered libel. As I did a content research log I was able to track down all of my sources again when writing the articles to make sure that all of the statistics were correct. I did not directly comment on my imagery, therefore I could not leave any misleading comments about the images. I used quotation marks when using direct pieces of speech from my interviewees: therefore showing that they said it and it was not something I wrote.

Privacy

I did not take any pictures that I did not have consent from the people in them to take. Models signed a model release form and all of the people  None of the images were taken on private property – therefore I did not trespass.

Harassment

I didn’t peruse my interviewees or models once they asked to desist, as this code states. I didn’t follow up questions that any of my interviewees felt uncomfortable answering, and when writing my questions for the interview I avoided topics that were too personal anyway – to ensure I wasn’t harassing them.

Intrusion into shock & grief

 All of my interviewees were prepared for the interviews and all of them were in a stable for them. As I didn’t deal with any topics that could provoke this sort of emotional response I feel I have not broken this code. I also didn’t take pictures of anything that I did not have permission from the people in them to take. The pictures for the Romania article were the most risky images to take for this code, however I insured that all of the people in the photos consented the photos been taken.

Children

For the images in the Project Romania article children under the age of 16 were used in the photos. I had spoken consent from the parents, who were there when taking the photos, that it was acceptable to have photos of their children. I did not embark on their school life and did not take any photographs of children in school time.

Children in sex cases

I did not do any stories involving a sex case: and therefore could not break this rule in any way.

Hospitals

I did not go into any hospitals to speak to anyone or to take pictures: therefore I didn’t break this code.

Reporting of crime

I did not do any stories about crime, or report about any people involved in crime: therefore didn’t break this code.

Clandestine devices and subterfuge

I didn’t hide any cameras, or take any pictures without the people in them knowing about it. I didn’t listen in to any phone calls read any messages and e-mails at all.

Victims of sexual assault

I did not associate with anyone who was a victim of sexual assault, and did not write any stories about such topics.

Discrimination

When discussing the Roma community I was very careful to maintain a level opinion and not show any digression. Although I mentioned other people’s opinions on them, and how they are highly discriminated against. I made sure that this was said as someone else’s opinion – not as my own words.

Financial Journalism

I didn’t use any of my own finances when producing this magazine. I did not pay anybody for their services and therefore did not break this code.

Confidential Sources

I did not deal with any confidential topics.

Witness Payments in criminal trials/Payment to criminals

I did not cover any criminal trials, or speak to with criminals – and did not pay anyone in the making of this magazine.

Project Monitoring

4

28th  Jan

1 In this lesson I will start work on my contents page on in design. I will be setting up margins and the text for the contents page but I will be in able to add all of the imagery just yet. 2 In this lesson I will conduct my photoshoot, making sure that all of my models are there and I have the necessary props for the shoot. 3 Finish the first draft of my front cover, which I have already started prior to the 7th of January. 4 Project Monitoring & time for contingency. Homework 1: I will carry on to work on my contents page. Homework 2: import the images into several places in a readable format, putting them on a memory stick, email format and on my network space to insure that I don’t lose my images. Homework 3: Post production of images; editing the contrast, colour manipulation, image and facial correction.

This was my schedule plan for this week. In lesson 1, I started work on my contents page, I added in some images I though were appropriate, the title and a couple of headlines for the main stories. I have not however made any advancements with this due to being off college on Thursday and therefore inable to access the software.

I have conducted the photo shoot for the Dos and Don'ts of Teen Holidays article in second lesson, as scheduled. I have also edited some of these images on Photoshop   I have done this by taking out the colour of the background, that was off white, and making it white. I have also edited the reflection of the studio lights out of the sun glasses in the models; to make the photos look less candid. 

 

These are some of the photos unedited alongside the edited version that I will include in my double page spreads. For these photos I used the magic wand tool to select the background colour, and then I used the magnetic lasso tool to deselect parts of the models that had been included, then changed the brightness to 150 to make it white. I then used the magnetic lasso to select the lenses of the sunglasses so that I could edit out the light reflections. I used the clone tool to get rid of some imperfections on my models also.

This week I have worked on, and finished the first draft of, the Fundraising 101 article. I have looked at other layouts closely and have added some extra images.

I have also made some changes to the front cover:

I have added a bar code, and the issue number and date to what I had already created. I got the image of the bar code off the internet.