Eltham College’s Head of Facilities Brenda Parara: Spreading Joy this Christmas
How many of us recall walking out of Santa’s grotto with a fixed smile, trying not to look ungrateful but wondering how he could think this doll was an appropriate alternative to the printing set/Arsenal shirt/trainers that had been carefully described in answer to the question: ‘So what are you hoping for Christmas’? A first-world problem for most of us: as Santa was aware, our parents had our backs. But what if the only present you would get this year, thanks to a charity gift bag you received, turned out to be the one game you already had as a hand-me-down from an older cousin and had played ad infinitum?
Eight years ago, it was this thought that prompted Brenda Parara, Head of Facilities at Eltham College, to make a change. A long-time contributor to charities which supported children at Christmas, she realised she, and others, were giving blindly: “We had no idea what these children wanted,” she says. That year, she elected instead to provide toys at Christmas to six disadvantaged children from a local school – toys chosen with their specific needs in mind. Her involvement quickly began to build, and in 2018 she launched her ‘Joy this Christmas’ campaign. With its help, the programme has grown year after year, and last year she supported 253 children in southeast London.
Brenda’s campaign provides tailored Christmas gift bags specifically designed to make sure every child feels valued. These gifts are based on information provided via ‘nomination forms’ that partner schools complete, with families’ help: questionnaires, essentially, which get to the heart of what each child wants and needs. It’s not enough to know a child likes football. What team do they support? Do they play themselves? If they love books, such as Harry Potter stories, which books have they read to date? Do they need a coat or some warm clothing to get through the winter months? Her concern is that each child should receive gifts they wanted or needed.
“We want them to receive something, that they feel comfortable to talk about when they return to school,” Brenda explains, “and to make sure they’re not left thinking ‘why did Father Christmas forget me? Was I not good enough?’.”
Importantly, they also ask about older or younger siblings, at other, non-partner schools. “We give to the whole family.” Brenda says. “And if one of our children leaves their primary, we ask for details of their new secondary school, so we can carry on helping them.”
At the beginning, Brenda ran her campaign from her living room – which it quickly outgrew. Every year, she has brought more and more partner schools on board, extending the number of children Joy this Christmas can reach. And, though Brenda loathes the limelight, she has forced herself to embrace PR to extend her campaign’s reach and support; she was featured on the BBC morning news, interviewed on BBC radio as well as other news outlets, and is hoping further coverage this year may help her in her mission to fund year-round storage.
“Eltham College has been so supportive,” Brenda says. “As soon as school finishes, they allow us to take over College Meadow Pavilion as our holding and sorting hub. But, of course, when term starts again, we need to clear everything out, to give the school back the space it needs. Finding room to keep surplus donations that didn’t match with a child this time is a huge challenge. We are continually moving items!”
With the help of long-term storage, Brenda would love to be able to extend the support they give to families all year round. But for now, everything focuses on three weeks in College Meadow around Christmas. As soon as the school term finishes, the challenge is to sort, check and clean all the donations; counting every jigsaw puzzle piece, washing clothing, dressing, and restyling dolls’ hair – in short, doing everything they can to make any preloved gifts they share feel like new. And then comes the critical part: matching donations to the children’s nomination forms. Every child receives a selection box of chocolates, a book, a cuddly, some kind of art and crafts, a puzzle, and a game as well as gifts which match their wish list and a coat if needed (they have never before had so many requests for coats and trainers as this year, Brenda reveals, a challenge she is currently trying to meet).
Teenagers are the hardest to provide gifts for (as all parents know), but Joy this Christmas strives to ensure they feel just as important as the younger children. “Ideally, we want to give something that doesn’t necessarily need electricity. Last year we focused on jewellery stands, make-up; small speakers; dartboards etc. Those kinds of things work well.” Where possible, Joy this Christmas also provides gift cards to gamers, to allow them to upgrade their online skins / games to reduce the risk of negative comments from their peers. Brenda is hoping donations from secondary schools will help her to provide gifts such as quality warm coats, even meet some of the demand for quality trainers as well as other teenage-related gifts.
Packing the gift bags takes four days – and very late nights.
“I couldn’t do it without my son and husband – or Breda!” (Breda Kelly, Eltham’s Facilities Manager) Brenda says. “They’re by my side day and night. But the core to all of this is the generosity and kindness of those who donate and their determination to help – some even collect all year for the campaign.”
This year, the campaign is collecting right up until – and including – Friday 13th December, and has teamed up with Thomas Franks, the school’s caterers, collecting adult clothing in support of the homeless.
How can you help?
Donations are sought in numerous ways:
- Collections across a range of schools – including Eltham, of course – for the first two weeks of December.
- Collections from people’s homes
- Amazon Wish List or
- Go Fund Me page
Parents/ Staff can follow the Instagram and Facebook pages to see their journey unfold through the coming weeks and how their donations have been used.
https://www.instagram.com/joythischristmas2024 or https://www.facebook.com/Joythischristmas
Thank you for all the support you give to these wonderful initiatives, transforming Christmas for so many local people.
