Charity My Life My Choice scoop Jubilee grant (From Bicester Advertiser)
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Charity My Life My Choice scoop Jubilee grant
7:00am Thursday 7th March 2013 in News
By Debbie Waite, Features writer
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DELIGHT: Back row, Tracey Taylor, Andy Law, Hannah Harrison and Graham Shellard. Middle row, Tommy Owen-Lovegrove, Bryan Mitchell and Jackie Scarrott. Front, Neal Kinsella
MEMBERS of the charity My Life My Choice were dancing with joy this week after scooping a £5,000 Diamond Jubilee Grant to spend on their nightclub for people with special needs.
My Life My Choice, based at the Jam Factory in Park End Street, Oxford, was one of five charities which had been shortlisted for the latest Diamond Jubilee Grant.
And the advocacy project for people with learning disabilities came out top of the list, ahead of mental health charity Tandem Oxfordshire, sports charity KEEN, Oxfordshire Family Mediation and Wolvercote Young Peoples Club.
Dawn Wiltshire, a trustee of My Life My Choice, said: “The charity is absolutely honoured and delighted to have been awarded the Diamond Grant.
“The money will help us to develop our new nightclub for young people with learning disabilities, StingTeens.
“At our last event over 100 people attended.
“We now want to organise more club nights for even more people.”
StingTeens, aimed at 14- to 19-year-olds, and its adult equivalent The Stingray Club, take place one evening a month at the Plush Lounge, Park End Street, Oxford.
It is the only nightclub in the county for people with special needs. Entrants pay on the door and they can also DJ, or become rappers or breakdancers for the night.
Diamond Jubilee Grants have been created to provide cash legacies for the county’s small and struggling charities and are being drawn from the Oxfordshire Jubilee Fund, which was launched in 2012.
Businesses, schools and individuals have been donating to the fund and the money is being distributed to groups in the shape of £5,000 awards.
Jayne Woodley of the Oxfordshire Community Foundation, which is awarding the grants, said: “We were dazzled by the activities of My Life My Choice – the numbers involved, the work that members are undertaking and particularly the way the organisation is not only focused on assisting people with learning disabilities, but is to a large extent run by them.”
