L4A

We work with older people receiving care across Leicester and Leicestershire

volunteer

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Tom cycles for 12 hours straight to raise £500 for L4A!

At 3am on a cold, rainy and dark Saturday morning in August, Tom March climbed onto a bike at Anytime Fitness Corby, started cycling and did not get off again until 12 hours later. At 3pm, he clambered off the bike having raised £500 for Learning for the Fourth Age and we could not be more grateful. 

Tom is no stranger to fitness challenges and works as a personal trainer. Between all the cyclists on Saturday 5th August, the combined distance achieved together was 270 miles and most of these were achieved by Tom himself who did not stop pedalling at an impressive cadence throughout his challenge.

With such a huge challenge to undertake, he had spare bikes next to him for other people to join in support. Many people did, including some of his family members and friends, and even our very own CEO (in spite of being almost 7 months pregnant).

It is not too late to sponsor Tom for this huge effort or to donate to our ongoing work here.

And if you need some help with a similar challenge or would like to work with Tom as your personal trainer, please see here for more details or call him on 07739 558171.

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Challenges Accepted!

We are proud to have all sorts of supporters in L4A and some of them even take on crazy challenges to raise much needed funds for us. If you are inspired by any of the stories below and would like to take on any sort of challenge at all in order to raise money for us, we would be really grateful. Please speak to any member of our team or email us on info@l4a.org.uk to discuss in more detail. You can, of course, donate to L4A at any time through our Just Giving website here and we are especially grateful for small monthly donations.

Cam Smith spent an entire three days walking 47 miles (and many more to campsites and beyond) across shingle and over hills along the beautiful Norfolk Coastal path in order to fundraise for us. Read his story here.

In less than one month, Tom March will be cycling for 12 hours solid for us in order to fundraise to improve quality of life for older people receiving care locally. Ouch. Read more about his challenge here.

Rozanna Kinmans has successfully run a half marathon raising £180 for us. See here.

A huge thank you to all our supporters and to all of the wonderful people who sponsored them in their challenges. We are grateful to you all. All funds raised will be spent at the grassroots supporting our charitable work improving the quality of life for older people receiving care in Leicester and Leicestershire.

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Volunteer Case Study: Alpha John

I first joined L4A because I heard it was a great organisation to help those with mental health problems to live their lives to the fullest where they can enjoy their favourite hobbies and other awesome activities such as arts and crafts! I was very glad to be a volunteer as I was keen on helping them live their lives the best way they could as they got older. One of my one to one sessions was with John who is a very light-hearted person and enjoys creating drawings using charcoal pencils.

I enjoyed seeing how friendly all the staff and patients were at the care home – it was amazing. Also, the drawing sessions I had with John were so fun as we learned more about each other and how we have common interests, like we are both into Indian food and gardening. The sessions were one hour or so long each week and I enjoyed seeing how John’s drawing skills improved each time I visited him. One of his best drawings was a batman picture which he added his own twist to it by angling batman’s face in a different direction, this surprised me and I realised how great John’s imagination is! Our sessions started with him drawing stars using a ruler but as time went on he started drawing freehand and added shading with shadows and highlights to faces, animals and landscapes. It was quite the learning journey!

I learned lots about how you can still have fun and learn new hobbies even as you get older. I was also able to see how the whole care home works and how the carers are always there to support the patients if they need to. The whole experience showed me how vast the caring world is and this has inspired me to find out more about the things I saw. I wasn’t expecting to learn how being a carer was such a passionate role which included encouraging patients to persevere when at times they felt they lost the confidence to go on. For example, when John felt he found the face drawings hard, through a little encouragement, he attempted them and produced good pieces of art. I was excited about getting home, as I had so much to speak to my family and friends about!

One special highlight for me was how my contribution to John’s life has made a great impact on him as he said ‘you’re an inspiration and you get me going’. This was so heartfelt as he lets me know from time to time how he enjoys the sessions and how he eagerly waits to get the sessions started! I was so pleased that he takes keen interest in them.

I will definitely say that volunteering with the L4A is a worthwhile experience for anyone of all ages and background.This experience has strengthened my consideration of pursuing a career in a caring profession in the future, perhaps through a medical degree. The volunteering experience has made me realise how much of a lasting impact that carers can have on people’s lives and the lives of future generations.

 

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Support us

It is our privilege to work every single week amongst older people, carers and volunteers who have the energy, will and ability to create positive change in care. L4A is, however, in need of ongoing monthly donations to support this good work improving wellbeing through learning for some of the oldest people in Leicester and Leicestershire.

If you have some spare change each month that you’d like to make a real difference to the lives of older people, please sign up to give a one off or monthly donation here and know that your money is going to support the valuable work of a small, innovative local charity.

Do you shop online? Almost everyone does these days, even our care home residents! Sign up to Give As You Live for free and with every purchase a small percentage of your shopping spending will be donated to L4A, at no cost to you! Make sure you type in our full name of “Learning for the Fourth Age” to nominate us as your charity – happy shopping!

You can also undertake a challenge for sponsorship, like Rozanna recently did when she raised £180 running the Surrey Half Marathon for us in March. More information here. If you have an idea that you’d like to get sponsorship for, please don’t hesitate to contact any of our staff or email info@l4a.org.uk as we’d love to hear from you.

Thank you in advance for your ongoing support.

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Sarah’s Success!

This is a case study written by Sarah McCarthy, one of our volunteers. Sarah joined L4A to volunteer when she was a student and has since undertaken a wide variety of placements and is now returning to university to study medicine.  

Upon hearing about L4A at a careers’ fair at Leicester University, I knew I wanted to get involved. It has been extremely rewarding helping older people to rediscover or take up new hobbies as it is clear to see the difference it makes to their lives and general wellbeing.

At an art group, I’ve seen how residents’ skills have developed, along with their confidence and self belief. This has been particularly inspiring as they’ve got an art exhibition coming up where their work will be on display. (More information about this is available here).

For over a year, I also visited a lady on a one-to-one basis in her own home. This was through L4A’s innovative domiciliary learning service. Together, we put her old photos into an album, which stimulated her to reminisce and share her memories with me – it was wonderful to see the pleasure that this brought her. Initially, she was quite shy, but over time her confidence grew, and often she would suggest ideas for activities herself.

I have thoroughly enjoyed volunteering with L4A over the past 3 years. I believe it has helped me to gain a place at medical school, where I reflected on my experiences at interview. I will continue to volunteer with L4A until my new course starts in September.