I recently spoke to a member of staff at a local school, who informed me that a large number of their pupils did not receive Christmas presents. As a parent myself, I found this hard to hear, and we began to discuss how Social Vision could support the staff’s efforts. We decided to keep this process anonymous to protect the young people at the school.

The member of staff has devised a reward system, where underperforming / disengaged / low attendance pupils could gain points based on their journey of improvement. Crucially, this would not be linked to academic performance, but focus more on small improvements to attendance levels, reductions in number of incidents, and higher engagement in everyday school life.

It’s hoped that these subtle adaptations to their daily life will improve their learning and social behaviours over a longer period of time and be more sustainable.

To support this, Social Vision has provided a cash donation to be spent on Christmas presents and rewards for those young people who show improvements. I’m hoping we can make this into a longer term partnership with ongoing support.

As a social enterprise, with the sole aim of making York a better place for people to realise their potential, this seems like the perfect way to reinvest our profits, practice what we preach, and try to positively influence the future for our city’s youngsters.

If you’d like to support Social Vision to do more of this, you can sponsor our newsletter or commission us to undertake your next project. If you’re a local business who would like to be more socially-conscious and support initiatives like this, then please drop us a line – joe@social-vision.org.uk