Michaelmas

Newsletter

Happy New Year from ExVac!

To start off our first newsletter from the new committee, we want to say that 2023 was a phenomenal year thanks to the generosity of our incredible donors. The committee is so grateful for your continued support, we couldn’t do any of the amazing work without you. 2024 is set to be even bigger and better as we finalise our transition to becoming a Charitable Incoroporated Organisation, a change that will allow us to continue our incredible ExVac legacy long into the future, and prep for our Easter vacations.

I’m Elisabeth, the President of ExVac this year, and I’m so excited to share more of our amazing work with you all. We’d love to reach as many people as possible with this newsletter, so if you know of anyone who might be interested in hearing about what we’re up to, then send them this link: https://web.us10.list-manage.com/subscribe?u=7246ff115c6d62a2f1e156245&id=f6843aeedb

Our CIO Transition

As you may well know, ExVac has recently celebrated 40 wonderful years of providing magical holidays to disadvantaged children from the Oxfordshire area. To fascilitate the continual existence of this crucial project, and bring the charity into the 21st century, the decision was made to ammend our legal structure. This change is completely necessary for the safe and effective running of ExVac. It has come at an unprecedented cost to our organisation, with legal fees equating to our yearly expenditure, meaning we have to raise double the amount we ever have before. We therefore have made a designated JustGiving page to try to garner support for this campaign. Every donation means more now then ever before. ExVac is entirely reliant upon the generosity of our supporters to keep going, so please, if you can, donate today!

*This appeal is closed, general donations still welcome*

Our 2023-2024 Committee

In October we welcomed the new committee into their positions! We have a truly incredible team who are so dedicated to working towards the best holidays ever this year.

President - Elisabeth Whittingham

Treasurer - Freddie Crichton-Miller

Chairperson - Carla Handford

VP Leaders - Nina Oldham

VP Social Services - Maya Kerr-Davis

Secretary - Olive Matthews-Prichard

Holiday Organisers - Jacob Newman and Matthew Holland

Internal Fundraiser - Emma Little

External Fundraisers - Anuj Mishra and Rayvell Wijaya

We also have our leaders for 2024 confirmed, as well as the accomodation, coaches and catering all booked, so we’re really excited to meet the amazing kids we’ll take on the vacations!

Fundraising

During Fresher’s week, we had an ExVac bake sale to give everyone the opportunity to learn more about the charity and how they can get involved this year, and introduce ourself to all the new members of college. We then had some amazing ExVac cocktails at the college bar, and our big event of the term, the Promise Auction! This year saw stick and poke tattoos, bop themes, tiramisu baking and so much more auctioned off for ExVac. It was an unforgettable night and definitely solidified ExVac’s importance within Exeter’s JCR, raising over £1,000. In the wider Oxfordshire community, we had some wonderful carollers fundraise at the Christmas market for us! It means so much that ExVac has so much support from the college and Oxford more widely. Beyond our CIO transition, ExVac still has to contend with the ongoing impacts of covid and the cost of living crisis; we need to see our increased costs matched with increased donations, so our fundraising efforts continue to be central to the running of the charity.