Latest News

Hoe Valley students help Santa arrive early for Whiteley residents

14th December 2020

The Whiteley Homes Trust is grateful for the lovely relationships we have with many of our local schools and colleges, and the residents in our care homes have really missed their visits from children and young people during the pandemic. So, we were delighted to be contacted by Hoe Valley School in Woking who have been supporting the Times Educational Supplement’s Classrooms to Care Home Campaign, to encourage schools to write letters or record short videos for care home residents at Christmas, who may be feeling isolated or lonely.

Members of the school visited this week bringing handwritten letters for our care home residents and some lovely Christmas hampers which arrived in a fabulous handmade sleigh with Santa and his reindeers and a Hanzel and Gretel cottage, with sparkly lights!

Chief Executive, Rachel Hill said: “We’re so grateful to the staff and children of Hoe Valley school for all their kindness and hard work. All the beautiful hampers and gifts in the sleigh and little cottage were amazing and the handwritten letters will be so appreciated. Young people are not used to letter writing and I know how thrilled I feel as a grown up to receive a letter, so I think our residents are going to be over the moon with their letters and wonderful gifts.

“The TES campaign is a really important one. There are so many benefits to intergenerational relationships between older people and children. Young people help to bring much joy and fun to a care home and older people can be wonderful role models for them too. But these relationships are especially vital now.

“The pandemic has had a huge impact on those living in care – being unable to see family and friends in person for so many months. It has been a real struggle for us and for many care providers trying to keep residents safe while working to combat their inevitable feelings of loneliness and isolation.

“Many children will be missing their grandparents and older people in care will have desperately missed their grandchildren, so this initiative by the TES is a timely opportunity to show someone cares and is thinking of them.”

Watch Rachel talking to TES about these issues here.