Minibus Replacement Appeal - Update and Thank You

We did it! Our Go Fund Me minibus replacement appeal has now closed, having exceeded our target.

We extend a massive THANK YOU from all of the children, young people, staff and families at Freemantles for your incredible generosity.

We have been overwhelmed by the incredible support of the local community, including the Woking District Rotary Club.  Since launching our minibus replacement appeal, you have collectively raised more than the amount we needed to fund our replacement minibus, which is truly amazing.

We are delighted to let you know that our replacement minibus has arrived, in order to continue to facilitate our vitally important community learning programme for our autistic students.  These weekly trips form an incredibly important part of the students’ curriculum at Freemantles, and allow them to apply what they have been learning about in the classroom in a functional way in the ‘real world’. Our autistic students can find interpreting the context of different settings and experiences very challenging. By giving the students meaningful, appropriate experiences in the community, in a vast range of places such as shops, cafes, leisure centres, parks (you name it we go there!), we can encourage the development of their independence, social understanding and communication.

We are having some signage made up for the minibus to reflect the support from the community in purchasing it, so you may well see it out and about in the local area!

We are continuing with the planned expansion of the school to offer more specialist school places to autistic children and young people. As well as maintaining our existing fleet, we will soon be seeking to purchase additional minibuses and/or larger cars so that every student can continue to access and benefit from community learning experiences. We will therefore be putting the surplus raised from this appeal towards the purchase of our next vehicle. (so if you still wish to donate it will go towards a very similar cause!)Thank you for your support in giving us a head start on this.

Thank you again for your hugely generous support and kindness over the last few weeks.