SOS Children’s Villages Society

The SOS Children’s Villages Society has been set up to raise money and awareness for the SOS Children’s Villages charitable organisation. They are the world’s largest orphan charity and operate in 125 countries, supporting orphans long-term through the means of sponsorship. For nearly sixty years, SOS Children has developed an approach based on building a community. They provide children with a home, a family and a new mother in a purpose-built local Village. They invest in whole communities in order to help many children and provide for them until they are ready for independent life. Because they are reasonably unknown in the UK, they have set up student societies around the country to increase their profile.

I spoke to Annalise Baker  who is the president of the SOS Children supporters group and set up the society at the University of Manchester. She explained about what they do, “in order to reach our aims of raising money and awareness, we organise various events throughout the year. To raise awareness we carry out public talks in local community groups such as churches. These talks are not about raising money. They involve us giving a presentation which we can adapt to the audience depending upon what countries we specifically talk about, and answering any questions they may have. To raise money we host events such as gigs and raffles. These also increase the social aspects of the society.”

Since setting up the society last year they have already held a public talk in a local church and organised a concert called ‘gig for the kids’ that raised £361 for the charity. At the end of the year they also organised a raffle draw that raised a further £100.

Their plans for the year include at least two more talks and they are also hoping to have another gig as well as a comedy night.

SOS Children’s Villages Society meets every Wednesday at 7pm in the Student Union to organise their events. They hold regular monthly socials where they do activities such as bowling to ensure everyone in the society has the chance to get to know each other.

If you would like to get involved you can join through the student union website by searching ‘SOS’ in the societies section. They can also be found on:

Facebook by searching ‘UOM SOS Children’s Villages’

Twitter: @MCRSOSCHILDRENS.