Leeds Building Society seeks two new community partners
Melanie May | 18 July 2023 | News
Leeds Building Society is looking for two partner organisations to help deliver its purpose of bringing home ownership within reach of more people.
The Society is inviting charities to apply to be its next charity partner from April 2024. Over a three-year period, the Society, along with its members and colleagues, will aim to raise a minimum of £300,000 through a range of fundraising activities.
The Society is also looking for a financial education partner to help support vulnerable young people who are likely to be at a greater risk of facing financial challenges. This will be an initial one-year pilot with the potential to extend. The Society will work with them to deliver sessions to vulnerable groups of young people, aged between 14 to 25 years who are financially independent and living in Leeds and the surrounding area.
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Charity partner eligibility criteria:
- Must closely align to the Society’s purpose of putting homeownership within reach of more people.
- A UK-wide charity that can provide volunteering and engagement opportunities for colleagues.
- The charity must not be partnering with any other building society or financial services provider in the same way.
The closing date for both applications is 31 August 2023. Applications for the charity partnership will be considered at a shortlisting meeting in September with the shortlisted charities invited to pitch to a panel.
The final two charities will be asked to create a video to showcase their work and Leeds Building Society’s members and colleagues will be able to vote for their favourite cause. Voting will take place towards the end of the year.
Applications for the financial education partner will be reviewed in September, with successful organisations appointed before the end of the year.
Vanessa Roberts, Head of Strategy and Responsible Business said:
“We are excited to start the search for our next charity partner and find an organisation which can help us in delivering our purpose of putting homeownership within reach of more people.
“We’re looking for innovative and creative links to our purpose, which might mean partnering with charities who support people at risk of homelessness, or who experience barriers to home ownership due to their circumstances or background. Our colleagues and members are amazing fundraisers and volunteers and we have a lot to offer our next charity partner. We see this as a true partnership and look forward to hearing from charities with their ideas.
“For our education partner, we’re looking for an organisation to help us deliver impactful support to vulnerable groups of young people, such as care leavers, those excluded from mainstream education, at risk of homelessness, or who may be experiencing fuel or food poverty. Through the partnership, we plan to deliver a financial education programme that is preventative, rather than reactive, to prepare and support vulnerable young people who might not always have a strong support network to fall back on.”
Past charity partnership
How much might the new partnership yield? In recent weeks Leeds Building Society passed the £700,000 mark in its fundraising for Dementia UK, the specialist dementia nursing charity which is its current charity partner.
The Society appointed Dementia UK as its charity partner in April 2020, with a target of raising £500,000 over four years. The funds raised would enable the charity to help over 2,500 families living with dementia across the UK.
- Leeds Building Society doubles volunteering time of its staff (21 June 2018)
- Leeds Building Society launches funding in support of parkrun communities (16 May 2018)
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About Melanie May
Melanie May is a journalist and copywriter specialising in writing both for and about the charity and marketing services sectors since 2001. She can be reached via thepurplepim.com.