Surfers Against Sewage has secured a £5,000 grant to fund a six-month ocean education project for primary school pupils in Tynemouth.
The donation was provided by the Santander Foundation, which offers Discovery Grants to UK registered charities for projects that help disadvantaged people in local communities.
Surfers Against Sewage (SAS) is a national marine conservation and campaigning charity that aims to inspire, unite and empower communities to take action to protect oceans, beaches, waves and wildlife. SAS campaigns against society's throwaway culture with a specific focus on the damaging impact of single-use plastics via its Plastic Free Communities campaign and national beach cleaning programme.
The funding supports an immersive education programme which is being offered to primary school pupils at Tynemouth beach who may not have had the opportunity to learn about coastal ecosystems. It will teach pupils about environmental stewardship – from interactive biology in rockpools to how to care for the coastal environment via beach cleans. The programme will run until spring 2019.
Sally McGee, Surfers Against Sewage Regional Rep for Tynemouth, said: “We'd like to thank the Santander Foundation for its generous support and for helping us to deliver this incredibly worthwhile project to children from the North Shields area. Education will play a vital role in creating plastic-free coastlines and recruiting and inspiring the next generation of ‘Ocean Guardians’.”
Emma Scott, Branch Manager at Santander's North Shields branch said: “The Santander Foundation makes hundreds of donations to local projects every year with the aim of assisting organisations, communities and vulnerable people throughout the UK. The staff at our branch know the great work Surfers Against Sewage does in protecting the environment and we hope this grant will help them in their support for local community action.”
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Notes to Editors:
Media Contact
Leonora Burtenshaw at Santander
Email: Leonora.burtenshaw@santander.co.uk Tel: 020 7756 4543
Sally Fish at Surfers Against Sewage
Email: press@sas.org.uk Tel: 01872 553001
About Surfers Against Sewage
Surfer Against Sewage
The charity is a national marine conservation and campaigning group that inspires, unites and empowers communities to take action to protect the marine environment.
For more information, please visit: www.sas.org.uk
Santander Foundation
The Santander Foundation is at the heart of the Bank's community activities, providing grants to small charities and social enterprises working with disadvantaged people to fund skills, knowledge and innovation projects across the UK. Discovery Grants of up to £5,000 are available to support three types of activity:
- Explorer: improving people's knowledge
- Transformer: supporting skills and experience
- Changemaker: innovative solutions to social challenges
Over the last five years, the Santander Foundation has provided £26 million in funding to 13,914 UK charities through Discovery Grants and Staff Matched Donations. For more information please visit: www.santanderfoundation.org.uk
Santander UK is a financial services provider in the UK that offers a wide range of personal and commercial financial products and services. It has brought real competition to the UK, through its innovative products for retail customers and relationship banking model for UK SMEs. At 30 June 2018, the bank has c24,200 employees. It serves around 15 million active customers, via a nationwide branch network, telephone, mobile and online banking; and 64 regional Corporate Business Centres. Santander UK is subject to the full supervision of the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) and the Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA) in the UK. Santander UK plc customers are protected by the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS) in the UK.