On Friday 19 January, Year 6 girls spent a night at school in support of SPEAR, a charity for people experiencing homelessness in southwest London. Surbiton High Girls’ Prep School has supported SPEAR in Kingston for over five years through numerous events.
On the night, Bruce and Andy visited us to inform us about homelessness and how SPEAR supports them.
Bruce, a fundraiser, has been working at SPEAR for over a decade. He advised us that if we see a homeless person on the street, we can:
- Report them on Streetlink – a team of outreach workers will go to the area as quickly as possible
- Do not give them money as we do not know what they would do with it
Andy, who now works at SPEAR, shared his personal experience about being homeless. Andy was a self-employed builder who found himself homeless after his relationship ended. He tried to hide his situation but was taken in by SPEAR.
We talked about how some people need to make difficult life choices, for example, choosing between food and clothing.
The message we took away from the experience is that we should be very grateful for everything.
