Get a New Building

Over 30 years ago the nursery Westcott Tots was formed. Creating a space for little pre-schoolers to start there journey in education as well providing childcare so those parents were able to work as well. The building that still stands today is the same building as of 30 years ago when Westcott Tots first opened. And now it is in complete disrepair, it is a temporary building and wasn't built to last as long as it has. And sourcing funds and means has been one of many challenges and although many have attempted in the past for whatever reason I do not know nothing happened.

Then the pandemic hit and the nursery shut during this time which had a massive impact financially on the nursery, which was prolonged further when it reopened but was only offering half days so for a while the nursery had been running at a loss and barely surviving so any funds/grants/monies it received it was needed elsewhere to keep going, meaning the building fell further and further down the list because of the size of the job that needed to occur.

Now we are at a risk of closing which would impact 30 children some of who also have and need SEN support. So it would affect many families and the school who we feed a fair amount of students too as well. The school are as supportive as they can be and although we are not a part of the school directly we do work closely with them when it comes to transitioning children up to school.

The nursery has had to overcome more than its share of obstacles over the years which has impacted staff, committee members and even the children. I have recently become chair of the committee, after joining back in 2022 when my son attended the nursery and it was at threat of closing then too because there was no one to take over the manager who had been running it in absence of an active committee and because I had just had my baby girl, I wanted to make sure the nursery remained open so that it was there for her to attend when she was old which she is here now and loves it. The nursery had to overcome a temporary closure because we didn't have enough staff to remain open due to long term sickness but we managed to come through that but again these things that come up take attention away from the building. So we have just tried to keep ticking along while we came up with a solution so rather pay out money to keep constantly repairing a building we want to put that money towards sourcing and building a newer and bigger site so we are able to take on more children in the community.

Our nursery is not the only one that is like this, there are others too that struggle like ourselves, and its a lot to ask of volunteers to take on the task of running a nursery and everything that comes with it, but here we are and we do our best. I have a wonderful team of staff who support me and the committee and go above and beyond for us and the children, the staff care so much and its more than just a job to them and you can see it in the children. The children who attend are so happy and settled and love it when they are here. So we know we are doing something right, we just want to give them building that is as good and wonderful as the team and the kids that are on the inside.

We are asking and pleading for help in order to support our goal of providing a new building for the nursery so prevent us from closing as we cannot afford to keep repairing the old one, which is on its last legs after a 30 year stint and after everything we've had to overcome we do not want it to end in closure.

Any donation big or small would go a long way to help make this nursery amazing which is what it deserves to be for both the staff and children who we are lucky enough to work with and to the parents who rely on us so they are able to work.