Support Needed - Scouts building Sensory Garden in India

glenn3ie

Hi Folks,

My name is Glenn Webster and I'm a Scout Leader from Donore Avenue in Dublin 8.

At the end of this year 13 fellow scouts (aged 16-19) with the support of a couple of leaders all from Donore Avenue will head out to Siliguri, Inidia where we are going to be working in a orphanage for disabled children. We have been invited to build a Sensory Garden here for them so that they can enjoy spending time in the garden with loads of objects and plants that will appeal to their different senses.

Each scouts going is paying their own fare of €1,750. We are also fundraising €17,500 so that we can buy materials for the garden once we get out to India.

We have recently got use of a plot of land in the Pearse College Allotments in Crumlin so that we can get use to gardening/landscaping and have been requested to build a small play area here for the children of people who use the allotments. This is a great opportunity for us to get our skill level up to what is needed for the big challenge we are about to undertake in India!!

However, we didn't originally budget for building two gardens so we now need to seek donations of MATERIALS from Garden Centres and other interested parties.

The following is the list of materials that we require to build the play area/garden in Pearse College Allotments.

1 x ton of gravel
1 x ton of sand
1 x ton on of 804. 50mm down
15 x bag of cement
2 x 4m lengths of 75mm x 50mm rough
2 x 4m lengths of 75mm x 50mm treated
10 x 1500mm stakes 100mm diameter
10 x 1500 mm stakes 150mm diameter
1 sheet of 22mm marine ply
4 shovels
2 pick axe handles
4 shovels handles
2 forks
2 rakes
2 landscaping rakes
2 builder’s trowels
2 floats
1 timber float
4 buckets
1 hose & connection
1 1200mm level
2 hand saws
2 hammers
1 lump hammer

20 pairs of gloves ass sizes
12 bags of composite
1 bag 25kg of soil improver
5kg bag of no2 utility grass seed
5 rolls of weed block
12 beech trees for screening
Bedding plants
Small shrubs
Alpine shrubs


Perhaps you may work/run/own a garden centre or suppliers and would be in a position to donate some of the above. Or perhaps you may be a gardener and have spare equipment that you could donate to us.

Please PM me or email me at gairdindochais@gmail.com

Best Wishes,

Glenn

Sonnenblumen

Glenn - the Indian equivalent of your combined fundraising, self financing and labour probably equates to an equivalent a local spend > € 200k for a sensory garden!
This raises the obvious question , why not utilise the valuable resources of money and labour in more productive ways? A bloated indulgence in a single garden by inexperienced but willing volunteer gardeners is hardly the best or most constructive means of making a charitable contribution?

Nonmonotonic

Think you are being a bit harsh there, Son.

glenn3ie wrote: »

we didn't originally budget for building two gardens

They are only looking for materials for the Irish garden.

Quite a high percentage of charitable contributions go to administration. At least this group is 'cutting out the middleman' and doing the work themselves.

Sonnenblumen

Nonmonotonic wrote: »

Think you are being a bit harsh there, Son.


They are only looking for materials for the Irish garden.

Quite a high percentage of charitable contributions go to administration. At least this group is 'cutting out the middleman' and doing the work themselves.

I don't mean to be harsh, I am simply questioning the wisdom of raising funds to spend € 17.5k on materials in India to build a sensory garden in Siliguri. €17.5k is an extraordinary budget, especially locally. To put the spend into context, the minimum pay rates in the region is typically € 3.00 - € 5.00/day. The annual pay for an experienced Secondary school teacher in the region is < € 3k.

dory

Sonnenblumen wrote: »

I don't mean to be harsh, I am simply questioning the wisdom of raising funds to spend € 17.5k on materials in India to build a sensory garden in Siliguri. €17.5k is an extraordinary budget, especially locally. To put the spend into context, the minimum pay rates in the region is typically € 3.00 - € 5.00/day. The annual pay for an experienced Secondary school teacher in the region is < € 3k.

I agree. But the OP probably simplified things for the sake of not writing an essay up there. I'm sure there are other things other than just garden things for that €17.5k (at least I hope so - give me the money OP and I'll build you a school and a sensory garden in India!).

redser7

Sonnenblumen wrote: »

I don't mean to be harsh, I am simply questioning the wisdom of raising funds to spend € 17.5k on materials in India to build a sensory garden in Siliguri. €17.5k is an extraordinary budget, especially locally. To put the spend into context, the minimum pay rates in the region is typically € 3.00 - € 5.00/day. The annual pay for an experienced Secondary school teacher in the region is < € 3k.

But didn't they say they are doing a project in Ireland too?

magicbastarder

worth also pointing out this phrase: "We have been invited"; so it's not the OP's original idea.

Sonnenblumen

redser7 wrote: »

But didn't they say they are doing a project in Ireland too?

Yes they did for which they're looking for materials here in Ireland. If you read you'll note they're separately fundraising €17.5k for garden in India.