Barcan+Kirby’s Community Fund assists JIGSAW Thornbury with children’s well-being programme

We are pleased to have donated funds to JIGSAW Thornbury for their Project 5 Wellbeing and Resilience Programme.

The funding comes after the Thornbury-based charity was successful in its application to the Barcan+Kirby Community Fund. The initiative, launched in 2020, provides groups and individuals who are local to our six offices the chance to receive financial support from our firm.

What is Project 5?

Project 5 is a support programme which helps young people who are struggling with anxiety and mental health issues. Through this, individuals are provided with a journal which uses Mind’s ‘Five ways to wellbeing’ to help develop resilience and coping skills. JIGSAW has been delivering this successful programme to local schools and other organisations such as Bristol Autism Project and, in 2019, held a sell-out Project 5 conference focusing on mental health issues in young people for parents and professionals.

Commenting on the project, our Managing Partner, Bill Willcocks, said: “We are really proud to provide funds to JIGSAW Thornbury. Project 5 is a great initiative to assist young people and their families with anxiety, which has been needed more in the last year.

Being an active supporter of the communities in which we operate is an important part of who we are as local high street solicitors. We strive to bring out the best in not just our staff, but also in the communities that we serve around Bristol.”

About JIGSAW

JIGSAW supports children with additional needs and disabilities and their families. Located just a few doors down from our office on Thornbury high street, the charity provides support groups, a SEN-sory lending library, holiday activities and a young volunteers service. It also offers training to families and professionals.

“Over the last few years we have been getting an increasing number of families and schools approaching us for support for young people struggling with anxiety and other mental health issues. We were approached to develop a programme to support these young people and have since delivered this to many young people in the area and their parents.

The funding we have kindly received from Barcan+Kirby has been used to set up a box of resources that schools can borrow from our lending library for use when they are delivering the programme. This will make the programme much more affordable for schools and more interactive for the young people taking part. We are very grateful for the support provided by the team at Barcan+Kirby, particularly helping with us securing our new venue in Thornbury.”

– Tor Goodman, CEO of JIGSAW

Our charity and community support

Supporting our local community is rooted within our core values, and we are proud to have supported a range of charities and community groups over the years.

The Barcan+Kirby Community Fund, which we launched just before the first lockdown in March 2020, has already helped several local community projects across Bristol and South Gloucestershire, many of which struggled during the Covid-19 pandemic. You can read more about our Community Fund, and who it has benefited so far, here.