Potato firm chips in for pre-school (From This is The West Country)

Potato firm chips in for pre-school

4:00pm Sunday 28th October 2012 in Somerset

POTATO company Branston has given £1,400 to Shepton Beauchamp Pre-School to allow it to buy a range of equipment to improve the children’s day-to-day learning.

The school has 28 children aged between two and four years and 11 months old.

The money was used to purchase and install a child-height sink, a touchscreen computer and educational toys, including three wooden jigsaws and £100 of Lego. The school also purchased a CD player which the children can use to record their own voices.

Pre-school supervisor Shelley Bacon said: “This donation is absolutely fantastic news and we have invested it well. We have needed a sink for quite a while now and have been using a washing up bowl on a chair as an interim measure! We had to fill it up using a jug but it is great that we now have a sink with running water.

“We have also bought a touchscreen computer which the children are fascinated by and will be so useful. We feel we have really put the money to good use.

“Every year we have to do all the fundraising ourselves – and it can be a real challenge. So when Branston approached us about a donation, it made such a huge difference to us and we are all thrilled.”

As a thank you, the children have put together an abstract painting for the company’s reception area. Branston general manager Ian Wait said: “As a company we like to support our local communities and we felt that the Shepton Beauchamp Pre-School was a really worthy cause.”