Welcome to the Friends of Rowledge School (FORS) homepage. FORS is a charitable organisation (charity number 1019929) run by parents and teachers at the school, to help raise additional funds to buy things that the school budget doesn't stretch to.
Every member of the school community is a Friend of Rowledge School and is automatically a member of FORS.
Each year FORS typically raises an incredible £20,000 for the school which is used to provide a huge range of enrichment for the pupils. In 2024-2025 our main FORS events raised £6,342 from fireworks, £4,532 from the Christmas fair, £1,239 from quiz night, £1,081 from the Rowledge Village Fayre and £870 from the summer fair. Our smaller events: discos, Easter egg hunt, Break The Rules Day, Christmas plays, Summer Concert, Sports Day, Buddy Café, uniform sales, Christmas cards and the lottery raised almost £4,000.
In 2025-2026 we’re hoping to raise a similar amount and have already raised a record breaking £7,362 from fireworks night, £4,133 from the Christmas fair and £608 from the new rainbow raffle.
This is possible due to your amazing support in attending, running and helping at these events, so THANK YOU!
Not only do FORS raise funds for Rowledge School, our Quiz Night is used to raise money for our partner school, Pambogo, located in Mbeya, Tanzania. Our 2024 and 2025 events raised a combined £895. These funds have been used to sponsor two children, Godfrey and Lightness until 2030, alongside improvements to the kitchen and classrooms. Our 2026 event is planned for the Spring.
How CAN YOU BE involved with FORS?
We're always looking for parents to get involved, in any way they would like, so please do get in touch via the office or headteacher.
Major events like fireworks and the Christmas fair involve around 30-40 volunteers, whilst some of the smaller events only need a handful of people. The class reps help us to organise volunteers from their parent groups to assist with making everything run smoothly. Each event has a sub-committee, who help oversee things.
FORS holds termly meetings at the school which everyone is welcome to attend, you don’t need to be a committee member or class rep to get involved – wine and nibbles are always provided. The dates are shared in advance and reminders will be sent out nearer the time. FORS meetings are a great way of getting to know other parents and feeling more connected to what is happening at school.
Whilst the major events provide the core FORS funding, smaller regular events massively boost the total we raise. Recent success has included the introduction of the rainbow raffle, which was pitched at the AGM and run a few weeks later, raising an amazing £608.
Please speak to your class reps about and ideas you may have and how you can get more involved.
East Hampshire Community Lottery
FORS are members of the East Hampshire Community Lottery which raises money for good causes in the East Hampshire district.
For every £1 ticket bought, 50p comes directly to FORS, with a further 10p distributed to other local good causes. Each ticket has a 1 in 50 chance to win a prize each week, with a top prize of £25,000! There's a better chance of winning the jackpot than the National Lottery or the Health Lottery!!
Tickets can be bought at https://www.easthantslottery.co.uk/support/the-friends-of-rowledge-school.
Good luck.
BagS 2 School
Twice a year, typically near the Autumn half term and Easter holidays, FORS organise collections with Bags 2 School, a free eco-friendly fundraising scheme that helps schools, businesses, community groups, local councils, and charities raise funds through textile recycling as well as spreading textile recycling awareness. Bags 2 School give a great opportunity for everyone to have a clear out whilst raising funds to support FORS.
FORS have committed to fund various initiatives on an ongoing basis, approximately £9,000 per year, including:
- KS2 library new releases
- Cooking lessons
- Mathletics
- Singing workshops
- Y6 leavers coach
- Student enrichment
Any remaining funds are allocated to both long and short term requests. Major funding contributions over recent years have included:
- £20,000 to remodel and upgrade the school kitchen to enable us to give secondary school equivalent cooking lessons to all pupils every term
- £20,000 to upgrade the toilets and significantly improve the school facilities
- £9,000 to upgrade the school laptops
FORS are committed to supporting The Big Build project, with contributions to be agreed based on 2025-2026 fundraising performance and emerging project requirements.
COMMITTEE 25-26
| Chair | Ana Martins-Kaczor |
| Vice Chair | Position vacant |
| Treasurer | Jon Franklin-Ferrar |
| Secretary | Amy Craig |
Alongside their roles on the committee, the Chair and Treasurer also undertake the roles of trustees for the charity in conjunction with Ms Sarah Oliver as head and Mrs Bryony Wait, staff governor. The trustees are legally accountable for the correct running of the charity and ensuring the annual reports and accounts are submitted to the Charity Commission.
Easy Fundraising
Another easy way of supporting school is through easyfundraising.
Please sign up today at www.easyfundraising.org.uk search for Rowledge school PTA.
A percentage of your online spend on purchases from stores such as John Lewis, Amazon, Booking.com, Tesco, Asda and The White Company to name just a few of the thousands, will be donated back to the school.
IT DOESN'T COST YOU ANYTHING, you just need to support your cause (Rowledge School PTA) through the website and when shopping online go to your chosen retailers website either via the easyfundraising homepage or by installing an app from the easy fundraising website, which then remembers your cause whenever you're visiting an online retailer which is registered with easyfundraising.
Just imagine, if every family contributed just 1% of their annual online spend to school, we would raise a lot of money without having to do very much at all.
REGULAR GIVING
Several parents and their families choose to support FORS through regular giving. The amount can be anything you are able to donate, with the majority gifting between £2 and £10 a month. If regular giving is something your family would like to do, please contact the FORS treasurer for the bank details. If possible, please also complete a gift aid declaration which enables FORS to claim an additional 25% at no cost to you.
Gift Aid
Donating through Gift Aid means FORS can claim an extra 25p for every £1 you give at no extra cost to you. If you make any donations to FORS either through regular giving, additional donations alongside event tickets or as a one off, please consider completing a Gift Aid form to ensure FORS can make the most of your generosity.
Social Media
FORS has a Facebook page for general communications and a separate page for second hand uniform. Please feel free to join these if you want to.
Second Hand Uniform
We know uniform can be expensive and children seem to grow out of it in no time at all. To try and help, FORS run four second hand uniform sales throughout the year, three for the current school community (usually around October, April and July) and one for prospective Year R parents at their welcome evening. Please consider passing any good quality uniform to FORS for onward sale to the second hand uniform team via the wheelie bin by the school gates. If you need something urgently please get in contact and we can see what we have in stock.
Class Reps
|
Year R |
Caroline Towndrow & Jo Collins |
|
Year 1 |
Leanne Gockelen, Lottie Flett & Elise Brink |
|
Year 2 |
Catherine Timson & Fran Scott |
|
Year 3 |
Laryssa Jesse & Rebecca LAwton |
|
Year 4 |
Rebecca Hardcastle & Denise Wostenholm |
|
Year 5 |
Claire Colcombe & Ali Hutchings |
|
Year 6 |
Emma Lush & Polly Ross |
Each year group will typically have two class reps, a minimum of one is required, but more can be used to spread the effort. Class reps play a vital role as the link between FORS and the wider school community.
Role of the Class REPS
Maintaining Class Lists and Managing the Class WhatsApp Group
Traditionally reps have kept a list of all the children in the class and parent contact details. Each class now has a WhatsApp group to make this easier. Please remember that WhatsApp is a form of social media and should be used appropriately. It is very important to get everyone's permission to be added to the WhatsApp group. The groups can be used for everything from playdates to emergency pick-up help, event volunteering, weekly reminders and communications from the teachers. It is not to be circulated outside the school community and not to be used for commercial purposes.
Organising Social Events for Parents
Class coffee mornings and parents’ nights out are always good fun and the most effective way of helping parents get to know each other and generating a good team spirit in your class. The class reps may organise these from time to time but they will always be thankful if anyone else wants to organise a class get together.
Christmas Fair, Summer Fair and Other Events
Every year group is allocated stalls for the fairs and Class Reps help coordinate the preparation, rota, clearing up, and notes. They need all the help that they can get, so please get invovled if you can!
Teachers’ Presents
If your class decides it wants to give the teachers and the teaching assistants a Christmas or end of year present, the Class Reps will usually organise this however if another parent in the class wishes to do this the reps won’t be offended! Apps like Collectiv can be used so people don’t need to share bank details.
Communication
Some teachers appreciate help with communication to parents. If this is the case with your class teacher, the reps will share all communications as necessary.
Constitution
The current FORS constitution was written back in 1992. We are reviewing this and any updates will be shared in due course.
Ticket Tailor
FORS use Ticket Tailor as our primary ticket sales platform for our major events. Our box office can be found at https://buytickets.at/friendsofrowledgeschool
Major events include our fireworks night, our biggest fundraiser of the year, quiz night, and our summer fair. Tickets typically go on sale around a month before the events.
