UOB brings festive cheer to community with pop-up event, carolling sessions
Booths are set up by charities and social enterprises to raise funds, and boost awareness of various causes
A POP-UP event and carolling sessions organised by UOB on Wednesday (Dec 4) and Thursday raised the festive spirit in Raffles Place.
Charities and social enterprises set up booths at UOB Plaza to sell products – such as handmade gifts, apparel, art and baked goods – and raise awareness for the causes they were supporting.
While the funds raised went directly to their own causes, UOB also helped to garner donations for Community Chest, its key corporate social responsibility (CSR) partner that supports people in need.
One charity that set up a booth at the pop-up event was non-profit organisation New Life Stories, which supports children whose parents are in prison, as well as their families. It aims to improve the quality of life for the affected families and encourage social mobility.
Saleemah Ismail, chief executive of New Life Stories, said: “We work with children aged zero to 12 to provide them with quality early-childhood education to prevent intergenerational incarceration and to help them build coping, developmental and functioning skills as a child, including reading and literacy.”
Every year, New Life Stories teams up with UOB for a gift-giving programme, by which new interactive toys or games are bought and delivered to the 150 children the charity supports. This year, the programme was open to members of the public for the first time.
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At its booth, New Life Stories also sold children’s books written by fathers and mothers in prison, and hand-drawn by those who have already been released. “We feel like this is a good opportunity to share to the larger public about the talent that these fathers and mothers have… because other parents and children will resonate with these stories and the expression of love,” Saleemah noted.
The funds raised will go towards the charity’s family-strengthening programme, through which it works with the children, the grandparents taking care of them, and the jailed parents. It provides counselling services to the family and play therapy to the children, as well as takes the young ones to the prison so that they can bond with their parents.
Saleemah added: “We try to heal the broken relationship. We have counsellors go inside the prison to work with the parents on self development, being more involved in the life of their kids, and being more responsible.”
New Life Stories’ ongoing partnership with UOB started seven years ago, when the bank contacted it because it wanted to support small organisations that did not have the “bandwidth” or “name recognition”, she said.
In addition to the gift-giving programme, UOB employees also take the child beneficiaries out for excursions, for example to the beach and Sungei Buloh.
Other partner charities and social enterprises that participated in the pop-up event include Extra.Ordinary People, Flour Power and The Art Faculty.
Enriching experience
Twice a day, UOB volunteers held carolling sessions, with vocalists from Extra.Ordinary People – a charity that supports adults and children with special needs – joining them for lunchtime sessions.
Choo Tuck Wai, executive director of group governance at the risk and compliance office at UOB, participated in the carolling sessions.
He volunteers four to five times a year, calling his experiences “enriching”. Besides it helping him to give back to the community, volunteering has allowed him to develop leadership and collaboration skills, he said.
Choo added that much of UOB’s CSR efforts focus on children, education and the arts.
On Wednesday and Thursday, the bank also organised art workshops conducted by UOB Painting of the Year artists for children from Canossaville Preschool and the People’s Association (Woodlands).
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