Charity team Solidoares writes Christmas letters and postcards for elderly people

With Christmas and the winter holiday break just around the corner, the Charity student team of the College of Europe Bruges campus Solidoares launched a heartwarming initiative. In cooperation with the Student Representatives and the Student Affairs Office, they set up a Christmas letter/postcard campaign for elderly people in Bruges, who have been isolated in elderly homes since early 2020.   The idea was to write a letter or a postcard in Dutch, French or English to an anonymous person in a nursing home, wishing him or her a Merry Christmas. Students could write a Christmas card, a nice letter containing an additional story about themselves or their stay in Bruges, a poem, a drawing or another creative message related to Christmas. The Residence Representatives were asked to place letter boxes in every residence. In that way, the collected Christmas letters and postcards could be easily collected and delivered to the right people. Earlier this semester, the socially engaged members of Solidoares, the Student Charity Club of the College of Europe 2020/2021, organized some other lovely activities: an online Harry Potter quiz in October, which raised € 210, and the selling of College-related Christmas cards, raising € 350. The revenues of the first two events went to Pleegzorg Vlaanderen, a local foster care organization planning on building a new visiting room where parents and children can get to know each other. The donation made by the CoE Charity team will be used for the purchase of furniture.  Last but not least, Solidoares sold Movember Masks and raised € 180. The revenues were kindly donated to the worldwide Movember Foundation, which raises awareness for men's health issues