What a Wonderful World Trust
Trustees Report 2023-2024 draft 1.2
October 2024
An overview of the charity's work over the last year, successes, challenges and risks, and future plans.
Background
In October 2021 What a Wonderful World held its first event, a Climate Action Day in the Northumberland Hall, Alnwick. We had no idea who, if anyone, would come. In fact some 200 people visited over the course of the day, interacting with stall holders, listening and getting involved in talks and music, applauding the Trash Fashion show and watching our MP being interviewed on Zoom by Rosemary Hartill. Covid dictated that planning time was limited and everyone mucked in to help. The charity and Board of Trustees were very new. Funding was provided by a donation from our founders.
3 years on – what a change! We have an experienced Organising Team who have run three 3-4 day Festivals in Alnwick Playhouse and The Alnwick Garden, with additional outreach events in other venues. Planning for each Festival starts immediately after the previous one. Our team of Trustees is slowly growing in number and breadth of experience, and the necessary policies for a Charity are in place. Thanks to our experienced fundraiser Elizabeth Anderson we have a track record of securing grants from local authorities and donors for each Festival. Every year our audience grows, and we get excellent publicity through Alnwick Playhouse and local print media. We have recently appointed a social media co-ordinator to develop our community of followers through the year.
2024 Festival
2024 was a year of many successes. For the first time we hosted a session at Alnwick StoryFest in February 2024, where over 100 people listened to Tim Smedley discussing his book The Last Drop which revealed the true state of Britain’s water supply.
In April 2024 we announced our most ambitious exhibition project, the My Northumberland Photographic Exhibition . Over 120 entrants, including 10 aged 18 and under, submitted photographs of their favourite places in Northumberland, with a statement expressing their feelings about possible loss and damage to these places from the climate and biodiversity emergencies. Over the month of June approximately 300 visitors saw it, as well as those attending the Festival.
To kick off the Festival Rothbury Poetry, Writing and Music Group hosted A Flight of Poets , a magical summer evening of nature poets in Rothbury Golf Club. At Alnwick Playhouse young people from four different local primary schools joined with Alnwick Duchess High School over two evenings to perform a specially written piece, The Air We Breathe , which put over a very strong message about air pollution to capacity audiences of families and friends totalling about 450 people.
Over the weekend sessions included The Owl’s Gaze , storytelling for children and adults, and The Science Around Us , in which the audience participated in experiments about air guided by a science teacher. At Hauxley Wildlife Discovery Centre Northumberland Wildlife Trust hosted Poets In Flight. Change in the Air? brought together three strong speakers on air pollution, wind energy and the effects of pollution and
climate change on wildlife. Approximately 150 attendees were involved in the lively debate, and for the first time to our knowledge this included at least one climate sceptic, showing that we are not simply preaching to the converted.
Kathryn Tickell and Amy Thatcher played a sell-out concert, My Northumberland , about their experience of Northumbrian people, landscapes and wildlife. Films shown were The Lorax for families and Six Inches of Soil for adults. On Sunday 34 people participated in the Sing for the Planet workshop, and then performed in a final concert with top UK choir Voices of Hope, with an audience of about 75. Meanwhile approximately 30 adults and young people took part in music performances in The Alnwick Garden.
Feedback was given through an online survey linked to a QR code. The general level of satisfaction with the events was very high - averaging 4.82 out of 5 across all events. The degree to which people’s understanding of the climate emergency changed was much more varied. The events aimed at children and families had good impact in this area with The Air we Breathe (average score 4) while The Owl’s Gaze (4.4) and The Science around Us (4.2) also did well. The Change in the Air? talks, where many of the audience might well have been previously aware of the issues, still averaged 3.9 and perhaps more importantly more people felt motivated to talk to others about the subject (average 4.2) The more music-centred adult events scored lower this year (average response under 3), highlighting the need to ensure some more explicit messaging for this different audience.
Photographs, press coverage and videos of the Day and the Festival can be viewed on the Festival website Gallery 2024 | What a Wonderful World (whataww.org)
Challenges and risks, and vision for the future.
The 2025 Festival will be held on June 26-29 and planning is already well underway. During the year we have held two strategy meetings at which trustees and organising team have looked at the opportunities and challenges of our position. What a Wonderful World Festival is becoming an established fixture on the local scene, with many new attendees coming through word of mouth. We have more organisations keen to partner with us, and will be working with Greener Berwick for one session in 2025. However we must avoid outgrowing our strength, and must focus on succession planning to bring in more and ideally younger trustees and volunteers.
The establishment over the last year of the Northumberland Green Hub of multiple organisations with similar green interests gives an excellent opportunity to involve more people, but for this to work we need a strong central point of co-ordination. To this end we are seeking funding for a part-time coordinator role. This will reduce our dependency on a small number of key volunteers, and will give us more scope to follow up our beneficiaries after the Festival and reinforce the messages for change. In this way we hope to build a more sustainable Festival, which can develop and extend its reach over the years to come. There is still so much to do.
Thanks
Huge thanks are due to the performers, writers and speakers and many others who have donated their time and talents to deliver the Festival:
FESTIVAL PARTNERS Alnwick Playhouse, the Alnwick Garden, Friends of the Earth Alnwick, staff and students of the Duchess’s Community High School and local primary schools, Northumberland Wildlife Trust and Rothbury Climate and Nature.
FUNDERS in cash and in kind: Alnwick Town Council, Barter Books, Bill Grisdale Design, CBS for print services, NCC Environment and Climate Fund and Northumberland Estates.
Our 2024 ORGANISING TEAM Chris Algar, Alistair and Liz Anderson, Lisa Bellamy, Cllr. Rosie Bush, Susie Cochrane, Anne Lowrie, Sarah Morey, Sue Patience and Eve Reverchon. Jane Coltman and Lynda Wearn helped create the Photography Exhibition.
What a Wonderful World Board of Trustees
November 2024
| Charity Name | Charity Name | Charity Name | Charity Name | Charity Name | No(if any) | No(if any) | CC16a | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| What a Wonderful World Trust | 1195577 | ||||||||
| Receipts andpayments accounts | |||||||||
| For the period from |
Period start date | To | Period end date | ||||||
| 2023 11 01 | 2024 10 31 | ||||||||
| Section A Receipts and payments | |||||||||
| Unrestricted funds |
Restricted funds |
Endowment funds |
Total funds | Last year | |||||
| to the nearest £ | to the nearest £ | to the nearest £ | to the nearest £ | to the nearest £ | |||||
| A1 Receipts | |||||||||
| Alnwick Town Council | 1,000 | 1,000 | 1,440 | ||||||
| Northumberland County Council | 5,000 | 5,000 | 250 | ||||||
| Joicey Trust | - 0 | - | 1,600 | ||||||
| Sir James Knott Trust | - 0 | - | 2,000 | ||||||
| Robinson family Trust | - 0 | - | 1,000 | ||||||
| Northumberland Estates for 2022/3 | 1,000 | 1,000 | - | ||||||
| Northumberland estates for 2023/4 | 2,000 | 2,000 | - | ||||||
| Barter Books | 300 | 300 | 300 | ||||||
| Private Donations | 110 | 110 | 1,250 | ||||||
| Schools Contributions | 600 | 600 | 300 | ||||||
| Alnwick Playhouse Box Office | 5,682 | 5,682 | 3,178 | ||||||
| Story Fest Box Office | 43 | 43 | |||||||
| Calendar Sales | 410 | 410 | |||||||
| Bank Interest | 25 | 25 | 23 | ||||||
| Sub total_(Gross income for AR) _ | 16,170 |
- | - | 16,170 | 11,341 | ||||
| A2 Asset and investment sales, (see table). |
|||||||||
| - 0 | - 0 | - 0 | - | ||||||
| Sub total | - 0 |
- 0 | - 0 | - | - 0 | ||||
| **Total receipts ** | 16,170 |
- 0 | - 0 | 16,170 | 11,341 | ||||
| A3 Payments | |||||||||
| Strategy Day costs | 152 | - | - | 152 | - | ||||
| Story Festival Costs | 345 | - | - | 345 | - | ||||
| Schools projects | 4,063 | - | - | 4,063 | 1,776 | ||||
| Performers | 4,418 | - | - | 4,418 | 4,325 | ||||
| Craft Workshops | 455 | - | - | 455 | 266 | ||||
| Speaker Expenses | - | - | - | 197 | |||||
| Hire of Films | 129 | - | - | 129 | 172 | ||||
| Marketing | 2,270 | - | - | 2,270 | 1,827 | ||||
| Photographic/video | 800 | 800 | 800 | ||||||
| Exhibition Costs | 561 | 561 | 90 | ||||||
| Taste of Northumberland event | - | 200 | |||||||
| Rothbury Hall Hire | 50 | 50 | |||||||
| Launch event | 69 | 69 | 52 | ||||||
| Printing calendar | 773 | 773 | |||||||
| Bank Costs | 60 | 60 | 60 | ||||||
| **Sub total ** | 14,145 |
- | - | 14,145 | 9,765 | ||||
| A4 Asset and investment purchases,(see table) |
|||||||||
| - 0 | - 0 | - 0 | - | ||||||
| - 0 | - 0 | - 0 | - | ||||||
| **Sub total ** | - 0 |
- 0 | - 0 | - | - 0 | ||||
| **Totalpayments ** | 14,145 |
- 0 | - 0 | 14,145 | 9,765 | ||||
| **Net of receipts/(payments) ** | 2,025 |
- | - | 2,025 | 1,576 | ||||
| A5 Transfers between funds | - 0 | - | - | - | - | ||||
| A6 Cash funds lastyear end | 9,528 | - | - | 9,528 | 7,952 | ||||
| **Cash funds thisyear end ** | 11,553 |
- | - | 11,553 | 9,528 |
CCXX R1 accounts (SS)
02/12/2024
1
| Section B Statement of assets and liabilities at | the end of | the period | |||||||
| Categories | Details | Unrestricted funds |
Restricted funds |
Endowment funds |
|||||
| to nearest £ | to nearest £ | to nearest £ | |||||||
| B1 Cash funds | - | ||||||||
| - | - | ||||||||
| - | - | - | |||||||
| Total cash funds | 11,553 | - | |||||||
| (agree balances with receipts and payments account(s)) |
OK | OK | |||||||
| Unrestricted funds |
Restricted funds |
Endowment funds |
|||||||
| Details | to nearest £ | to nearest £ | to nearest £ | ||||||
| B2 Other monetary assets | - | - | - | ||||||
| - | - | - | |||||||
| - | - | - | |||||||
| - | - | - | |||||||
| - | - | - | |||||||
| - | - | - | |||||||
| Details | Fund to which asset belongs |
Cost (optional) | Current value (optional) |
||||||
| B3 Investment assets | - | - | |||||||
| - | - | ||||||||
| - | - | ||||||||
| - | - | ||||||||
| Details | Fund to which asset belongs |
Cost (optional) | Current value (optional) |
||||||
| B4 Assets retained for the charity’s own use |
- | - | |||||||
| - | - | ||||||||
| - | - | ||||||||
| - | - | ||||||||
| - | - | ||||||||
| - | - | ||||||||
| - | - | ||||||||
| - | - | ||||||||
| Details | Fund to which liability relates |
Amount due (optional) |
When due (optional) |
||||||
| B5 Liabilities | - | ||||||||
| - | |||||||||
| - | |||||||||
| - | |||||||||
| - | |||||||||
| Signed by one or two trustees on behalf of all the trustees |
Signature | Print Name | Date of approval |
||||||
| ALISTAIR M ANDERSON | 2024 11 12 | ||||||||
CCXX R2 accounts (SS)
02/12/2024
2