Supporting Our Projects
We are always incredibly grateful to receive donations and it is through such generosity that we hope to fulfil our charity’s mission to help change young lives for the better. Through their experiences at Heatree, children and young people learn to challenge themselves and put their trust in others, in a safe and supportive environment.
Your support, through one-off donations or regular gifting, will help make it possible to update current facilities and to plan new projects; each time we are step closer to helping shape young lives and create positive and lasting memories.
Despite the challenges of the last two years and the damaging impact the Covid-19 pandemic has had on the outdoor industry, our small team remains passionate and driven in continuing our work with young people, with a Christ-centred approach, sharing the Gospel in new and innovative ways and using the natural world as our canvas.
Below are just some of our current projects which we are fundraising for and would benefit greatly from your donations.
The Quantick Bursary
This bursary is in memory of Elizabeth Quantick (1911-1995) who officially started the Heathercombe Brake Trust charity in 1956.
As a Christian charity focused on the physical, spiritual and mental wellbeing of children and young people, we want as many individuals as possible to have the opportunity to hear the Gospel message. For many young people, a visit to Heatree may be one of the very few occasions where they get to learn about the Christian faith. The purpose of the Quantick Bursary fund is to provide discounted places for under 18s to enable them to come to Heatree, who might otherwise not get the opportunity to do so.
A residential trip can influence and inspire a young life in the long term and remains an important and meaningful instrument in youth ministry. We want to enable more youth leaders and teachers to bring their groups to Heatree, creating the potential to inspire hope in young minds and transform lives, whatever background, physical ability or socio-economic circumstances an individual may have.
We use our unique setting to provide engaging and inspiring experiences through outdoor adventure activity sessions, where we teach young people key life skills and how they can navigate the challenges they face, through God’s love and grace, whilst learning how to value and respect the natural world and the people around them.
You can keep up to date with our fundraising progress and donate via our Stewardship page HERE
Faith in Art is an art project to help children and young people who come to Heatree to visualise the gospel message and to understand key Christian principles through art. Our aim is to commission local artists across the South West to produce artwork to fill our interior spaces with colourful and visually engaging art that supports our children’s ministry of exploring the Christian faith through outdoor learning.
We want to display artwork around the centre, not just to improve the overall customer experience in creating an exciting and enjoyable place to stay, but to help reinforce the Christian message to children and young people. Often their visit to Heatree is one of the few occasions where they’ve had the opportunity to hear about the Christian faith. In addition, children have different learning styles and for those with particular learning difficulties, being able to communicate through visual art, will help them connect in an exciting and enjoyable way; supporting their learning and understanding.
The aim is that the project will cover the next 2-3 years and will be completed in two phases:
- Phase One will cover the interior of the building; the communal areas in our main accommodation wings of Heatree and Farmhouse.
- For Phase Two we aim to move into doing art installations outside in our grounds such as special trails and sites for disconnecting and reconnecting, featuring seating and carvings from natural materials such as stone and wood from the estate.
You can keep up to date with our fundraising progress and donate via our Stewardship page HERE
Improving Accessibility
Being an inclusive and welcoming place for everyone is not only very important to us, but part of our charity’s mission. There are many ways in which we would like to improve accessibility across the whole site, but this is a long term and sizeable undertaking which requires sound planning and investment.
Even though our main house is a wonderful feature in our landscape, we are fully mindful that the building is almost 200 years old with different levels, entrances, doorways and corridors. Following an accessibility audit, our plan over the next few years is to make Heatree a place where everyone feels welcome and included.
Examples of what we hope to achieve are:
- Build a wheelchair accessible ramp outside the main entrance
- Install an electronic door system and a covered porch area to provide shelter when entering/exiting the building
- Improve access to bedrooms
- Widen corridors and change internal door systems
- Adapt and improve wet room facilities
- Install a lift in the Farmhouse wing
- Resurface pathways around the estate to be wheelchair friendly
- Improve signage
- Expand our fleet of sit-on-op kayaks which are more user friendly
We are very pleased that we now have our own all terrain wheelchair which has already been used by several young people this summer.
How to Donate
Donating to us is simple, you can donate directly to our bank using the details below:
Bank account: Heathercombe Brake Trust
Sort code: 51-81-21
Account number: 53438590
Feel free to email us on admin@heatree.org to let us know, and if you’d like your donation to be used for a particular project, please indicate this in your message.
Or send a cheque made payable to ‘Heathercombe Brake Trust’ to: Heatree Activity Centre, Manaton, Devon TQ13 9XE.
Other Ways to Support Us
Make a one-off donation or set up a regular gift on our Stewardship page:
Donate every time you shop online through Amazon Smile where 0.5% of your eligible purchases will go towards Heathercombe Brake Trust. It’s free and easy to sign up:
Donate via Easy Fundraising every time you shop online. It’s free to use, simply start your online shopping at easyfundraising.org.uk then shop as normal through 6,916 retailers. Our charity will receive a small donation for every purchase:
Thank you for your support!
Fundraising News
It is always wonderful to celebrate the successes and share news of our fundraising stories and how so many people have helped through donations and prayer support. This page is all about how these projects have helped young people and their families, and why the work that we do at Heatree is so important and worthwhile. It is always a pleasure to share in how God provides for our needs and enables us to do the work that we do.
