Planet NCFE

Welcome to Planet NCFE!

Here at NCFE our staff get up to a whole host of weird and wonderful things - sometimes for biscuits, but more often in aid of a worthy cause…

The Eve Appeal

NCFE has hosted a Vintage Tea Party in honour of The Eve Appeal to raise money and awareness for gynaecology cancer research. Staff were treated to afternoon tea and home baked goodies galore, in exchange for a charitable donation. Ladies from across the business dressed in 1940s attire to host the event, the room was decorated with traditional bunting and we were entertained with music from the era. At the end of the day, £267 was raised which will be matched by NCFE to make £534 in total for the charity.

Movember
Eight of NCFE's finest gentlemen took part to raise awareness and funds towards men's health issues. The national event, "Movember", sees thousands of men all across the UK battle with extra facial hair during the month of November, to raise money for The Prostate Cancer Charity and The Institute of Cancer Research.

There was internal competitions for the longest length, most voluptuous moustache and largest amount of donations. The last day of November seen the team host a "wear your tache to work day", where everyone in the office donned a fake moustache for the day to support the cause and we managed to raise over £500 across the whole month!

Random Hat Day
One of the more random NCFE events...  All staff were encouraged to come to work wearing the most random hat they could find.  There were some interesting efforts on the day, including a monkey hat, an air hostess hat, a festival umbrella hat and a smurf hat!  Very random indeed!

Marie Curie Great Daffodil Appeal

A small team at NCFE recently took to the streets of Newcastle City Centre as part of the ‘Great Daffodil Appeal,’ Marie Curie’s biggest annual fundraising event.

Rebecca Sangwine who organized the NCFE team said: “We took to the streets wearing Marie Curie hats and tabards to encourage the generous people of the North East to dig deep into their pockets.  Over the course of two days we split our lunch breaks so we could spend some time out of the office to support the charity. We managed to raise £432.69, which has been doubled by NCFE to give us a grand total of £889.30 which is fantastic.”

The funds raised will help support patients in the North East, both at the Marie Curie Hospice in Newcastle and across the region in their own homes with Marie Curie’s community nursing service.   

Sleeping rough for Children in Need
We recently proved that nothing will stop us when it comes to raising money for charity – not even sub-zero temperatures and snow! On 26 November 2010, one of the coldest nights of the year, six brave NCFE employees slept rough in the underground car park of head office,  in order to raise money and awareness of Children in Need. The fundraising event was named “Operation Soup Kitchen” and involved a number of activities throughout the day in order to raise money for the cause, from raffles to a quiz night, to racing up and down the office in sleeping bags! Headed up by Russell Craxford, ICT Testing Analyst at NCFE, a team of dedicated employees set to work to make sure enough money was raised to really make a difference. The fantastic grand total came to £3,100!

Look good, feel better
Katherine Tunney, Centre Support Assistant, has recently been using NCFE’s time bank scheme to get involved in the charity, Look Good Feel Better. This means she has been able to use NCFE time to volunteer for the charity.

Look Good, Feel Better was set up to help women suffering from cancer to “look good and feel better” while they undergo treatment. A worthy cause, I’m sure you’ll agree,

Katherine took part in a workshop at The Freeman Hospital in Newcastle, helping a group of ladies with skincare and make-up routines. She’s now set to become a permanent volunteer!

Great North Run
A number of our super-fit staff ran the BUPA Great North Run this year (rather them than us!) raising money for a number of deserving charities. Congratulations go to our athletes!

KIVA
As part of our ongoing commitment to 'giving something back' we're working with KIVA, a micro lending company who make loans to entrepreneurs starting their own businesses to work themselves out of poverty.

We're doing this because we want to help to build other profitable and sustainable organisations throughout the world, in areas and with people who perhaps aren't as lucky as we are. We also want to create something that’s sustainable and not just a one-off.

Each team at NCFE has the ability to invest in a real person who is looking to achieve economic independence and improve life for themselves, their family, and their community.

Daniel Muriithi (pictured) is a married 43-year-old businessman who our Research and Product Development team have invested in. He operates a transport business, transporting primary-school children to and from home.

Daniel is using his loan to improve his loan to provide a better service and to build and stock a small shop for his wife. Less than 2 months after borrowing money through KIVA he's already repaid a fantastic 87% of his loan!

The National Blood Service
For the last 3 years we've been donating blood at our Head Office through the National Blood Service's mobile sessions and have recently reached a milestone of 181 units of blood!

Rebecca Sangwine, NCFE Centre Support Assistant, has been responsible for organising these blood bus sessions and has given everyone at NCFE an opportunity to do something amazing.

We're delighted to tell you that this was recently recognised by the National Blood Service (NBS) as a significant achievement and Rebecca was invited to represent NCFE at a corporate recognition ceremony at Lumley Castle!

Summer fun
We raised a fantastic £420 last summer for childhood bereavement charity Winston Wish, after turning NCFE HQ into a village fete, (complete with bunting and everything!)

As well as a Mad Hatter's tea party we also had a coconut shy and even tried our hand at face painting.  Fantastic prizes were won in the raffle and staff whipped up a lovely selection of homemade cakes, biscuits and preserves for us to enjoy.

Celebration of Norwegian Constitutional Day

Yup it might seem random but you heard us right! To celebrate Norwegian Constitutional Day (and to mark our Norwegian ICT Programming Officer's last day with us), we had a 'dress down for £1 day', raising money for Parkinson's UK.  The day was rounded up by a yummy waffle bake-off and a head-scratchingly-difficult Norwegian themed-quiz.

NCFE gets sporty
We couldn’t let Sport Relief go by without us marking it here at NCFE. Staff were encouraged to ‘dress down for a pound’ in a range of spectacular, sporty outfits. We also held our own version of ‘A Question of Sport’ with sports quizzes and challenges bringing in money (and laughs) all day. Alongside this excitement, an array of delicious cakes were on sale and went down a treat! At the end of the events we crossed the finish line with our heads held high after raising a grand total of £100.

Haiti Appeal day
Like many others across the globe, NCFE staff were eager to raise some funds to help those tragically affected by the Haiti earthquake. We held a fundraising day in the office and throughout the day staff took part in activities such as a limbo contest (pictured), arts and crafts and an 'Ebay Friday auction'. We also brought in tasty treats for a cake sale and had our very own NCFE charity shop so staff could clear their unwanted clutter while raising money. The appeal raised a fantastic £366.44 for the Red Cross.