What is SOCHDOC?
SOCHDOC is a group that has existed in St. Oswald’s Parish since the Spring of 2005. The group was created by Winifred Beesley, who, in the aftermath of the Boxing Day Tsunami, wanted to create a way of raising money to donate directly to a project or group in a developing country.
What does SOCHDOC mean?
SOCHDOC is the acronym of Saint Oswald’s Community Helping Develop Overseas Communities.
What do we do?
Through various activities such as sponsored walks, Christmas Fairs, quiz nights, musical evenings and beetle drives, we raise funds to donate to our chosen projects.
Everyone is welcome to any of our events and we are always looking for new ideas!
Our link with St. Oswald’s Primary School is still as strong with a member of the senior management team always attending our general meetings. The school has made several generous donations to SOCHDOC.
We also have little bags in which people collect their small change.
Our projects
We have had 2 long term projects, both of which have been through created through the Sisters of Notre Dame.
2005 -2009 Justice and Peace School, Ugwuomu, Nigeria.
The first classrooms
This is a rural school which began its life in the Town Hall and serves the local farming communities.
During the time we were supporting the school we were able to donate £9,000 towards the building of more classrooms and offices.
2010 – the present Malava Kenya
Our 2nd long term project has been to help support the development of firstly a nursery school and then a primary school in Malava, Kenya. Again this is a school in a very rural area.
In January 2010 the school registered its first class of 16 pupils some of which were traveling 45 minutes on the back of a bike to get to school.
The first classroom was in one of the worker’s house.
Since then the school has gone from strength to strength being recognised by the local Education Board as a centre of excellence. To January 2016 seeing the new school year staring with more 200 pupils!
the new primary classrooms
The next project is the construction of an Admin block and also the purchase of computers. Some of the parents have begun fundraising for a school bus.
Whilst we have been supporting Malava we have been able to donate £10.500.
Book Parcels and TWAM
From 2005- 2013 we sent parcels of used school books to Nigeria which were then distributed to several schools. The books were donated from various schools and Wigan LEA and were mainly reading books and some text books. We sent 185 parcels and raised £2,306 for the cost of the postage. 
This money was raised through people just collecting their small change in one of our ‘book bags’.
Sadly, we can no longer send out books as the cost of postage has become too expensive. So we needed a new project to use our ‘book bag’ money. We are now working with TWAM (Tools with a Mission) and we have already had 1 collection of haberdashery, sewing machines, tools and books and hopefully soon we will be able to have another one. We were able to give them a donation of £500 towards the repair of the tools and transportation of the packs to workers in developing countries to help set up their own small business.
In 2015 SOCHDOC had been in existence for 10 years. We are only a small group but with the generous support of the parish and wider community we have been able to raise over £20,000.
We are always looking for new members and ideas so please come and join us.
Christine Allcock
