An inspiring and motivating evening
Last night we at Oxfordshire Mind held our 2015 Annual General Meeting. It was a great evening of friendly faces getting together to celebrate our achievements over the past year, to thank all of the staff, volunteers, and people who make up Oxfordshire Mind and to look forward to all the work we’ve got ahead of us.
The evening started with our Chair of Trustees, John Copley, addressing the AGM to say that Oxfordshire Mind have had an excellent year. We delivered more services to more people than ever before and put a huge amount of effort into preparing for funding changes to come. John pointed out that Oxfordshire Mind is more than the sum of its parts “the effectiveness of the organisation is down to the way the staff, trustees, volunteers and everyone else all come together to make it happen”.
Our Chief Executive, Patrick Taylor, told the AGM that we’d had a significant year with lots of successes. Helping more people than ever through our Information Service, our Course Programme, Housing Service and Benefits team. However, on a more sombre note, he also warned that the impact of austerity will soon be felt as the planned cuts to social services will have a significant impact on our work. Patrick expressed his absolute thanks to all of the staff and volunteers who work hard to deliver a strong service to people who need it.
Then we went on to hear about the various initiatives that Mind have been a part of over the past year. From the ‘Blue Light Programme’ providing practical wellbeing support to those in the emergency services to Mind’s presence at summer festivals – reaching more and more people through new and innovative ways. We learnt more about our psychological therapy service, TalkingSpace and our Information Service role within the Adult Mental Health Teams around Oxfordshire. We also heard from someone who benefited from our housing support service – an inspiring story of someone who needed and got the help required.
To end, we handed out our Mind Recognition Awards. These go to people who have worked hard to contribute to the work of Oxfordshire Mind.
We heard from lots of different voices throughout the evening, from Trustees, staff, through to people who have used our services – it made for a wonderfully interesting night! Thanks to everyone who came and participated.
