Literature

The KAA Intrepidus Trust is a registered charity set up by the governors of Kensington Aldridge Academy - all local K&C residents (Lucy Morris, John Brown (founder of Viz), Mick May OBE, and Adam Balon (co-founder of Innocent Juices)).

The school was deeply affected by the Grenfell Tower fire in June 2017. 65 of our students were in the tower, and very tragically five lost their lives. The school is still very much recovering from this loss, but despite this, and having to move into portakabins for over a year, was recently rated outstanding in all areas by Ofsted and won secondary school of the year. It is truly an inspirational place, and in fact, was recently the subject of a 2 part BBC2 documentary: The Choir, with Gareth Malone, now on BBC iplayer. This tells the moving story of a home-coming concert put together by students in the wake of Grenfell. You can watch a clip here.

What we do

As a charity, our mission is to raise funds for extra curricular activities benefiting the 1,200 students at the school in arts, sports, life skills and academic enrichments. To date, donations from our supporters, many of whom are local K&C residents, have enabled us to: provide free and highly subsidised individual music tuition, set up the Duke of Edinburgh programme, fund academic trips to Berlin & Paris, sponsor a daily breakfast club and establish outdoor rowing on the Thames (to name but a few!)

These are all opportunities that would otherwise be completely out of bounds to the school and its students. Despite being located in one of the wealthiest areas in the country, the ward it serves (Golborne ward) is unbelievably, one of the poorest in the country. 66% of our students are 'Pupil Premium' - the government's poverty index, and half of those are on Free School Meals (meaning that their families live on less than £7,400 annually).

The Endowment Fund

In light of this, we decided, last September, to launch an appeal to build a £2 million expendable endowment fund that would provide a permanent source of income for all our programmes, now and for future generations of students to come. We are thrilled to have recently passed the £1 million mark, but we still have a long way to go.

"School Dinner with a Difference"

For this reason, on Tuesday 21st May, close to the 2 year anniversary of Grenfell, we are hosting a one-off fundraising dinner at the school attended by 240 guests. The school dinner themed event will be compered by Rory Bremner, will include a performance by the KAA students conducted by Gareth Malone OBE, a live auction by Sotheby's Chair & auctioneer Lord Dalmeny, and an online silent auction.

We have 6 major lots for our live auction (including the Brian Eno etching) and c.30 auction items for our silent auction, which will open a week before the dinner and through the evening via Givergy (tablets on tables). The attached doc details all our current auction lots.