Students in the area are one step closer to some financial relief with $2000 donated to the Country Education Foundation (CEF).
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The Forsyths Foundation chose the CEF as the recipient of its annual donation, and staff at Forsyths Gunnedah presented the cheque on Friday afternoon.
CEF's Vicki Isbester was very grateful for the donation, saying she felt "so blessed that we had been thought of and included".
"In this kind of climate it's very hard to do fundraising and so at the moment to have this support from Forsyths, it's really wonderful," Ms Isbester said.
The CEF helps local youth who have lived and/or attended school in the region for the majority of their high school years. The four essential selection criteria for the applicant are demonstrating financial need; aged 16-25 years; attended school or currently reside in the region covered by CEF Gunnedah; and shown commitment to achieving goals.
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Foundation representative for the Forsyths Gunnedah office, Megan Ellbourn, said it was easy for the Gunnedah staff to decide on the CEF.
"Each year school leavers come and work for us so we see them getting ready to go off to university and the financial burden is huge for them and their families," Ms Ellbourn said.
"It was an easy call for us to make especially because they're helping the youth in the Gunnedah community specifically."
Ms Ellbourn said that the foundation's annual donation is usually $1000, but with extra money in the kitty, the amount was bumped up.
"It's a hard slog and these organisations that rely on businesses and the community to donate to them in order to provide this service are going to really struggle this year with the downturn of business due to COVID-19, so it made a lot of sense for us to up that donation this year," she said.
The foundation was formed in 2015 to enable Forsyths staff to donate money from their salary, with the funds then matched on a dollar-for-dollar basis by Forsyths.
Every year Forsyths staff in Gunnedah, Armidale, Coonabarabran, Inverell and Tamworth nominate a local charity they would like to support and the foundation's committee makes the final decision.
2020 recipients
Armidale: Armidale Riding for the Disabled
Inverell: Rural Outreach and Support Services
Tamworth: The Friends of Nioka
Coonabarabran: Breakthru