On Friday I met with my 100minds mentor Caroline McDevitt to discuss my project ideas for fundraising. So far I'm looking at doing multiple mini projects namely a Christmas tree collection, a Clothes collection both in Newcastlewest and an Old Boys vs SCT rugby match which would hopefully be held in Glenstal.

"Much frustration I have". Book of Yoda 7:11:35

Exams are almost finished so I can fully concentrate on my 100minds projects before and over the Christmas holidays. Recently Declan managed to put me into contact with Marianne Rowan who is the corporate fundraising executive in the ISPCC. My hope was initially to get a speaker out from the Limerick office to Newcastlewest to speak with people coming into my clothing collection in Newcastlewest on the 16th January sadly however this will not be possible but there is hope that I can get a speaker for before the potential Old Boys vs SCT rugby in March/April.

Sadly my outlandish hope to break a Guinness World Record as a means of publicity stunt for Childline and 100minds won't happen mainly due to the fact that "most children in a line- (Childline get it?)" is'nt a valid record title, on top of that there's a significant cost attached to even just applying for one. In better news we're looking at Sunday April 10th as a date for our SCT vs Old Boys match although we may look to have it earlier, a Sunday would be ideal as many parents come to mass to see their boys. I spoke to the sports director Sean Skehan at school who suggested we do a lunch for the parents beforehand perhaps combining it with a raffle. We may yet have an issue with insurance for Old Boy players but hopefully not.

Seeing as I've been so inactive for the past month I feel now might be a decent time to update on my progress! Thankfully the barren appearance to my donations section has increased by a record 170%. The christmas tree collection from a business perspective wasn't the overwhelming success I'd hoped it to be from money raising point of view. I could give you a long winded analysis but frankly who wants to read that, but most importantly I'm €170 up on my target of €1000.

I decided to cancel my clothing collection in January due to the prospect of people "dumping" clothing that really couldn't be worn again or was of insufficient quality and the prospect of sorting through this and then trying to track down people whose clothing wasn't acceptable.. It goes on... My attentions are now focused on the rugby match between the old boys & SCT of Glenstal and navigating the first obstacle of insurance for the players.

Things are starting to move thankfully insurance has been sorted as an issue and I'm now in the midst of trying to sort out jerseys for the old boys as a commemorative aspect. We're now considering a pivot of moving the match from Glenstal to College Park in Trinity. This might generate a greater amount of Old Boys coming to the match and so increase traffic. I'm going to look into all the possibilities and restrictions anyway before making a decision.

Since I haven't posted in so long I think it would be wise to update on where I stand and what has been happening the last few weeks

The match is going ahead now on the 10th April 2016 K.O at 2.30 in Wanderers RFC. It took me extremely long to sort a venue Trinity, Donnybrook, St Marys College RFC were all earmarked as potential venues however thankfully I was able to secure Wanderers for that Sunday. See the Facebook event here: https://www.facebook.com/events/1564542463857618/

I had been hoping to organise an Old Boys kit (images I will attach) however unfortunately I had to pivot on this and abandon it as it worked out too expensive for the boys to afford given that they are students!

There were a number of problems firstly I failed to do any customer validation or enough research on what my participants would be willing to pay and whether they were interested in a commemorative kit. I failed to organise sponsorship cards for players I had hoped for them to raise funds themselves I wanted to use Give2Go an online fundraising platform that I had used for the TourDePicnic in 2015 this platform would allow me to cover the costs and the recommended donation I wanted with it however it would mean that there would have been a lot of money coming and going into accounts as I would have had to get Childline to reimburse me which was more hassle than it was worth! Another lay in the fact that the manufacturer needed to be paid up front so I needed not only to source a team but also finances quickly. At one stage I was considering getting an overdraft on my bank account to pay for it up front first in the thoughts that I can recover the money from the boys.

I had also set up a crowdfunding page on Indiegogo at one stage but quickly got rid of it. It was my hope that I could raise funds to cover the cost of the kit externally on an almost global basis. That was my sort of last ditch attempt.

My hope is that the event may become an annual thing and perhaps assuming it grows I can attract a sponsor for jerseys next year or again organise at least a more successful and carefully thought out crowdfunding campaign and so on however it all depends on how this one goes!

There have been times where I was half thinking of throwing the towel in however the problem lay with me giving up on things too easily after a setback and it was quite important to dig my heels in and continue. I have pivoted the event slightly and made it more accessible and attractive to people to sign up so we now have quite a decent looking team with representatives from years as far back as 1983 and as recent as 2015. My main revenue streams will be from ticket sales at the gate, sponsorship in the match programme, selling of programmes and the player fees for both teams. I've done rough forecasts for worst and best case scenarios and I'm very confident of hitting my target either way

Hard to believe it's all finished up. Having been something that I basically spent poring over or at least crossing my mind on some occasion it's a bit surreal.. It's now its now Thursday four days after my event has taken place. The Old Boys vs SCT ReUNION rugby match was a success first and foremost bringing in a "profit" so to speak. Although my own lofty ambitions of making the €2000 mark weren't met in terms of a financial perspective there is a bigger story at work in that there has been a bit of a clamour many of the past pupils involved to make it an annual thing. That is bigger than any financial reward I could of hoped for. Undoubtedly the skills I've learned from organising this project will serve me well in my future endeavours for this project and others that I wish to pursure. It's been real.

Rossa xo