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On Sunday February 13th our Beavers, Cubs and Scouts, helped by other members of the Highfield community, assembled a giant Parrot of Coins in the Atrium of the WestQuay Shopping Centre. In doing this we raised an amazing £4,512-75 for the Childrens Cancer Ward in Southampton General Hospital and collected an astonishing 76,857 coins.

“Project Parrot” was inspired by one of our Beaver Scouts who has been treated for Leukaemia in the Piam Brown Unit. He and his family were keen to raise funds for the Unit and our Scout Group was eager to help. The symbol of Piam Brown is a parrot – hence “Project Parrot” – the plan was to collect a large number of coins and lay them out in the shape of a parrot in a public space. Naomi, one of the Cub Young Leaders, suggested WestQuay as our venue – the authorities at WestQuay were only too pleased to help and offered us a 50 square metre area in their Atrium.

It dawned on us that the parrot needed to be big and the volume of coins required was huge – we needed tens of thousands of coins! But our Highfield Beavers, Cubs and Scouts, joined by Highfield Rainbows, Brownies and Guides, Students from Southampton University’s SSAGO (Student Scout and Guide Organisation) and the children of Highfield Church, were prepared to take on the challenge. The families in our Scout Group and Community have collected tens of thousands of coins since Christmas.

We took 15 buckets of coins to WestQuay on the morning of Sunday 13th February together with Maggie’s large and colourful Parrot Template. And then our children went into action. They collected more than two thousand pounds from a generous Southampton public – the copper and silver parrot was surounded by a ribbon of gold pound coins.

Thank you to everyone who has made Project Parrot such an outstanding success!

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