Businesses work together for good of Burnley school

Two East Lancashire businesses joined forces to supply a local school with crucial IT and furniture ready for all pupils to return to school this week.

The collaboration between Rapid IT and The Senator Group, has seen St Mary Magdalene’s RC Primary School in Burnley receive a generous donation.

The donation came about shortly after computer refurbishment and recycling company, Rapid IT, approached office furniture suppliers, The Senator Group, for some furniture to kit out their expanding offices.

Rather than take payment for the furniture, The Senator Group alerted Rapid IT to St Mary Magdalene’s RC Primary School who have recently completed building work and were in desperate need of new IT.

The Senator Group has a dedicated Recycling facility called Sustain and Paul O’Brien, Recycling Manager, said: “We had become aware that St Mary Magdalene’s had undergone significant renovation work and needed technology to kit out their new spaces.

“When Rapid IT came to us for office furniture, we saw an opportunity to help out both a fellow local business and a local school. Instead of invoicing Rapid IT for the furniture, we supplied them free of charge in return for a hardware donation to St Mary Magdalene’s.”

Jack Bannister, MD at Rapid IT, said: “We’ve donated computer hardware to a number of schools in the region as part of our Tech 4 All Kids campaign, but St Mary Magdalene’s had a particularly urgent need.

“Like all schools, they have had to provide IT for pupils to facilitate home learning, but they had also built new buildings which left little money to adequately fill them with the necessary computer hardware.

“When Paul suggested we make a donation to the school as payment for the office furniture we acquired from Senator, we jumped at the chance. We have since provided the school with 10 PCs and monitors, five laptops, and an interactive touchscreen TV on a height adjustable stand.”

On what the donation has meant for the school, St Mary Magdalene’s bursar, Sarah Ginn, said: “The Catholic diocese had funded renovation works which included new classrooms and new staff room. However, the work wiped out most of our budget and we’ve been unable to purchase computers for the new rooms.

“With the pandemic already putting a strain on our IT resources, we were in a really difficult place. The donation from Rapid IT has just been amazing. It will make a real difference to those families we can now provide computers to during the remainder of lockdown. It also means we can turn the new rooms into richer learning environments.

“We should add as well what an incredible resource the interactive touchscreen TV will be. It will allow us to prepare much more engaging assemblies and can be easily wheeled between classrooms. We’re so grateful to Rapid IT for the donation and to Senator for thinking of us.”