Haniyyah devoted her time to lead the 2024 Christ's Hospital Christmas appeal to support local families in need.

Photo: Haniyyah (middle, third from the left) with the Christmas appeal team. 

'Our target for the appeal was to ensure that as many people as possible in our community had resources to have a comfortable and enjoyable Christmas. It involved a lot of collaboration around school and with teachers.

Photo: Christmas appeal meeting

Taking inspiration from the girl who organised the appeal when I was in year 12, I took on a leadership role in organising the appeal drive for the school. My responsibilities included a lot of planning alongside large amounts of advertising, with the help of the year 12 charity reps.

It was one of the best things I have ever accomplished. Not only did I feel an enormous amount of pride in everything my team and I were able to do, but I also felt massive amounts of relief. Growing up in a single parent household in similar situations to these people who we were giving donations to, I completely understand the levels of stress that can stem from the unknown, not knowing what your Christmas is going to look like, just knowing that I was able to reduce that anxiety for some families fills me with joy.

Photo: Haniyyah packing up the donations

The donations we collected were then all given to the charity Horsham matters, where the people there explained to us that local schools and clubs etc, had given them a list of children and families who were struggling and would really benefit from donations we had collected especially in the holiday season. 

Photo: The team delivering the donations

I would absolutely love to continue with my charity work even when I finish here at school, I hope to continue these actions well into my university days and beyond. It's thanks to charitable and kind people that me and my younger sister can attend this school so I would love to help more as I get older.'