Down's Syndrome North Yorkshire
Charity Number 1185176
Paul & Michelle Underwood
Married for over 30 years and living in Harrogate Paul & Michelle were blessed with Hannah their beautiful daughter who was born with Down's Syndrome in 2002.
Paul concentrates on fund raising along with the upkeep of the website and facebook pages, whilst Michelle is the long suffering clerk of the family and knows most form filling exercises inside out.
Sally Bagshaw
Sally is the proud Mum of the irrepressible Joe and also lives in Harrogate.
Sally's primary function is to establish new contacts in order to refresh our members as the older ones move on.
So if you are a school or an organisation which can provide any facilities for our members or even new members, then Sally will be your first point of contact.
As you can see Sally is extremely good fun to be around, is very approachable and enjoys her days out with the DSNY.
Linda Hall
You may well already know Linda as she has attended numerous events in her capacity as a carer. Linda has a huge amount of experience working with young carers and amongst her duties are organising trips and outings. Her bubbly and caring personality will offer an added dimension to our charity and her input will be vital in moving new ideas forward in the future.
Our newest committee members
The committee are absolutely delighted to welcome Emma Husband and Kristina Carr, both of whom have a youthful exuberance and a desire to make life better for our members with their charitable approach. They will no doubt be instrumental in educating the more senior members of the committee in the ways of the modern world.
Emma Husband is instantly recognisable as the daughter of our long serving treasurer Sally (see above).
Perhaps more importantly she has spent many years devoted to brother Joe as a young carer who is also pictured above.
Sally enjoys the outdoor life taking part in many sporting activities and in particular challenges like the tough-mudder which hold no fear for her as she continues in her mission to make the world a better place for those less fortunate than ourselves.
Kristina is a huge asset to the team and her vast experience is both welcomed and respected.
Currently working in a well known local establishment which offers support for those with all types of special needs, perhaps Kristina's biggest asset is the ability to cope with all situations that others may find challenging.
Her level headed and mature approach helps to placate others who have mood swing issues and her patience is unmatched.
Kristina is a huge music fan and can always be seen shaking a metaphorical leg at our monthly Discos.
Alongside our permanent management committee, we will be relying on our team of experts for advice and guidance on many issues and hopefully building on the excellent work that they have put in over the past two decades.
Jan Lake
Sheila Constable
As our knowledge base and support crew grow in size many more names will be added to this list.
Our Mission
The mission of the committee is to bring more and more Down' Syndrome families together in an atmosphere where we can share experiences, knowledge and fun, so this is a research experiment in an effort to judge the feelings of all of our members.
The fact that the committee is based in Harrogate means that almost all of the facilities that we have immediate free access to are based locally and we know that the organisation of events is almost always awkward to say the least, but that doesn't mean we can't organise transport to bring us all closer together. We have some free facilities such as venues (licensed or otherwise) and a DJ who will work for very little, so any funds raised could perhaps be spent on transport rather than the actual event itself.
It stands to reason that some of these events will come at a cost and in those cases, we would respectfully request a contribution, but wherever possible we will expect subscriptions to be heavily discounted.
Thank you we look forward to pooling your opinions and getting back to you with some positive suggestions.
Kind Regards, Paul, Michelle, Linda, Sally, Emma and Kristina.