As the Bears Movember campaign comes to an end, the team have reflected on their charity work and what they do as a society to give back to the community.
Sam Cowan, Charity Sec, spoke about the importance of the charity to the team.
“It’s very important to us personally, I wouldn’t take away from anyone else’s we’ve got league, we’ve got football, it’s for everyone, but I know it is certainly a very personal thing for myself and a lot of our boys as well.
“Everybody feels very strongly about it which is why it is one of our main charities we do every year, as we are all just personally very close to it and we think it’s a very good mantra which they support.”
For Cowan, being Charity Secretary is more than just what he does with his team… it is about building a community.
“Being charity secretary involves organising charity events throughout the year and can be based in our sport but it doesn’t have to be.
“It’s just about giving back to the community and getting everybody involved and raising some money for some good charities.”
Movember is the main campaign which the mens rugby union team get behind as it raises money for a charity which sits closely with the team’s hearts.
It involves rallying his team together to grow the best moustaches they can and to raise money at the big event they do at the end of November, this year is a BGT event.
“Movember for us involves at the start of November shaving our faces and grow silly little moustaches for the whole month, and for us that is the physical way of doing it.”
Cowan continued: “Then we have a big event at the end of the month to close it off, but having the moustache that’s the marketing of it, it shows that we are all involved with it and by walking around we are promoting it.”
To continue raising money the team do promotion activities throughout the month including “tash updates.”
The University also helps to get involved with raising awareness of what each society is doing for charity by circulating QR codes for the links and advertising what the teams are doing.
All the societies love to get involved and support each other to raise money for charity.
“Everybody is willing to make a fool of themselves for charity, and knows it’s for a good cause.” said Cowan.
The charity side to each society is fundamental, Cowan said “It shows we are more than just a rugby team.
“It shows we are very connected to our community and we do stuff outside of rugby union and we like promoting for mens mental health and everyone’s mental health as well, and it means we get involved with the other societies as well and everyone comes together for a good cause.”