Lucy Holland, MDXSU Vice President Arts & Creative Industries, reflects on a busy and hugely successful 'Movember', raising awareness and money for the Movember Foundation.

The wonderful month of 'Movember' is officially over for another year – but the Movember Foundation and all that it does is 24/7! You can still donate, raise awareness, fundraise and more!

Looking back at the varied events and talks we've hosted throughout this month, I can genuinely say that this was a Movember to remember, and I can’t say thank you and congratulations to all that got involved and fundraised.

TThis included two Chill Out Hubs, weekly Pub Quizzes, free haircuts from barbers on campus, and our end of Movember fundraiser and 'Live Shave Off’ at The Claddagh Ring pub! It has been an absolutely fantastic month, and it’s been great seeing so many moustaches around campus. We’ve continued the open conversation around men’s mental health, had shower stickers put up in the men’s changing room in MDX House to raise awareness about testicular cancer, and felt a real buzz on campus throughout the month.

On Thursday 28 November, we invited The Hermes Project onto campus to give free haircuts to students, and raise awareness about Movember, the project itself and get talking to our students about men’s mental health.  The Hermes Project is an absolutely inspirational initiative launched by Ken Hermes, which aims to provide support to those bereaved by parental suicide - you can support the project through their go-fund-me page, or drop them a follow on social media. The event started from 11am in the Quad – we had 16 slots available on a first-come-first-serve basis and filled every one! As this was the first time that we have ever done it, we didn’t know what the demand would be, how many students would engage with it or even if this would be successful! But following the number of conversations which were started, the positive feedback and the demand for more barbers, we’re looking to bring this event back in the next term, so keep your eyes peeled!

On the same day we also had our fantastic student newspaper, The Echo, running a 24-hour live stream and raising awareness and money for the foundation - you can find out more here.

Our final Movember RAG pub quiz at The Claddagh Ring pub also took place on the Thursday 28 November – with a great turn out – and our local Hendon RFC team even won! This was a really fun evening which had engagement from our students and the local community. The quiz is only £1 to take part and you even get some free half-time food – keep your eye out for future events!

Finally we get to our Moustache Party and Live Shave-Off at the Claddagh Ring. This was a really fun event which took place in the private function room and included a raffle (which included four tickets to the Hundred Ball Competition at Lord’s in the 2020 season), temporary moustache tattoos, a glitter station, and the penultimate shave-off! Our barber for the night was local barber Sam from Restyle Hair. For the shave-off we had seven volunteers who had their ‘tash’s shaved away and brought a great buzz to the night.

With an incredible donation from the Clad of £540.00, we raised £977.26 during the month of Movember – and you can still donate to the foundation! As well as this, our very own Men’s Rugby team took part in Movember by growing out some fantastic mo’s (three even took part in the shave-off!) to raise money for the foundation and they exceeded their target of £500 and are still taking donations – you can donate here.

Well done and a huge thank you to everyone involved for an absolutely fantastic Movember, and remember you can keep on mo’ing!

Find out more about MDXSU's work on students' mental health and wellbeing at mdxsu.com/wellbeing