A GROUP of 13 college students from Eastleigh have recently returned home after a 10-day volunteering trip to Nepal.

The volunteering project saw Barton Peveril students work on a rural Nepalese school in Kathmandu across four days, after experiencing Nepalese culture at the start of their trip.

Here, the students deep cleaned and painted the classrooms, sanded doors and shutters, and built a fence around the school to keep the children safe, after collectively raising £5,000, through a variety of fund-raising activities including bake-sales and quiz nights to help pay for the fencing.

Barton Peveril’ Subject Leader for Health and Social Care, Jodie Lindsay-Watson, accompanied the students on the volunteering trip between Wednesday October 23 and Friday November 1.

She said: "During the half term break 13 Barton Peveril students embraced the opportunity to take part in a school refurbishment project in a rural area of Nepal. The students loved spending time with the Nepalese children, laughing singing and dancing. They have made such a difference to so many lives."

Barton Peveril students have previously volunteered across Africa but this is the first-time students from the College have volunteered in Nepal, with a new group of students set to go on a similar volunteering project in Nepal in 2021.

Maisie Mann, who was part of the volunteering group, said: "I decided to go on this trip was because I really wanted an eye opener into other cultures around the world. Living in England, I feel as though we have become so used to our everyday lives and comforts that I wanted to travel to Nepal to realise that there is so much more we could learn from these other cultures.

She added: "The experience of this trip was truly amazing and allowed me to discover a different way of life and that we simply shouldn’t focus our lives on money and success.”