University of Bath School of Management MSc students are working hard to help local charities and community groups in an initiative sponsored by Bath-based engineering company Rotork plc, which also develops students’ managerial, creative and professional skills.

In the Rotork Community Challenge, 20 local charities and organisations have asked teams of School of Management students to find new ways to help their activities and community support work. The varied challenges include creating a TikTok strategy to attract young people to libraries, developing marketing and fundraising campaigns, improving social media presence, designing a Christmas stall, and helping a charity which sources businesswear for women returning to the workplace. Student Union (SU) volunteers sourced the charity contacts to create a varied range of challenges for the students to choose from.

The results of each project will be judged by business and management experts on Monday 12 December and the winning team will receive a donation from Rotork for their project’s cause or charity. Over 120 students are taking part. Thanks to the hard work of the SU volunteer coordinators who sourced the charity contacts, there are a variety of interesting and fun challenges for the students to choose from.

“The Rotork Community Challenge has become a regular – and incredibly popular – fixture amongst our students, who are inspired by its aim to contribute to the wider Bath community and the opportunity it provides to develop their teamworking, planning, leadership and project management skills,” said Viktoriia Korsun, Student Experience Officer.

The community charities and local groups include Bath Mencap, 1st Impressions, Citizens Advice, Dorothy House, The Paul Hodges Trust, Food Cycle, The Childrens Society, Genesis Trust Bath, and Fringe Arts Bath.

“We are proud as a local company to support this valuable annual initiative and look forward to hearing how the School of Management students have responded to the challenges from the charities to help the local community,” said Rotork’s Early Careers Manager Marie-Pier Fournier.

Rotork is a FTSE250 global flow control and instrumentation company, which supplies equipment to customers in the oil, gas, water, wastewater and power sectors to manage the flow of liquids, gases and powders.

"The Rotork Community Challenge has been an amazing and fun experience. The challenges make it worth it when we’re doing it for a good cause! We got the opportunity to help Fringe Arts Bath prepare for their annual event, and met lots of interesting people along the way. We would definitely do it again!", the Fringe Arts Team said in a statement.