Movember offered up the opportunity to go head-to-head with other students and staff to see who can grow the best moustache throughout November whilst raising the most money. Every penny raised supports men's mental health and suicide prevention.
Since 2003, Movember has been a tool to raise awareness for men’s mental and physical health. It has funded more than 1,250 men’s health projects, ranging from men’s mental health and suicide prevention to prostate cancer and testicular cancer and has become infamous for ‘challenging the status quo, shaking up men’s health research and transforming the way health services reach and support men’.
Visit our MOVEMBER pages for more information.
Reaching the end of the month means the moustaches have all been shaved off and a huge amount of money has been raised for charity. We wanted to take a look back at some of the amazing fundraisers student groups have run this past month and share the final total raised. (Spoiler alert- it’s a lot! We actually raised over £3000 in the first two days alone!)
At Bath, we had 36 SU groups signed up to grow some ‘staches and over 400 students and staff members ran, walked, cycled and burpee’d their way to raising some impressive funds for Movember. Take a look at the video below, and read below for our highlights!
The Rugby Club were heavily involved in Movember, holding a dedicated Movember day which involved the team dressing up in the finest suits to celebrate the occasion at their Movember Ball. The event raised £1934, they also donated ticket and raffle sales which raised almost £1000!
Rugby also held a 60 hour cycle out on the parade, covering an insane total distance of 3441 km, as well as holding an inter spot tournament with Netball which raised an amazing £579.68 and a charity game ‘Battle for Bath’ against Bath Spa which of course, they won! We were particularly blown away with the emotive messaging and honest reflections members of the club did through the Movember Instagram account, they really put themselves out there for a cause you could tell meant so much to them.
The Canoe club held a 24 hour challenge where they had to canoe continuously for 24 hours. They raised £1000 in the first 18 hours and finished at an amazing grand total of £1664 after canoeing over 250,000 metres. Bath Jets’ Cheerleading hosted an open stunt session and Shooting, Archery and Golf turned one of their usual sessions into a special Movember themed session, wearing jazzy staches’ and donating money raised to Movember.
Throughout the month, student group Nightline also held numerous discussion groups to encourage people to be open about speaking about their emotions and Howie (Nightline’s mascot) grew a ‘moustache’ to collect funds – which even got waxed off in the big Shave Off at the end of the month!
There were also some individuals that really stood out throughout the month – Barney Gill ran 48 miles in 48 hours and raised a whopping £865! Ben Tudor completed 4,300 bunches and crunches, raising £860 and Johannes and Noah rowed a combined 200km in just 10 days (while growing moustaches!), raising over £700. University staff also got involved, with Simon Gane walking 140km over the course of the month, raising £520.
There also needs to be a special shoutout to this year’s Movember Ambassadors Tom Berry and Harry Jeavons, who were crucial to the success of Movember this year. Amongst their studies and other commitments, they have helped to run the Movember social accounts, contacted sports clubs, advised groups on their fundraising events, organised the limited edition of Movember x Surridge kit, stayed up to date with all things national November and even did a bit of modelling of the kit on the side! Fundraising Co-ordinator at the SU Hazel commented, “They have both been instrumental in ensuring the Movember campaign was so successful and I am so proud of what they achieved”.
The month ended with a brand new event for 2023, The Big Shave Off! The event provided another opportunity for fundraising as students could bid to shave off each other’s moustaches. At the event, the top three groups that had raised the most money were announced – Lacrosse was in third, Canoe was in second and Rugby came out on top, raising a whopping £13,000!
The overall total raised by University of Bath students and staff was also announced, an unbelievable £30,000.
We wanted to take the opportunity to say a huge thank you to all the staff and students who got involved with Movember and to everyone who kindly donated to the cause. It has been such a fantastic month raising awareness and we are absolutely blown away at the total amount raised and the commitment our groups have shown with amazing creative fundraising ideas.
Here’s to topping it next year…?