The Gatehouse is an open-door drop-in café for Oxford’s homeless and vulnerably housed, based at the St Giles Parish Rooms, 10 Woodstock Road, near the centre of Oxford.

Because of the Covid-19 pandemic the last few months have been a period of considerable change for us, and our operating model will continue to adapt to changing conditions over the coming months. Having temporarily shut the drop-in centre for 3 months and run food delivery and remote personal support services, we finally re-opened with a takeaway café in late June. This takeaway service is likely to continue for several months, until we are able to fully open up the centre safely again.

We will be on the lookout for volunteers to help us run our sessions following our annual two-week summer closure (17 to 31 August inclusive) by which time we hope to be opening for our usual six evenings a week, but please check our website for the latest details.

Each session takes up less than four hours of a volunteers’ time, and most individuals cover a regular slot once a week, but some do more or less than that and you can simply limit your commitment to one session at a time on varying days of the week according to your availability. If you would like a challenging experience where you can make a difference you can join our volunteer team by contacting us at Zoe@oxfordgatehouse.org  See oxfordgatehouse.org/volunteer for further details about volunteering.

In the meantime we are also looking for keen cyclists willing to take up the Bike Oxford 2020 Medal Ride challenge to raise funds for the Gatehouse. Full details can be found on our website News page at oxfordgatehouse.org/updates . There is no fixed date for this event so you can register at bikeoxford.co.uk and participate whenever you like over this summer. Contact us at fundraising@oxfordgatehouse.org after registering and we can provide you with a Gatehouse t-shirt for the ride and help with your publicity to gain sponsors.

Check out our social media pages too. In addition to our long running facebook page (oxfordgatehouse) we are also active on Twitter (@GatehouseOxford) and Instagram (thegatehouseoxford). Follow us on all of these sites to keep track of the latest news at the Gatehouse.

Find out more about The Gatehouse on College’s Univ in the Community page.

Published: 6 August 2020

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