Question: How much was raised at Quiz Night in Adelaide?

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Megan Elms at the Quiz Night. Image: Supplied

BY KIRRALEE NICOLLE

The Salvation Army’s Youth Homelessness team in Adelaide recently held a very successful fundraising event in collaboration with Revolution Church in Salisbury.

The Youth Homelessness and Revolution Church Quiz Night, an annual event aimed to tie in with Red Shield Appeal, was bigger than ever, with 180 attendees, multiple corporate partnerships and more than $11,000 raised on the evening.

Program Manager Youth Homelessness SA Megan Elms said this year’s event raised several thousand dollars more than any previous Quiz Night, with last year’s event donations totalling about $6500, a previous record.

She said it meant a great deal to the team that despite a cost-of-living crisis, there was so much belief in The Salvation Army’s work. She said many of the donations on the night came from people who may not have been particularly wealthy but had a strong investment in work which they knew to be impactful.

“People are down and out, but I feel like in my job, I just see people’s generosity,” Megan said. “Even in the midst of [the cost-of-living crisis], people are willing to give to something that moves them or is a good cause.

“I just think that’s amazing. I cannot believe we raised this much money in this era of the world we’re in right now.”

She said on the previous Sunday morning, she had told Revolution Church members that the event would raise $10,000, but she didn’t quite believe it was possible.

“I don’t know why I said it,” she said. “I just said it on a Sunday morning, and then I started panicking because everyone started saying, ‘Yeah, we’re going to raise $10,000’. I was like, ‘that's so much money, we’ve never done anything like that’. Anyway, we exceeded it, somehow! I don’t even know how we did that, but we exceeded $10,000. We met our target and more.”

Megan said attendees across 16 tables included State Member for Playford John Fullbrook MP, Divisional Commander Captain Scott Frame and Area Officer for Northern SA Captain Natalie Frame, Youth and Young Adults Secretary SA/NT Captain Aaron Coombes and other TSA personnel, as well as several tables full of attendees who were new to the event.

“The whole point is to [think about] how we reach the people who don’t do it every day, and that’s what we did,” Megan said.

Alongside the trivia, the night included pulled pork rolls for purchase, a talk by Rosealeigh, who also spoke at the Youth Homelessness Matters Day event at Ingle Farm, and a silent auction. Many Adelaide businesses contributed to the auction, with donations including a voucher to Mount Osmond Golf Club, a $100 voucher for Tree Climb and an eight-week gym membership from The Yard Campbelltown, whose owner came to Australia as a refugee. As her first Christmas gift in Australia was from The Salvation Army, the generosity of the donation came partly from a desire to give back.

In a more eclectic twist, staff and residents at Burlendi Youth Shelter had grown some enormous pumpkins, which they donated to the auction. One sold for $230, and then the purchaser donated it back to be sold again for $250, bringing it to a total price of $480. To make the story even more outrageous, the pumpkin turned out to be rotten, but the donations will go to alleviating youth homelessness across the Adelaide region.

The enormous pumpkin which brought in a total of $480. Image: Supplied

Megan said the goal of the night was to progressively tell the story of what the team does throughout the night, using videos, talks and statistics to map the picture of youth homelessness in Australia. She said since the night, she had heard that attendees had been having conversations in their personal lives with people about what youth homelessness looked like.

“For me, there’s a win where one, we’ve raised money that’s going to go straight to young people who are in need, but two, people have walked away with knowledge and maybe a different viewpoint than they had before of what youth homelessness is, and [we are] breaking down some of those stereotypes, which is what we want to do too,” she said.