Support SOPHIE: End Hate, Embrace Difference

A bake sale - and lucky dip - will be hosted at Parker's Piece (Cambridge - CB1 1NA) on Wednesday 21st May 2025 from 1pm-5pm. This will be run by a group of students from Hills Road Sixth Form College as part of Social Action Week: a week to raise money for community engagement and meaningful social impacts.

Sophie Lancaster was a young woman who was murdered for being different. She was artistic and dressed in her own unique way. She was attacked by a gang of five boys in a park in Bacup, Lancashire on 11 August 2007. Sophie remained in hospital for 13 days and died on 24 August 2007; she was just 20 years old.

Sophie’s mother, Sylvia, had seen at first-hand the abuse and prejudice her daughter had previously been subjected to because of how she dressed. She was determined that she would carry on this work and The Sophie Lancaster Foundation was established as a lasting legacy to a beautiful life cut short by violence.

The students working on this project are Olive, Lola, Zain, Samuel, Malwina, Nathan, Oscar, Lotte, Abi, Devon, Max and Nooh. We are all first year students at Hills Road Sixth Form College who want to do something for the alternative community. All of us either dress alternatively, have people we care about that do or just deeply care about self-expression and freedom without fear, so we want to nurture an environment that allows people to do as such with pride.

We've observed hate and prejudice towards alternative people, or those who express themselves differently from the norm: even now after an evolution in societal values. These improvements cause people to turn a blind eye to the stigma still lingering and the harm it does particularly to the youth of today. It is incredibly important to spread the message of the Sophie Lancaster foundation and that is exactly what they stand against: hate, prejudice and a lack of acceptance.