Benjamin Wells

Ben Wells began his commitment to charity as a short-term volunteer working in the notoriously neglected state run orphanages of Romania worked solidly for four years with the Nightingales Children’s Project, seeking to improve the lives of children in Cernavoda, Romania. As in many areas of Romania, Cernavoda has a large Roma population often driven to destitution through exclusion and marginalisation. The Nightingales Children's Project is also sensitive to their plights. Under Ben Wells, a school for destitute children has been created in order to provide the necessary tutelage for these children, the aim being to eventually reintroduce them to the Romanian education system.

Through the Nightingale’s project, Ben recognised the need to provide an education for children in Cernavoda who could not attend school, either for financial reasons or because they had been out of state education for more than two years. Today the scheme has been running for seven years and currently has eight classes with seventy-six pupils. Few of the children had ever attended school before and attend determined to succeed. The majority of pupils come from troubled or unstable families, difficulties that stem from their poverty. During their time in education, the children have the chance to gain a school diploma, to learn a skill or a trade in an apprenticeship scheme (mechanics, cookery, sewing and woodwork), and support for them and their family, where funds are available. Giving the children a chance of a rounded education and teaching them a skill, which will help them to gain employment, offers a brighter future and a chance to break out of the poverty in which they live.

Ben brought with him considerable freshness to Nightingales. He showed great ingenuity in expanding the sponsorship schemes that have been crucial to the charity's fundraising. He wrote the information for a new website for the charity. He writes the Nightingales Quarterly newsletter. He helps to run the children's home. He directs the operations of the Nightingales School, where he is both the headmaster and a teacher. He teaches English outside the school to the town's other children. He is group leader to a team of British volunteers, and encourages those volunteers who've now returned to England to continue their fundraising efforts back home.

When the state-run orphanage shut down in the summer of 2004 and the charity underwent an enormous change, Ben played a leading role in its smooth transition. Ben is dedicated to fundraising back in England. He is in touch constantly with the charity's UK accountant and fundraising team to encourage and co-operate with them. He runs the ‘Sponsor a Child’ and ‘Sponsor a House Mother’ schemes. He has run marathons in London, Paris and Timisoura, Romania. He founded ‘Bike for Others’, a new annual bike riding event in aid of the charity, which took place for the first time last summer. While others cycled, Ben ran from Beaconsfield to Bicester. Ben has been crucial in the creation of the charity's latest project, the Tereza Community Centre. This was built for the restless youths of Cernavoda who, because they have no role models and few opportunities, often turn to stealing, prostitution, alcohol and drugs.

“Ben is a remarkable and uniquely wonderful person whose altruistic personality is genuinely a beacon … to many young and older people whose lives have been touched by gentle, unassuming and delightful character”.

Dr. G C Moncrieff

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