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HISTORY The Vale Festival is not old. It’s still a little toddler really. The 2007 event was only the third after all. On the other hand, it found its feet pretty fast. In 2005, two friends watched ‘Hotel Rwanda’, a harrowing film about the genocide of 1994. They both felt that one of the greatest tragedies of everything that happened is that, somehow, we still didn’t learn the lesson, and so another African genocide was occurring (and still is today) in Darfur, Sudan. So (and I still don’t quite know how this bit happened) they decided to try to hire an outdoor cinema screen and show ‘Hotel Rwanda’ to as many people as possible, to raise awareness of the whole, horrible issue of genocide. They then got talking to some guys who were thinking of doing a music event on the Vale – a beautiful area, surrounded by first-year students’ accommodation – and the idea of the festival, incorporating the film and the music and much more, was born. The first one was organised in about a month. Over 1,500 students attended, and approximately £10,000 was made for charity, the money split between Medicins Sans Frontieres’ work in Sudan, and the Rwanda Genocide Appeal, which now works with any genocide in Africa. The event was widely hailed as a massive success, and expectations grew for a second, bigger, better festival for 2006. By January of ’06, a committee was forming – some old, some new – all ever so keen. Six months of planning, under the watchful gaze of all in authority, led to an event bigger I think than any of us had ever really imagined. Simple figures are that just under 4,000 students came, making it almost certainly the biggest entirely student run event in the country, and over £25,000 was raised for charity. The theme was ‘Unite Against AIDS’, and the money was split between two wonderful projects, an S.P.W. one in Zimbabwe, and a Unicef one in Kenya, both working to reduce the impact of HIV/AIDS on young people, through community care projects, home care, and innovative education methods using drama, music, art and sport. The event itself was also incredibly special – one massive main stage, two big marquees, and too many magical little extras to mention here. Hopefully, Vale Festival will continue for many years to come, and it can only get better.
Vale Festival 2006, Birmingham Uni	ETHICS The event has always been, and will always remain student run. A non-hierarchical committee dedicate huge amounts of time and energy to this event, for the simple reason that they all believe in its capacity to do so much good, on so many levels. We put great pressure on ourselves to run the event as ethically as possible. We recognise that any big event has an environmental impact, and we do our best to minimise this, by being as sustainable as possible. We use bio-fuel or renewable energy sources instead of diesel; we recycle as much as we can; we check carefully where everything we are getting is sourced from. We also refuse to be associated with any companies or groups that we feel are unethical. We very much believe that we have no basis upon which to try to persuade students to lead more ethical lives if we do not practise what we preach. We hope the event makes students think about their own lifestyle choices, so that the positive benefits of it can last in the future, long after the festival itself.
This year The Vale Festival will once again play host to the ever popular Jungle Jam Stage. If you want to play the festival this is your chance, whether performing a killer Sax solo or coming down with your death metal band to play a 20 minute set, all you need to do is sign up for a slot at the Jungle Jam on the day. All instruments are available at the stage so if you fancy just coming along for a jam, it is all ready for you! After it's success at Vale festival 2007, the DJ Jam Stage will be returning this year. Same format, if you want to come and do a dj/mc set, just go to the DJ Jam Stage on the day and sign up for a slot.

	Charities Supported 2007 This year the money raised is going to be donated to Action Aid, working on climate change projects, and Kids for Kids, who work in rural regions of Sudan. The theme for Vale Fest this year is the humanitarian effects of climate change - that is the negative effects that climate change has on people around the world, particularly in developing countries, and what we, as students, in our day to day lives, can do to combat this. Also this years Vale Festival is supporting Friends of the Earth's 'The Big Ask' campaign, calling on the British government to take a lead in combating climate chaos.
	Charities Supported 2006 In 2006 £25,000 was raised, and then divided between two HIV/AIDS projects in Sub-Saharan Africa – a UNICEF project in Kenya, and an SPW one in Zimbabwe. The project in Zimbabwe for example, which we were able to provide about 30% of the start up fund reaches out to over 61,000 people, providing direct care for over 4,000 orphans and vulnerable children, and training and providing the facilities for hundreds of educators and advisors to help raise awareness of the disease and its prevention through innovative and participatory activities such as drama and sports. It also provides counselling and in house support for those living with HIV/AIDS.
	Charities Supported 2005 In 2005 £12,000 was raised for International Fund for Rwanda (a partnership between the UNF, UNDP and the makers of the film Hotel Rwanda), and Medecins Sans Frontieres for their work in Sudan.

After great deliberation Vale Festival 2008 now has a cause: The provision of sustainable access to clean water in the developing world. The issues arising from a lack of access to clean water are wide ranging. The most concerning of which are the health implications associated with dirty drinking water and poor sanitation. Unsafe water and lack of sanitation is now the single largest cause of illness worldwide and half the people in developing countries are suffering from water-related diseases. According to PlayPumps International, one charity involved with the water issues in the developing world, a child dies of a water-related illness every 15 seconds. But the social implications go further than that. The long and laborious task of fetching water often falls to women and girls, preventing the girls from being able to attend school and gain equal opportunities to their male counterparts. By providing sustainable access to clean water we can help people to be healthier, better educated and allow them to fulfil their potential.