Latest Notices
Christmas lunch at the Hostess
Music Appreciation group restarting.
Notices or urgent messages can be shown here…
Kathryn elected Chairperson at AGM.
Hello, it gives me great pleasure to introduce myself as your new Chair.
My sincere thanks go to members who have wished me good luck in this new (for me) position.
Thank you to my predecessors, Irene Brooks and, most recently, Steve Garner, for your contributions over the past years and months.
Going forward, I am excited about working with the new committee - all, like me, volunteers; some new to the committee, others with new positions and some continuing in their established roles. I feel sure we will work as a team to take Forest Town & District u3a into the future.
Exciting times lie ahead and I will endeavour to perform my duties to my best ability.
Kathryn Cope
Throughout these web pages you will find words and Buttons highlighted in Blue, these are clickable or touch links to other pages, documents or committee contacts, remember to use the 'back arrow' < to return you to the page you were looking at.
We have our Monthly General meeting on the 1st Friday of the month in the concert room of the Forest Town Arena.
The meeting is open is to all members and visitors, see the General News page for details.
Visitors are welcome, we like to see new potential members to our u3a.
If this is your first time at one of our meetings speak to one of the Greeters at the door and sign in as a visitor at the reception table, visitors are allowed to attend two meetings before deciding to join us.
We usually have a guest speaker at the meeting or are entertained by our own activity groups.
The Events page will show you a list of our speakers for the forthcoming months and the subject they will be covering, talks are very wide-ranging and are informative and often amusing.
Previous speakers>
VE Day celebrations
Throughout the year we have days out, holidays and extra meetings all arranged by our social team and Group leaders. The Easter Bonnet parade, Summer Ball and Hallowe’en party are always very popular.
You can make enquiries and book your place and pay for these trips at one of the tables at the monthly General meeting. Some of our Activity Groups have tables in the room and this is a good opportunity to talk to the group leader.
You can find us on Facebook at Forest Town u3a Group
MEMBERSHIP
We currently have 237 members and are open to new members, you can join at one of our monthly meetings or by contacting our Membership secretary: Hilary Bramwell by clicking or touching this link: Membership Secretary you can download an application form by clicking on this link: Membership application form Full details for joining are contained on the application form.
You are allowed to visit two of our monthly meetings to see what we have to offer before deciding to join us.
The fees are £20.00 for full membership and £16.00 for associate membership. (For associate membership please provide proof of membership of another u3a)
The preferred method of payment is by Bank transfer:
Bank transfer to 30-90-89 53978960 (Business account). To identify your payment please include your Name and Membership Number in the Reference Box on Online Banking.
Gift Aid - As a registered charity Forest Town u3a can reclaim 25p Gift Aid for every £1 of your subscription from the tax you pay for the current tax year. To enable us to do this members will need to sign a Charity Gift Aid Declaration Form. Forms will be available at the General Meetings or you can download one here: Gift Aid Declaration form.
Newsletters
The October 2025 edition of the newsletter is available to read on the Newsletters page,
Notts County Council bulletins and all previous newsletters are also available.
To read the Newsletters and other .pdf documents on this website you will need Adobe Reader or Adobe Reader DC. There is a download link to the Adobe website and guidance on the Computer and IT Group pages.
Forest Town U3A has over 20 groups that you are welcome to join, if you have a skill, interest or hobby that you would like to share please think about starting your own group, it doesn't necessarily have to be one person, two or more people can share the running of a group.
The u3a ‒ what does it mean to you?
The original University of the Third Age (u3a) was started in 1973 by Professor Pierre Vellas from the Faculty of Social Sciences at Toulouse University, France, his more academic version with connections to local university continues to be the model in much of continental Europe.
In the UK however the original French concept was significantly modified into a Self-help organisation originally focussing on people of retirement age and recognising that they have something to contribute, the emphasis has been on sharing, without formal educational links, many English speaking countries have followed the UK pattern.
Today there are some 1035 separate u3as in the UK, with almost 400,000 members between them. Each one is independent but affiliated to the Third Age Trust, the aim is to encourage people who are no longer in full employment to engage in educational and cultural activities and to find and help such people use their skills to learn and teach others.
‘The Third Age’ is defined as a time in your life (not necessarily chronological) where you have the opportunity to undertake learning for its own sake, this means that in today's u3a movement there is no minimum age, rather a focus on people who are no longer in full time employment or raising a family.
Help in running a group is available, contact our Groups co-ordinator Marilyn Redfern by clicking on this link: Groups Co-ordinator to find out more.
I know it's great to have lots of holidays and day trips and events going on but we need to get back to the roots of the u3a movement and keep our groups alive.
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