One donation, twice the impact. 29 Nov – 6 Dec 2022.
We are excited to announce that we are taking part in The Big Give Christmas Challenge again this year. This is the UK’s biggest online match funding campaign and we are hoping to raise more than £10,000 to support our fantastic EduLit programme. We are delighted to have received matching funding from The Reed Foundation and our other supporters up to the value of £5000.
All funds raised through the campaign will go towards transforming community learning spaces, such as libraries, into active hubs for young people to develop their literacy skills and discover their creative potential, as well as developing their leadership and critical thinking skills, to effect social change in a rapidly changing world. You can read more about the programme here, and how your donation will support our volunteers and students.
What will donations go towards?
- £1,500 – Training and mentoring for EduLit volunteers
- £3,000 – Purchase of African books and local textbooks
- £3,750 – Creation and delivery of 15 EduLit boxes
- £1,250 – Bookshelves
- £500 – Development of literacy resources & online hub
The campaign goes live at midday on Tuesday 29th November 2022 and runs for seven days, closing at midday on Tuesday 6th December. During this period, every donation we receive via The Big Give website will be doubled, meaning that every pound you give us has twice the impact. We would love you to be involved!
Why literacy?
222,000 females and 214,000 males aged 15-24 were illiterate in Ghana in 2018 (UNESCO). The pandemic has exposed the stark inequality in the Ghanaian education system, revealing the limited infrastructure and poor educational resources in rural regions of the Country (ResearchGate 2020). There is a shortage of literacy resources that reflect the local context with our own and wider research demonstrating the link between books mirroring students’ contexts, and their engagement in reading.
Why African books?
This is part of a year long ‘Bringing Africa to the Bookshelf’ campaign that we have run. Read more here.
Through reading books by African authors one can see African customs, traditions and practices directly expressed in the story which resonates with readers.” (Adam Nabila, volunteer, Kalpohin Spot)
‘Bringing Africa to the Bookshelf’ might be a particular focus for this year, but it is something EduSpots has been working on since its birth under the name of ‘Reading Spots’ in 2015. We published our first ‘Top 10 African Authors’ list in 2017, and fundraised for copies of African books across our Spots since, given that they are difficult to collect as they are less widely available.
Our aim by the end of 2022 is to enable the creation of an African fiction and non-fiction section in all of our 50 Spots. As ever, bringing a clear African fiction and non-fiction book case for adults and children is a collective aim, and requires action and commitment from everyone across our network to achieve.
What can you do to help the Big Give Appeal?
- You can share or like all our social media posts.
- You can make a donation to the page when it comes live
- You can share the donation page through email or your social media when it goes live.
- You can suggest that your place of work considers EduSpots for a Christmas jumper day.
- We are organising a ‘Spots for EduSpots’ theme across the week, which could be a perfect dress code for a party or themed charity day.
- You could organise a Christmas event in support of EduSpots.
- You can come to our EduSpots Christmas event (mulled wine and mince pies) in London on the 4th December (5-7pm), details to follow soon!
Contact Rebecca at rscotton@eduspots.org with any suggestions or offers of help or contact our Chair, Cat Davison directly on cdavison@eduspots.org! We are happy to provide you with supporting resources and guest speakers.
We hope you can help us smash our £10K target and spread the word – thank you!
#OurCollectiveFuture
Here are some different ways that you can support us:
