Helping refugee families start the school year on the front foot

As schoolkids in Melbourne looked forward to returning to school after an extremely disrupted 2020, an Australian retailed stepped up to help refugee and asylum seeker families in the western suburbs give their kids the supplies they need to start the new school year right.

Smiggle donated well over 250 items including school bags, lunchboxes, drink bottles and pencil cases to West Welcome Wagon.

West Welcome Wagon (WWW) is a volunteer-run not-for-profit that provides material aid and support to refugees and asylum seekers in Melbourne's west, including areas like Brimbank, Hobsons Bay, Maribyrnong and Wyndham. Assisting more than 800 families, including more than 500 with school-aged children from more than 30 different countries, WWW provides good quality donated items including furniture, bedding, clothing, children's toys and appliances. 

WWW Chairman Chris Scarris said the children would love the back to school packs. He said the organisation usually helps between 200 and 300 children each school year, but had already reach out to 450 children this year due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

While pencil cases, drink bottles, lunch boxes and backpacks might not seem like ground-breaking donations, they're hugely important for children facing the kinds of challenges that asylum seeker children face as they adjust to a new culture, a new language and a new way of life. In these unfamiliar and often scary surroundings, these items help young people feel acknowledged and welcomed.

With families often facing financial hardship due to not being allowed to or finding it difficult to gain employment, school supplies can fall down the list of priorities. These donations will mean asylum seeker children will have similar items to the other kids at school as they try to fit in and make friends.

The request from West Welcome Wagon was originally listed as a GIVIT Together project. GIVIT Together is home to bigger requests and larger projects. On this part of the website you can currently find requests like:

• digital devices for a special school;
• a long list of items for a mum and kids escaping domestic violence to furnish their empty new home; 
• musical instruments for a residential secondary school for vulnerable young people;
• furniture, tools and gardening supplies for the refurbishment of a homeless shelter; and
• winter clothing for an organisation supporting elderly First Nations Australians.

GIVIT Together gives companies, organisations, sports teams, schools, families, and other groups a way to target their social impact by donating to a project that catches their eye and their heart. For corporates, GIVIT Together is an interesting way to engage employees in the company's corporate social responsibility efforts. With community organisations now able to request donations of services, time and volunteering via GIVIT, this is another avenue for groups looking to give back in their local area.

Not sure how to help asylum seekers in Australia? You can use GIVIT's keyword search on the 'what's needed' list to search for requests in which the recipients are refugees or asylum seekers.

West Welcome Wagon requested these items as part of our Back to School Appeal. Despite being well into term one, plenty of frontline organisations are still requesting urgent donations of items to help young people whose families are experiencing financial difficulties or other hardship.

Updated 14/12/2021: Our Ready to Learn Appeal is now the best way to help disadvantaged kids get what they need as they head back to school. This appeal is not just for kids - it runs year-round and helps people of any age experiencing hardship for any reason as they attempt to complete further study.