For over 13 years, the St Christopher's School, Thailand Trip has been a central focus of our community service. Under normal circumstances, dozens of St Christopher's students, from years 12 and 13, volunteer to provide their time and skills to help educate the under-privileged children of the Tha Ton community hill tribes in Northern Thailand.
St Christopher's School students have made a tremendous impact to the Tha Tom children: building a canteen, library, toilet block, dormitory, gap year accommodation, medical room, and helping to build and decorate Thomas House, a school dedicated to the education of Thai children with special needs.
Alongside this, pre-trip fundraising and additional donations have enabled us to sponsor the education of nearly 50 students.
This year, however, Covid-19 has proven doubly difficult for the Thai community; not only can we not send students and support due to travel restrictions, but the schools themselves have been deprived of their learning resources and funding due to the economic challenges of the pandemic, and others have been shut down entirely. Thomas House has been particularly affected, having its financial support withdrawn and so being forced to send students home.
Being unable to send students and donations this year, we’re eagerly seeking ways to help the Thai children from afar. A Thailand-themed Mufti day on November 5th is already planned and we welcome suggestions and ideas for fundraising during a pandemic.
We hope that, with your support, we can keep many of these children in school, with the resources to support their learning and ensuring their access to education isn’t compromised by the pandemic.
Your support is greatly appreciated. Thank you.
