COMMUNITY School ‘Sleepout’ raises a record £18,000 for charity Tonbridge’s latest ‘Sleepout’ has broken the School’s previous fundraising records and raised more than £18,000 for Porchlight, a charity which supports homeless and vulnerable young people in Kent. More than 160 First Year boys, along with several staff, built cardboard shelters and spent a night sleeping rough in the Quad in the Summer Term. As well as raising vital funds, the event also helps to educate boys about the various social issues that can lead to homelessness.
Those taking part in the Sleepout were fed from a soup kitchen, run by Lower Sixth volunteers, and then tried to sleep, some rather unsuccessfully! For the first time, this year’s Sleepout led directly to Field Day the following day. Instead of returning to their houses in the morning, boys had to experience the reality of tackling a day’s activities without basic facilities such as showers or clean clothes, which provided more experience of how it may feel to be without a home.
The Sleepout has been running annually for more than 12 years. Since 2011, Tonbridge has been working with Porchlight and in this time the School has raised over £100,000 for the cause, making it the charity’s largest individual donor. The boys heard more about the vital work of Porchlight and the profound effect that the pandemic has had on the homeless of Kent.
Juliet Burnett, the School’s Community Action Manager, said: “All went home reflecting on their experiences and on the role that Porchlight plays in turning around people’s lives.”
