It has been a challenging but rewarding term for the World Vision Committee.

This year, undertaking a socially distanced 40 Hour Famine has meant group fundraising activities weren’t able to take place. However, the students of BHS pulled through with their individual fundraising efforts, doubling the total sum raised last year!

At the end of Term One, six members of the committee attended the 2020 World Vision Youth Conference. This was a great experience for students. Here they learnt about how the changing climate is increasingly affecting the subsistence farmers of Malawi and some ways that clever Kiwis were working to combat injustice and climate change here in NZ. The students also got to meet and share some of their ideas with like-minded young leaders from other schools.

The work done this year by the WV Committee was slightly different than usual. They worked hard to promote the Famine in the absence of assemblies, visiting all junior form classes and putting together videos for all the form classes to watch in the absence of assemblies.

This year, sixty-four students at BHS undertook the Famine and collectively raised $8745.00.

Additionally, 9NRSS participated in their own Famine challenge of walking one million steps. They were successful in this endeavour and raised $1698 in doing so. A special well done to these students. These two totals combined place us in the top ten schools for money raised!

Thanks to the Burnside community, we have been able to fund the equivalent of a whole school garden full of seeds, tools for eighteen families to grow crops, one hundred and seventy seedlings, goats for six families and can even support a community watering system! For this we are very proud of all the students that were involved.

By Bethany Hood and Rebecca Pullock