A University of Bristol student has raised over £1000 for charity Jacari, which provides tuition to over 200 children with English as an additional language (EAL) in Bristol and Oxford every year.
India Courage has been volunteering for local charity Jacari as an English language tutor for the past two years. She supports a young Syrian girl, visiting her at school every week for a fun tutoring session.
As part of Jacari’s Step Forward fundraiser, India challenged herself to cover 360km on horseback in three weeks. She completed the challenge despite being in the midst of her summer university exams.
India shared her experience of volunteering for Jacari with friends and family on social media, and raised an amazing £1,100 in total, making her Jacari’s top fundraiser for the “Step Forward” challenge.
India said: “Through tutoring a student for two years, I realised many very keen and clever children are classed as unintelligent or lazy purely due to their lack of English language skills. So I wanted to help Jacari further close the gaps in equality of opportunity by supporting EALchildren to learn the skills needed to unlock their abilities in all other areas whilst in the UK.”
India first discovered Jacari at the University of Bristol freshers’ fair. The charity works in partnership with 8 schools in Bristol and 12 schools in Oxford who help to identify pupils most in need of tuition, with volunteers providing 1762 hours of bespoke tuition last year.
India added: “I have always wanted to help young girls achieve their dreams and the student who spoke to me at the freshers’ fair explained Jacari very well and inspired me to volunteer as I already had some of the skills needed to teach English language.”
India’s pupil loves drawing and they often use creative games to help her learn English. They also spend time chatting and learning vocabulary around her interests, for example planets and animals.
India concluded: “I have absolutely loved the relationship I have with my student after two years of tutoring together. She inspires me every week with her enthusiasm to embrace a foreign language and culture.”
Image: India on horseback, Jacari