The most wonderful time of the year is approaching!!! No, I’m not talking about the wintertime holidays.

Actually I’d rather celebrate Halloween twice than Christmas, but I digress…

GIVING TUESDAY IS COMING UP, FOLKS! That means all of us at Far Away Friends are hard at work planning the launch of our BIGGEST. CAMPAIGN. YET.

Introducing The Walk to Water Campaign

ABOUT THE CAMPAIGN

Launching on November 27th, the international day of charitable giving called #GivingTuesday through December 31st, we will be raising $13,000 to install a clean water well at Global Leaders Primary school which will provide clean, safe drinking water ON SITE for over 175 students, 19 staff and their families and the Namasale community at large. We are so excited to launch this campaign on #GivingTuesday, as all transaction fees are WAIVED and 100% of your donation goes directly toward building the well. You heard that right — 100%. EVERY SINGLE CENT you give will provide clean water for GLP students & the local community.

WHY WATER

On average, students at Global Leaders spend an hour and a half per day walking down a very dangerous road to fetch water from one of the two community wells near our school. This walk to water is time consuming, exhausting and puts our students at risk of getting injured on the main road on a DAILY BASIS. Older students often carry up to 40 lbs of water back to the school each day during the dry season in excruciating heat — something a fourteen year old studying for exams should NEVER have to do.

Our goal during this campaign is to finally END the walk to water that our students, teachers and community at Global Leaders Primary school have no choice but to do on a daily basis. We believe that a child’s time is so much better spent studying, learning, playing and growing — not fetching clean water to drink.

This issue also affects our ability to sustainably grow the student body and campus of Global Leaders. When meeting with our staff this past summer, EVERY member of the GLP team expressed to Far Away Friends that having immediate access to water was an absolute TOP priority.

“You cannot imagine how difficult it is to cook food for so many children, three times a day when we have to take time to fetch water for cooking,” Etengu James, our Head of Nutrition, shared. The lack of immediate access to clean drinking water is also a health issue. Our Matron, Anges, explained how keeping children hydrated during their bouts of malaria is absolutely essential.

Furthermore, as our plans for expanding the Global Leaders campus progress, so does our need for water to build new structures. “Our construction crews need water to mix cement. Instead of paying money to truck hundreds of jerry cans of water in each day, we could use that money toward improving our buildings or expanding on current programs,” Collines, FAF Co-Founder and Uganda Country Director explained.

Not only will having a well on-site save the GLP community time and energy, but we also expect to see a direct impact on the academic achievement of our students, improved sanitation & hygiene procedures, a reduction in diarrheal diseases among our primary students which can be deadly in a rural community like Namasale with little access to medicines.

HOW TO GET INVOLVED

We have SO MANY ways for you to become a part of the Walk to Water campaign. We want to invite YOU to join us to provide clean, safe drinking water for thousands of students, teachers and families for generations to come.

Watch our CRAZY Livestream on #GivingTuesday

Just a few of the very serious, no-nonsense members of the FAF team you’ll have the opportunity to dare during our livestream.

Mark your calendars for #GivingTuesday (Nov. 27th) because you are NOT going to want to miss this one. If you know our team at Far Away Friends, you know we are all a little crazy and would do whatever it takes to achieve our mission. We’re about to take that passion to a whole new level.

To celebrate the launch of our campaign, our team will be coming at you LIVE from our office in Denver from 10AM MTN - 6PM MTN on both our Facebook and Instagram (if you’re not already following us, go do that now so you don’t miss a thing!) Together with our Ambassador team (see below) and all of YOU, our goal is to raise the first $5,000 of the campaign ON GIVING TUESDAY!

We’ll be Skyping with our co-founder in Uganda, taking questions from all of you, discussing the “why” behind the campaign and the best part….we’re going to do DARES FOR DONATIONS. Want to make us eat something nasty? Want to make us prank call our grandmothers? Shave our heads? WE’LL EVEN RAFFLE THE CHANCE TO CHOOSE A TATTOO FOR ONE OF US (Seriously, we’re crazy about getting GLP access to clean water.) We're taking your Dares for Donations all day on Livestream. We might even lock Kaitlyn in a cage for an extended period of time #FREETIMMY style. Who knows. DON’T MISS THE LIVESTREAM, FOLKS!

Join our Facebook Event for more deets right HERE

Sign up to become a #WalktoWater Ambassador

People like our friend Marissa Zamudio CRUSHED their fundraising goals in just one day and helped us to raise $3,400 in a single day.

The BEST WAY to join our efforts to raise $5,000 on GivingTuesday, and $13,000 TOTAL is to become a Walk to Water Ambassador and join our fundraising team. In 2017, twelve Ambassadors created their own fundraising page on Facebook on #GivingTuesday.

Together with our Ambassadors, we raised $3,400 in ONE DAY and hit our goal of $10,000 in December to build dorms for our students.

This year, we are looking for FIFTEEN of you who are passionate about helping to provide clean water to a community in need AND willing to share that passion with your network. All you have to do is tell us below if you’d like to participate and we’ll email you. You’ll be added to a private Facebook group before #GivingTuesday and given all the tools you need to crush your own personal fundraising goal.

Attend one of our fundraising events

We love getting together with other people who care about other people. We’ll be hosting a variety of fundraising events throughout the month of December across Colorado. Whether you’re in Boulder, Denver or Fort Collins, we’ve got a fun, family friendly events that give back a portion of sales to the Walk to Water Campaign. Check back as we add more events like the one below!

Share the Walk to Water Campaign & Donate!

We want to invite you to be a part of our biggest campaign yet to build a well for our students at Global Leaders and for community of Namasale, Uganda. Let your friends and family know why YOU are passionate about the #WalkToWater Campaign and invite them to donate on #GivingTuesday and throughout the holiday season.