39
Bo r l a s i a n 2 0 1 3
In School
Build on Books
In March, 25 boxes of
books were sent from
Borlase
Library
to
schools in Sierra Leone
as part of the Build on
Books programme. Many
schools and communities in
Sierra Leone lost their libraries during the 1991-
2002 civil war, meaning that pupils lack the books
they need to study and learn from. Build on Books
has provided books for
160 libraries so far, as
well as building safe
boreholes and sanitary
toilets and funding
school science labs
and community farms.
Charities at Christmas
This was the second year that Borlase has been involved in Operation Christmas Child, sending shoeboxes full of gifts to
children in poorer countries for Christmas. Inmany cases, the boxes are the only presents the children receive. The charity
Samaritan’s Purse began Operation Christmas Child
in 1990, and it now distributes around 1 million gift-
filled shoeboxes every year from the UK. This year
at Borlase, we put together 160 shoeboxes – more
than three times as many as last year. These were
sent to children in Romania, Belarus and Swaziland.
The boxes contained a variety of items, including:
stationery, toiletries, sweets, hats and gloves, and
toys. The toys ranged from the conventional teddy
bears, toy cars and tennis balls to the more bizarre –
including a giant plastic weevil!
This wasn’t the only charitable project that
Borlasians were involved in this Christmas. On
Christmas Eve, some of the members of the Chapel
Choir went carol singing on Marlow High Street,
wearing festive jumpers and hats. They raised a
total of £554.57 for Great Ormond Street Hospital.
And Mrs Lyons and a group of Year 12s put together
Christmas food hampers to be handed out to
elderly Marlow residents at the end of the winter term.
Emily Warne Y13
