Pause for A Cause

Donating to help disadvantaged children get the most out of their education

We’ll happily give $1 to The Smith Family for every Craftzero order this February. Every time you check out your shopping cart packed with non-alcoholic beers or our delicious alcohol-free wines, you’ll be helping a stand-out charity.

The Smith Family

The Smith Family is the largest children’s education charity helping young Australians from disadvantaged backgrounds to succeed at school, so they can create better futures for themselves.

The disadvantage experienced by the 1.2 million young Australians living in poverty today* not only impacts their life at home; it also adversely affects their education, and worse, the direction of their lives.

At school, these children miss out on things other children may take for granted. Imagine how it would feel to freeze all winter without warm school clothes; to feel ashamed because you have no decent school shoes; to feel isolated and alone because you don’t fit in, or to be stressed all the time because you don’t have the internet at home or the books you need to do your homework.

For almost 100 years, The Smith Family has been tackling the problem, one child at a time. Through their Learning for Life program, they are helping children overcome their circumstances by providing long-term support for their education in three distinct ways. They provide financial support for school essentials, like uniforms and books. They provide access to additional learning programs before and after school – tailored to each child’s individual needs. And they match each child with a dedicated coach at The Smith Family to help them get to school, stay at school and go on to further training or work.

This proven three-pronged approach is equipping these children with the motivation, resilience and life skills they need to complete their schooling and go on to better futures.

Breaking the cycle

Research says kids need to stay in school until Year 12 to create a bright economic future for themselves. Unfortunately, it’s difficult for some children to participate in their education without some help. Intervention needs to begin early and continue throughout their first two decades. With the Learning for Life program The Smith Family provides emotional, practical and financial support to help these kids build skills, knowledge and self-belief with a positive network of parents, peers and significant others. This support will help these kids, our kids, complete school and be prepared for life outside the school gates.

Education programs that work

Through a well-crafted series of programs, from mentoring to literacy to numeracy, art programmes, community programmes, the list goes on, The Smith Family are making a difference. Working within 91 communities nationwide, almost 210,000 families received support in some way from The Smith Family last year, and almost 58 thousand students were sponsored through the Learning for Life program. Sponsorship pays for learning essentials like a school uniform, books, shoes, excursions. ‘Sponsorship is a chance for me to say, well, there’s one child that won’t miss out.’ Paul, Child Sponsor.

This month The Smith Family will also hopefully benefit from febfast. People are choosing to give up alcohol, sugar or whatever the vice of choice is (we’ve all got plenty to choose from) to support disadvantaged youth in Australia this February. It’s a great excuse to keep pushing on with New Years resolutions, good health, good will and to help some kids. Take a peek here at what it’s all about, febfast 2021.

We’ll donate, and maybe you will too

So, we will donate $1 to The Smith Family fund, every time you check out an order this month. And if you’d like to help The Smith Family, they’re always looking for donations, people who would be willing to sponsor a child, volunteers, fundraisers etc. Take a look online and see how you can help too. www.thesmithfamily.com.au