Terere Kids Project's England Affiliate Fight for Funding

It’s been touch and go for most of 2021 at Terere Kids Project.

Kid classes resumed early in March but were forced right back into recession when Rio called for another lockdown. Tournaments are hit in miss, many are canceled, but there have been a few competitions were some of our adult athletes went out and won some medals. Although it’s risky, the motivation that our instructors and students get through competing, helps maintain a positive environment during this difficult time.

The rising cases of COVID have made it very hard to organize fundraising initiatives, which means we can’t make any promises in respects to salaries and stipends for our volunteer instructors. We are however, extremely fortunate, to have the support of some creative members of the community to lend a hand from overseas.

Our primary funding source is private donations sent from people that, more times than not, have had some kind of personal contact with our academy in Rio or our instructors and students when they travel!

When a need arises, we make a call to action, and the community responds!

And that’s exactly what Emily Eye did in her own community in Bristol, England. For the second time, this amazing purple belt from Pedro Bessa, took it upon herself to find ways to support the project.

On April 7th, Eye dedicated an afternoon to sprinting up a rather large set of stairs in exchange for donations. Little by little donations started flowing in from England to support our project here in Rio.