20 Years of Changing Children’s Lives
Happy Birthday to us!
February 2026 marks a huge milestone for African Children’s Fund - our 20th Anniversary! It’s a moment to celebrate what we’ve achieved since 2006, to honour the incredible communities we work alongside, and to look ahead to what the future might hold.
Thanks to your support, our work with partners in Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda and Zimbabwe over the past 20 years has led to:
Over 3,000 children per year regularly attending school, rather than working, scavenging or begging on the streets.
Improved exam results and increased secondary school enrolment, leading to children securing better opportunities for long-term prosperity.
The creation of a girls’ education programme, providing sanitary towels to 2,000 adolescent girls every year so they no longer have to miss one week in four of their schooling.
A further 700 children per year learning about children’s rights.
Improvements in health, nutrition, self-confidence, and general wellbeing across the board.
Throughout 2026, we’ll be sharing inspiring stories from the past two decades highlighting the impact of your support, together with ideas you can get involved with during the year.
We have a range of exciting events planned, starting with two special initiatives:
1) Charity Shop Loyalty Cards
From Monday 2nd February, you can collect a loyalty stamp every time you shop at – or donate goods to – our charity shops in Faringdon, Grove and Witney. Our shops raise funds when they sell your pre-loved goods, so by donating or shopping with us, you’re helping even more children go to school.
For every completed loyalty card (10 stamps) you return to us by 31st December 2026, you’ll be entered into a prize draw to win a night’s stay for 2 people at the Hilton Garden Inn in Abingdon. Thank you very much to the Hilton Garden Inn team for their generosity in providing this prize. Read on for the full terms & conditions.
2) 20 For 20
To celebrate our 20th Anniversary, we would love to have 20 supporters taking on fundraising challenges during 2026. Would you like to join Team ACF? Whether you’d like to walk, run, hike, cycle, sled, skydive or take on a challenge of your own creation, we’d love to hear from you. You can find a selection of events here – with more to follow in the next few weeks – or you can of course create your own fundraising challenge.
We’ve already welcomed Lo, Theo, Liz, Justyna, Annabel, Nicola, Claudy and Darren to the team. We’d love you to join them!
Remember, the funds you raise during your sponsored challenge will reduce school absence and improve long-term outcomes for children born into poverty.
Our Birthday Wish
As we celebrate our 20th Anniversary, our greatest wish is that our work was no longer needed. We wish children born into poverty didn’t face challenges that keep them out of school. We wish school feeding programmes weren’t necessary, and that girls had adequate sanitary protection. We wish no child would ever find themselves in a vulnerable position that they couldn’t see a way out of. We wish children facing the loss of a parent to AIDS didn’t have to worry about where their school fees would come from. And we wish that choosing work rather than school wasn’t the most viable option for any child.
Sadly these challenges remain.
So instead, we pass on our thanks to our wonderful supporters for your continued contributions and encouragement. We thank our partners in Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda and Zimbabwe for their ongoing efforts and hard work to enable children to be children, while giving them greater opportunities for a more prosperous future by facilitating their education. And we send our best wishes to the wonderful children who are, have been or will be supported by the funds you raise now, in the past and in the future.