Help us to brighten a child's world.
 

Help us to brighten a child’s world


 
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Gifting toys to refugee and asylum seeker children

Never underestimate the power of one child getting one toy.

We exist to bring joy and happiness to every single refugee and asylum seeker child in Australia.

Recognising the remarkable power of play, we aim to create as many happy faces and smiles as possible, by providing brand-new toys to these children, who would most often go without.


What do we do?

We deliver toys / gifts out to every single one of the over 10,000 refugee and asylum seeker children in Australia.

Working almost as a collective of people, we receive donations of toys (and money to buy toys), from generous sponsors and donors; then together with dedicated volunteers we distribute these toys out to specialised front-line community development partners, located at 34 locations around the country; who then provide these toys / gifts directly to each of the children and their families.

The culmination of this work is the holding of annual events, where we provide the children a day of food, fun, entertainment, and of course, a toy or two. It is truly something wonderful and joyous to behold.

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How do we do it?

 

What separates the RASTD apart from other similar charities, is our rare ability to reach every (if not most) refugee and asylum seeker children currently within Australia. We view this ability to gift toys as a privilege and a duty. Working as an outreach exercise, we gift to families that otherwise face countless barriers in both asking for, and receiving, such help. We recognise that the struggle for such families to establish themselves in a new country, often leaves these children without toys to play with; which given their backgrounds, is so vital to help their settling in.

This feat is achieved by utilising our detailed knowledge of the immigration sector; by working collaboratively with front-line community development partners and supporters we’re able to distribute toys out to all the children, including out to remote and regional communities.

 
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Where we started

 
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Like most great things, the Refugee and Asylum Seeker Toy Drive was born from a single idea, from one kind human who decided to take action.  

The RASTD was founded by Christopher Stenton, who had worked directly supporting refugees and asylum seekers, both in and out of immigration detention, for many years. Through his work, he identified that many refugee and asylum seeker children went without toys, and so he set about trying to change this.  

On November 25, 2015, Christopher made a single post to his own personal Facebook page, asking for donations to provide toys to these children.

Then by utilising his work experience, knowledge of the sector, and network of staff and organisations, Christopher has made it possible for the RASTD to reach almost every refugee and asylum seeker.

Each year since, the Toy Drive has continued to grow, from supporting just the local community, to all of metro Melbourne, and now out to the entire country! This growth has allowed us to extend our reach and to help more and more of the forgotten children of Australia, many of whom had never previously received a toy before.