World Sight Day Challenge 2017
Helping to Make Children’s Vision Count
(Denver, CO – July 28th): Optometry Giving Sight is once again inviting all those who value good vision to support its major fundraising campaign for the year, the World Sight Day Challenge. The Challenge will run throughout October – with World Sight Day being celebrated on Thursday October 12th.
This year’s campaign will help to raise funds for more children like Alyssa – a young girl from the southwest of Mexico who received her first pair of glasses last year thanks to a child eye health project that is funded in part by Optometry Giving Sight. In her words: “Everything that was wrong is now in the past. Nothing can stop me now!”
As part of its support for Our Children’s Vision, Optometry Giving Sight will fund projects that give sight and hope to more than 1 million children in 2017.
“It’s sobering to be reminded that seven hundred years after glasses were invented, there are still children in the world suffering from severe vision loss,” said Dr. Juan Carlos Aragon, Global Chair of Optometry Giving Sight. “This not only creates frustration and learning difficulties for the children affected, but can impact their future productivity and earning potential.”
For the past 10 years, thousands of Optometrists, their staff, patients, students and colleagues in industry have taken the World Sight Day Challenge by making a tax-deductible donation and / or by raising funds in their practice, school or company.
“It’s simple and fun to do,” said Clive Miller, Global CEO of Optometry Giving Sight. “We have materials to help promote your involvement, lots of fun fundraising ideas, and information that you can share that shows how your donations are having an impact on the lives of children in need.”
Dr. Don Matsumoto from Pacific Eyecare Center, CA has been participating in the World Sight Day Challenge for many years. “Optometry Giving Sight is part of our DNA,” he said. “It’s a true feel good experience. My staff is constantly looking for ways to fundraise and we change it up in our office all the time. What a surprise is how our patients have taken to giving. They want to be part of the experience as well. It’s become a new business model.”
To donate, or pledge your participation by selecting one of our Bronze, Silver, Gold or Platinum Award levels, please visit www.givingsight.org or call: 303 526 0430. For more information on Our Children’s Vision visit www.ourchildrensvision.org
Our Hero Image for 2017:
10% of children who go to public schools in Mexico have refractive errors. As part of the Our Children’s Vision campaign, Optometry Giving Sight is pleased to be supporting the Ver Bien para Aprendor Mejor (See Well to Learn Better) program. This well established and highly respected campaign will screen more than 4 million children throughout 2017. It will perform 1.1 million eye exams and deliver 500,000 eye glasses to children who need them.
World Sight Day is an annual day of awareness held on the second Thursday of October to focus global attention on blindness and vision impairment. It is coordinated by the International Agency for the Prevention of Blindness (IAPB) and is supported by eye health
organizations around the world – including Optometry Giving Sight - and is included on the official World Health Organization (WHO) calendar.
This year’s call to action is: Make Vision Count
Our Children’s Vision is a call to action – to come together to ensure that effective, inclusive, sustainable eye health initiatives are available to children around the world, regardless of their economic status or geographical location. Our Children’s Vision is an initiative of the Brien Holden Vision Institute and Essilor Vision for Life.
Optometry Giving Sight is a Global Partner.
Optometry Giving Sight is the only global fundraising initiative that specifically targets the prevention of blindness and impaired vision due to uncorrected refractive error (URE) – simply the need for an eye examination and glasses.
It was established in 2003 by the Brien Holden Vision Institute, World Council of Optometry, and the International Agency for the Prevention of Blindness as a means of mobilizing support from the global eye care profession and industry to help eliminate the backlog of people who are needlessly blind or vision impaired – currently estimated at more than 600 million worldwide. It is a registered charity in the USA, Canada, Mexico, Australia, Ireland, and Italy. In the UK we work in partnership with Vision Aid Overseas.
In addition to projects that train people in developing countries to become degree and diploma qualified Optometrists, Optometry Giving Sight funds projects that increase access to vision care for children. Here’s how donations can help in developing countries:
$1,000 – Help provide glasses for 200 children or text books for 10 Optometry students
$2,000 - Clinical equipment kit to provide outreach services or help provide glasses for 400 children
$3,000 - Upskill clinical staff to provide eye examinations for children or provide a scholarship for an Instrument Technician Course
$4,000 - Train 100 teachers to conduct child eye health screenings or purchase specialty equipment to set up a paediatric clinic in an optometry school
$5,000 - Sponsor a school eye health screening for 2000 children or purchase equipment to upgrade a Vision Centre or purchase equipment to help set up a clinical teaching space in an optometry school
$10,000 - Purchase equipment to set up a clinical eye health examination room