There are many charities and children’s charities. However, there is only one Children’s Wishing Well with LOVE.
Here is our philosophy:
Children’s Wishing Well was originally named as Student Advisory Centre when it was founded in 2002. When our CEO, Joanna, took over the helm in 2018, she renamed it Children’s Wishing Well.
Bright orange was chosen as the corporate colour as it symbolises youthful energy, optimism for the future, and childhood happiness.
The meaning behind Children’s Wishing Well is three-fold:
Vision
Opportunities for every child and youth to succeed in life, regardless of their backgrounds.
Mission
Providing holistic education, assistance programmes, and opportunities so as to maximise every child and youth’s strengths.
Our services support disadvantaged children’s educational and daily living needs.
We provide a broad range of services to more than 1,000 beneficiaries each year. Our services support their current educational and daily living needs, and equip them with skills for their future, so as to build a strong foundation for them to contribute as useful members of society, and escape the poverty trap.
Through our signature Children Enrichment Programme, children are able to receive academic support, enjoy hot lunch lunches at our centre, explore non-academic interests, pick up various life skills, explore career options and so on. They also receive socio-emotional support through counselling sessions that provide them a safe space to express themselves and learn coping skills.
We also believe in empowering our children and youth, focusing on “what’s strong rather than what’s wrong”. Based on this philosophy, our Reach For The Stars programme provides the opportunity for selected students to attend external lessons to further their interests in non-academic areas such as dance, art, music or sports. This is because we recognise that every child has their own strengths which may not always be academic. We hope that through this programme they will get to reach their greatest potential.
In line with empowering children, our FRESH programme provides them the opportunity to attend grocery shopping trips where they get to pick out items that they really need while learning about nutrition and managing a budget.
We work in close collaboration with Primary, Secondary, and Post-Secondary schools island-wide, other charity organisations, government agencies, and corporates, so as to ensure that our programmes remain relevant and meaningful to the children.
We follow the Ministry of Education’s criteria
Presently, the MOE’s criteria for financial assistance is:
a gross household income of less than or equals to S$3,000 a month OR
a per capita income of less than or equal to $750 for larger families.
Our beneficiaries submit a Nomination Form, signed by their parent(s) or guardian(s) and verified by the School, Family Service Centre or Student Care Centre.
We offer assistance to all regardless of race, gender or religion.