Hunger Day in schools
Get schools involved in Hunger Day 2026!
With the help of schools, you can significantly increase your branch's collection result and make pupils an active part of the chain of help. The collection offers schoolchildren a great opportunity to make a difference through their own actions, both in Finland and around the world.
Through Hunger Day, we want to encourage schoolchildren to work together, experience helping, and learn useful interpersonal and friendship skills.
Invite the schools in your area to watch the Hunger Day video morning assembly on Monday 21 September 2026
A morning assembly is a nice way to start Hunger Day week! The video will be available to watch from Monday 21 September onwards (the link will appear on this page then). The video is subtitled in Swedish and English. Schools can watch the video at a time that suits them.
Video morning assemblies have turned out to be a good way to reach and engage students and teachers. The Hunger Day 2024 morning assembly reached around 25,000 viewers, and last year the number of viewers rose to as many as 36,800.
Benefits of the morning assembly:
- Reaches a large number of schoolchildren at once
- Engages students with the Red Cross cause for a moment.
- Easy for the teacher to use
- If the branch is not able to make a visit to the school, the morning assembly can replace this
Easy tips to get you started with school cooperation:
- Primary schools are the easiest to get involved. So start with them.
- Be sure to start early. April is a good time to begin preparations for Hunger Day.
- Personal contact with the shcool principal works best – so pick up the phone or arrange a meeting at the school. Find out whether the school is taking part in the collection and who the contact person is.
- When placing your branch's material order, remember to order posters, for example, for schools as well. Schools can no longer order collection materials from the online shop.
- Start the discussion with the school's contact person at the beginning of August. Make a clear turnkey offer that is hard to refuse:
- Suggest holding the collection on Thursday; it usually suits schools best.
- Deliver the collection boxes, vests and posters to the contact person about a week before the collection.
- Collect the boxes and vests from the school after the collection.
- Count the money, report the result to the school and remit the money on the school's behalf.
- Remember to thank the collectors and donors.
- Persistence pays off: If the school does not join in this time, try again next year. Keeping in touch with the school at times other than Hunger Day increases the chances of success.
The headquarters also informs schools about Hunger Day
Electronic newsletters
In May and in August–September, the headquarters sends its school contacts a newsletter in which Hunger Day is one of the topics. Note! The newsletter only goes to people who have subscribed to it. It does not reach all teachers and school principles.
If you would like to receive the newsletters that is sent to schools, you can subscribe here.
School mailing
At the end of August, a Hunger Day letter is sent to primary schools, lower secondary schools and upper secondary institutions, encouraging them to get in touch with the branch and take part in the collection.
The letter emphasises that the best collection result is achieved by working together with the local branch. The letter shows the contact details of the nearest branch's collection coordinator. This way, the school can contact the branch, if the branch has not already contacted the school earlier and agreed on the collection.
Templates of the school mailing materials can be found in the material bank.
Three different ways to organize the collection:
Collection event at school: Pupils can collect money with collection boxes, or organise, for example, a bake sale, and donate the proceeds to Hunger Day.
Collecting outside the school: Activate students to support volunteers by collecting donations, for example at a shop near the school. In many cases, this works best when only students from a specific grade level (such as fifth graders) take part in the collection. It is advisable to arrange collection shifts of about one hour in advance. Primary school students must always be accompanied by an adult, while lower secondary school students can collect in pairs.
Branch responsibilites:
- The branch delivers the collection equipment to the school.
- The branch picks up the equipment and money from the school after the collection.
- The branch remits the money using the branch's Hunger Day reference.
- The branch reports the collection proceeds to the school.
- The branch reports the schools' collection box proceeds as a combined total in the collection remittance.
Schools receive all materials and supplies through the branches. So when you order collection materials for your branch, please remember to reserve some for the schools' use as well.
If the collection is carried out indoors at the school, you can, if you wish, deliver cardboard collection boxes to the school instead of plastic ones. However, remind the school that cardboard boxes may not be used for collecting outside the school.
A school or class can set up its own digital fundraiser and share the donation link by email and online.
Instructions for setting up a digital fundraiser can be found here.
Branch responsibilities:
- Encourage schools to take part in Hunger Day through a digital fundraiser.
- The branch should first set up its own digital fundraiser team. After that, the branch can ask the school to join the branch's team. That way, the school's digital fundraiser result can be followed separately, but it will also appear as part of the branch's digital fundraiser result.
- Remind schools that a digital fundraiser produces the best results when it is actively promoted to donors. Pupils can, among other things:
- hold a morning assembly over the school's PA system
- challenge the school staff to take part in the collection
- create posts about the collection on the school's social media channels
- put up posters about the collection on the school's walls
- run a slideshow about Hunger Day in the school canteen
- Remember to report your branch's digital fundraiser proceeds in the final Hunger Day remittance.
When a school chooses the Disaster Relief Fund as the beneficiary of a day's work collection (taksvärkki) carried out during the Hunger Day campaign period, the day's wages are counted as part of the Hunger Day result.
In a day's work collection, lower secondary and upper secondary students find a job for one day at a local company or agree to work at home.
Primary school pupils can do an adapted day's work. Pupils do a small household or garden task in their free time, for which a price has been agreed under the teacher's guidance.
Parents and employers pay the day's work wages either by bank transfer or with MobilePay directly to the Hunger Day collection.
The instructions for the day's work can be found on the collection's website (available in Finnish and Swedish).
Branch responsibilities:
- The branch encourages schools to take part in Hunger Day through a day's work collection.
Collection boxes are not used in the day's work collection, so the branch does not need to deliver collection equipment to the school or remit the money.
Schools that have chosen the day's work collection and their collection proceeds do not need to be itemised in the collection remittance.
Support materials for school collections
The headquarters will once again produce several materials this year to support the collection, for use by local branches and schools. They can be found in the material bank:
- A list to check which schools located within your branch's are
- Quick-reference guides wih easy tips for getting school partnerships started
- Collection info as text and a PowerPoint presentation (these can be used during school visits, for example)
- A Hunger Day poster
- Templates of the school mailing: envelope, letter, and brochure
The headquarters will once again produce several materials this year to support the collection, for use by local branches and schools. They can be found in the material bank:
- A Hunger-Day poster
- What your donation can do - examples on how donated funds are used
- Collection info as text and a PowerPoint presentation (these can be used during morning assemblies, for example)
- Collection information letter to students' homes
- Ready-made texts for Wilma messages
- A Hunger Day diploma
Questions about Hunger Day activities in schools?
Please contact your nearest district office or send a message to the headquarters at: keraykset@redcross.fi
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