Welcome

Running Away. For Good.

Find 52 is OneWorld Schoolhouse Foundation’s campaign to increase awareness of and raise funds for the Rainforest of Reading Festival. The festival brings Canadian authors and illustrators to St. Lucia where they meet over 11,000 students. Find52 relays in St. Lucia have raised $72,273.

COVID has made it necessary to suspend our annual relay but our goal is to re-group and restore Find 52 event when it is safe and practical!

THERE’S A FIND:52 CAMPAIGN JUST FOR YOU

Perhaps your school wants to Pass the Baton for literacy development. Or you’re with a business or organization wanting to Build Community. You might even be ready to finally Run Away For Good with your fellow running club members. Maybe, you’re simply a lover of books looking for a new companion during a Blind Date with a Book. The good news is you, too, can be part of a really great story by joining one of our many Find 52 campaigns — more details here.

Of course, individual donations are always welcomed.

The Road to Reading National Relay: 2018

Sponsored by OneWorld Schoolhouse Foundation

In July of 2018 Sonya White, Richard Clewes, Jennifer MacLeod, Albert Klein, Robin Todd and Luc Renaud jumped into the event and were joined by Saint Lucian Olympians. Verneta Lesforis (400 M, Sydney 2000) co-ordinated school teams across the island over the five day event. And Zepherinus Joseph (Marathon, Athens 2004) showed all of how to get the job done!

Their fundraising campaigns made it possible for OneWorld Schoolhouse to purchase class sets of books by Canadian authors and illustrators for over 8,000 students in Saint Lucia and brought book creators from Canada to the 5^th Anniversary of the Rainforest of Reading Festival.

Special thanks
A generous gift from Ontario English Catholic Teachers’ Association arrived just before we began the National Relay and put a bounce in all our steps! Thank you Yvonne Runstedler and Kelli Somers; you went above and beyond to help St. Lucia teachers and their students.

Nobody runs fundraising events like Centennial CVI and EEC Saint-René-Goupil in Guelph. We are so grateful to the staff and students of these schools for their continued efforts. Your leadership is inspirational!

This Next Mile Is For You
Each day of the run we posted special messages of thank to our donors and gave Canadians a sense of what books have come to mean to kids in Saint Lucia.

We hope you’ll support literacy in this part of the developing world through CanadaHelps. Or get your Ontario school signed up today for Find 52: Pass the Baton this year!

The event may be over for this year, but the road goes ever on!
Sonya & Richard

GET YOUR ONTARIO SCHOOL INVOLVED

We call our school campaign: “Find 52: Pass the Baton” and it takes place between March Break and the end of the school year. Here’s all the info you need to get your school up and running!!

RUNNERS, YOU TOO CAN SIGN UP

Do you like to run? We’re always looking for Rabbits and Turtles for Find 52: The Road to Reading in 2020. From pacing kids eager to sprint ahead of lead runners, to encouraging the back of the pack, the more runners on The Road to Reading the better. Daily distances in 2020 will be: half-marathon. You can spearhead your own ‘Friends of Find52’ Campaign to raise awareness and funds for literacy programs. Here’s a previous trip brochure to tempt you!

Smiles and waves from turtles at the back

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Le chemin de la lecture du relais national: 2017

Commanditaire principal : OneWorld Schoolhouse Foundation

Les écoles et les clubs de course de l’Ontario prennent des mesures importantes pour améliorer l’alphabétisation dans les pays en développement.

L’année dernière, plus de 1 000 élèves de Sainte-Lucie ont organisé un circuit de relais de leur nation insulaire. Entre-temps, en Ontario, École élémentaire catholique René-Goupil et Centennial CVI de Guelph, l’école secondaire Haliburton Highlands et plusieurs écoles élémentaires se sont jointes à la course en Ontario en organisant des événements qui leur étaient propres. Ils ont réussi à amasser plus de 10 000 $. Combinée aux dons de particuliers et de commanditaires, notre campagne a permis de recueillir une somme remarquable de 52 000 $.

The Road to Reading National Relay: 2017

After all is said and run

OneWorld Schoolhouse gratefully acknowledges The Slaight Family Foundation. They shared our vision of the 2017 event; without Gary and his family’s participation our first relay would not have been possible.

CANADA
To Eric Gillis, Canadian Olympian, whose school visits in Guelph inspired kids to run Find 52: Pass the Baton events. Thanks for giving of yourself.

To Robin Todd and Luc Renaud, superb runners and exceptional educators.

To Albert Klein, who ran every step of the way and still found time to keep Richard running, thanks for your compassion – and knowledge of human anatomy.

To Catherine Goulet-Paradis, who masterfully managed hundreds of excited St. Lucian runners, thanks for your unfailing good humour in English et en français.

To Jason Lupish and Erica Sherwood for extraordinary footage of the big picture and capturing a great story, thanks for your indispensable skills.

To Michele Shapiera and the students of Halibuton Highlands Secondary. Your extraordinary generosity showed us the way.

To Lisa Richards and Brad Hulme at Magic 106.7 for a very “sound plan”. You engaged Guelph’s students in Find52 runs of their own.

To Eric Coffey, Richard Ponsonby for amazing shoemaking skill and Rick Thurston who weaves the web beautifully.

FRANCE
To Stéphane Dovert, Cultural Attaché, Embassy of France, who’s offered the idea of relay segments in Martinique in 2018 and has agreed to run with us next year. Nous vous remerçions beaucoup!

UNITED KINGDOM
To HRH Prince Harry who listened politely to the idea of a “Royal Jog” but wisely told Richard he’d “retired from running.” Maybe next year?

SAINT LUCIA
To Olympian marathoner Zepherinus (“Knockay”) Joseph and Marinus (“Skelly”) Stephens, for your big hearts and unbreakable spirits.

To Olympic sprinter Dr. Verneta Lesforis, who went a lot farther than 400 metres organizing PE teachers and over 75 schools to participate in Find 52 Thousand. You own the podium.

To Nigel Simon and a tremendous transport team who moved mountains. Merçi beaucoup. En aller!

To Commissioner Moncherry, Royal St. Lucia Police Force especially Marcus George, Ali Winters, Irwin Mason, “Blackberry” and Felix Cools who kept us safe – and entertained.

To Mrs. Gaillard and her St. Lucia Red Cross Society staff, including MacIver and Ritsuko Kamizawa: thank-you.

To Pris Lucien, the Maestro. Your choir soared as we listened in awe. Congratulations to 70 children from Vieux Fort and Micoud for their moving performance.

To Flow St. Lucia for their financial and logistic support, thanks Anselm Mathurin, Terry Finisterre and Shermalyn Sidonie-John.

To Blue Waters St. Lucia for quenching thirsts and cooling heads, a toast to Aida Azaire.

To Her Excellency, Dame Pearlette Louisy, Governor General of St. Lucia: thanks to you and your able staff, Adelina Alexander and Solange Charles-Bélizaire, for making us feel at home in your home.

Above all and always, our thanks to Leonise François who routinely makes the impossible happen, and persuades everyone she meets to help her do it, too.

Finding the way for Fundraising

Olympian Jake Holden and Richard Clewes survey the route for Find 52 in January 2016. The duo were joined by St. Lucian Olympic athletes and members of the Royal St. Lucia Police Force.

A road is a song, a poem, a movie, an adventure. It's hope and optimism, and inquisitiveness.
A. A. GILL

The Angry Isle

International Literacy Day 2016

Soufrière Primary ran a relay on September 8, 2016 to celebrate reading. The event was filmed as part of the "run-up" to our first Find 52 Thousand campaign in 2017. Over 1,000 students from grade 3-12 ran 1 mile segments right around St. Lucia.

Logic will get you from A to B. Imagination will take you everywhere.
Albert Einstein

(1879-1955)

Fundraising is an Uphill Battle

In January 2015, I ran 52 miles in Grenada. Let me dismiss athletic motives; it so happens 52 miles gets you all the way around the island. I did it for money – $40,000 – all of which went to OneWorld Schoolhouse. CTV National news ran the story on May 25, 2015 and so began Find 52.

All men should strive to learn before they die what they are running from, and to, and why.
James Thurber

Find 52 started in Grenada

52 miles gets you right around this small, beautiful island. Companions on the second day included: Philip Clift from Petite Anse Hotel, an enthusiastic young boy and one very fit dog named "Dodgy".

The world is a book and those who do not travel read only a page.
ST. AUGUSTINE