What is World Literacy Day?

World Literacy Day, celebrated on the 8th of September each year, is an important annual event to celebrate the importance of literacy internationally and to remind policymakers, practitioners and the public that literacy is crucial for creating a society that is more literate, peaceful and sustainable. As a fundamental human right for all, literacy opens the door to greater freedom. When a child learns to read, the whole world opens up. 

Literacy is a foundation for people to gain broader knowledge, skills, values, attitudes and behaviours. Despite significant progress, there are still at least 739 million youth and adults worldwide that lack basic literacy skills as of 2024 and 272 million children and teenagers that were not in school in 2023. World Literacy Day highlights this to work on ways to reduce this number each year until everyone has access to literacy.

Why is World Literacy Day important to Sherpa?

At Sherpa, we work closely with our charity partner Room to Read, and through them, we donate a day of school to a child in Nepal for every item we sell. To date, we have been able to donate over 1.6 million school days. Giving back to the community of Nepal has been a core value of the brand since the very beginning, with founder Tashi Sherpa growing up in Nepal and wanting to offer opportunities through education to his local community.

What is a school day?

Donating a school day through Room to Read is so much more than just ‘time at a desk’. Room to Read provides holistic support through teacher training, working with schools to improve the literacy curricula, creating libraries and training teachers to manage them, creating reading activities and providing books for children in local languages. To learn more about the additional work Room to Read do to make education accessible, you can read Pratik’s story here. 

Secondary school girls also benefit from individual and peer-to-peer mentorship and life skills education to help girls practice essential life skills such as leadership, resilience and critical thinking. All skills that will help girls navigate challenging situations and key life decisions, including advocating for themselves and their peers to stay in school and graduate – something that continues to be a challenge for girls in Nepal. To read more about how Room to Read have supported women in advocating for themselves, you can read Sulochana’s story here. 

In Nepal alone, Room to Read have over 9,000 literacy program schools and nearly 60,000 girls enrolled on their Girls’ Education Program, helping to keep girls in school and give them better opportunities and life skills that they wouldn’t otherwise have had. 

Why Nepal? 

Sherpa was founded by Tashi Sherpa in Nepal in 2003 with the aim to give back to his community. He is one of seven children and his parents, who were uneducated, had the foresight to send each of their children to the best schools that they could afford at the time. Because of this, his siblings now include medical professionals and business owners. Tashi Sherpa believes that education is the reason for their success and that education is the gateway to opportunity. This is why giving back to the community in Nepal has always been an integral part of Sherpa, a way to give opportunities to people who would not otherwise have had them.  

The ripple effect 

A school day has the potential to be so much more than just a school day.  It can create a lasting and ongoing change in the community for more than the students that attend school.  Room to Read’s library programme creates opportunity for children to take books home with them, allowing them to share their newfound literacy skills with siblings, parents and even grandparents.  They are able to spread their knowledge and love of reading, creating a ripple effect throughout local communities.  This shared knowledge leads to stronger literacy, higher school completion rates and greater opportunities for all.

Global context 

Across the globe, 4 in 10 children are not reaching minimum proficiency in reading, something that can become a key contributor to a generational cycle of poverty. Those with low literacy skills are twice as likely to be unemployed, and workers with poor literacy earn, on average, 60% less than those with basic literacy. This is a cycle that Sherpa is passionate about changing. There are proven solutions in organisations like Room to Read which has benefited over 52 million children across 29 countries since 2000. In 2024 alone Room to Read have: 

• Helped 14.1 million children 
• Helped over 185,000 schools with the literacy program 
• Trained and coached over 27,000 educators 
• Distributed 44.5 million original and adapted children’s books 
• Helped 91% of adolescents advance to the next grade 

For World Literacy Day, we would like to celebrate the impact that Room to Read has had on children (and their families) across the world and thank our customers for helping us to donate over 1.6 million school days to the charity - creating a positive change to the lives of people in Nepal. 

Help us to continue to make a difference with your next Sherpa purchase. Every item sold donates a day of school to a child in Nepal — opening the door to opportunity, empowerment, and a brighter future. Explore our new Autumn collection and be part of our mission.