Previous Campaigns

Each year, Twice Upon a Time develops a special fundraising campaign project. This year’s project, ReconciliAction: Best Kids’ Indigenous Books, is currently running. You can find out more about our previous campaigns below. If you would like to make a financial contribution to support the work from any of these projects, please select “Where Most Needed” when making your donation and leave a note in the message field indicating the campaign title.

Kids Today! Special COVID-19 Project (2021)

The second year of our Kids Today! project continued the work we started in 2019, with community partners helping to distribute books to Ottawa kids in lieu of our own free bookstores. We will be continuing this work as long as public health and safety is a concern.  You can read more about this project here.

Kids Today! The Most Popular New Children’s Books (2020)

When we launched our Kids Today! The Most Popular New Children’s Books fundraising campaign at the end of 2019, we had no idea what was in store for us. The initial plan for the 2020 Kids Today! Project was to raise funds to purchase new books that truly responded to our little readers’ requests for the most popular books published in recent years. 2020 had other plans, however, and our Kids Today! campaign shifted focus onto getting kids the books they want to read but in entirely new ways than we had done in the past. Through community partners, we were able to distribute books to children throughout the city while respecting public health guidelines and keeping our readers and our volunteers safe.

Joie de livre! French Books for Ottawa Kids (2019)

In 2017, 28% of the books chosen by children at our locations were in French; at present, fewer than 15% of the donations received are in French, and much of the material donated is out of date, of poor quality, or not representative of the community. This means we often have to supplement French material by purchasing books, at bulk discounts through partner wholesalers and local bookstores, in order to offer adequate and appropriate material for the children who visit our sites. We live in a bilingual city and want to share the richness of this bilingual experience with all children in our locations.

Throughout 2019, Joie de livre! French Books for Ottawa Kids brought even more French books to Ottawa families!

Indigenous Materials Project – Year 2 (2018)

Continuing on the work of our 2017 campaign, the 2018 Indigenous Materials Project – Year 2 continued to support the acquisition of books by and about Indigenous communities for use in our locations. Throughout the year, we raised over $1600 and were able to give away 165 books to Ottawa kids.

Children visiting our locations responded very positively to these books, as the books were snapped up eagerly by our visitors. These books make a difference. One of our young Inuit readers came across the book An Inukshuk Means Welcome by Mary Wallace. When she saw the inukshuk on the cover, she immediately exclaimed “That’s my country!”

Indigenous Materials Project (2017)

Dedicated to support the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) Calls to Action #62, #63 and #93, this campaign focused on raising funds in order to purchase books by and about First Nations, Métis, and Inuit people. These materials are urgently needed to support youngsters of all backgrounds in understanding the variety of experiences that tell the whole Canadian story, and are not commonly available through donation to Twice Upon a Time.

Set in the year of Canada 150 celebrations, Twice Upon a Time responded to Calls to Action in the following ways:

• Call to Action #62 is supported by providing books to aid in family conversations about “residential schools, Treaties and Aboriginal peoples’ historical and contemporary contributions to Canada” which the TRC indicates should be a “mandatory education requirement”.
• Call to Action #63 calls for “intercultural understanding, empathy and mutual respect”. Our project resources help start that education process in the home.
• Call to Action #93 recommends revising the information given to newcomers to Canada and the citizenship test “to reflect a more inclusive history of the diverse Aboriginal peoples of Canada”. Our project makes resources by and about indigenous peoples in Canada more accessible to newcomers, both children and their parents/care-givers.

Throughout 2017, we raised over $900 and gave away 105 books to Ottawa families.