SolidartTee is the largest student-led movement fighting for change in the refugee crisis.
The only way refugees can escape the collapsing cycle of severely overcrowded and dangerous refugee camps and unjustified deportations after the highly complex legal process is through accessing legal support. Therefore, SolidariTee offers grants to NGO’s who provide legal aid on the ground (more on the importance of legal aid in this fight in an upcoming article).
The movement was established in January 2017 by a Cambridge Student, Tiara Sahar Ataii, as a result of her experiences volunteering as a translator and interpreter in Greece. Tiara witnessed the lack of recognition of the refugee crisis in media coverage and thus started SolidariTee. Whilst still a student, Tiara invested her student loan into buying and printing 600 t-shirts.
Since then, the progression of SolidariTee is incredible. The charity is headed and staffed entirely by student activists. Currently, there are over 450 student volunteers from more than 40 universities across the UK, US and beyond. The first two campaigns saw student committees amass donations and sales of over £43,000, earning support from MPs such as Caroline Lucas, Jonathan Bartley, Tim Farron and Jeremy Corbyn.
How does SolidariTee raise money?
The premise of the charity (as probably guessed) is the selling of t-shirts or ‘SolidariTee’s’. From each £12 shirt, £8.10 goes directly towards funding NGO’s and other vital services. Not only that, all of the t-shirts are ethically manufactured, with the 2020 collection also being 100% organic. Since 2017, over 20,000 SolidariTees have been sold! This is incredible as just one t-shirt funds a day’s food and accommodation for two volunteer translators, which would allow each to see around 30 to 40 asylum seekers each day! Not only this the shirts also act as a visual demonstration of having solidarity with the refugees.
However, the charity is not solely limited to selling t-shirts; through a variety of events across the globe, SolidariTee raises awareness of the refugee crisis by bringing people together to learn and educate. This is achieved through a range of events, from panel discussions and poetry events to comedy shows, theatre collaborations and even a programme of ‘Dance for SolidariTee' club nights. The charity also runs a range of social media campaigns such as the infographic and myth buster series (as seen below). Counteracting harmful myths and misinformation is key to keeping the conversation surrounding refugees’ rights alive despite a downturn or lies circulated by mainstream media coverage. Therefore, most importantly, SolidariTee empowers each of their members to be an advocate to stand up for the refuge crisis throughout their future lives with the hope of allowing refugees to live a prosperous life.
SolidariTee and the Covid-19 Pandemic
The current pandemic is a huge threat and source of disruption globally. However, vulnerable communities, such as those including asylum seekers, have been hit the hardest. Europe’s refugee camps are overcrowded but under-resourced, and thus normal infection control measures are incredibly difficult to achieve. This has resulted in infection rates being rife.
To respond to the urgent health disaster, SolidariTee launched the COVID-19 Emergency Grant in March 2020, which supported NGO’s on the ground fighting for refugees even as the rest of the world was in lockdown. SolidariTee also contributed a grant of £10,000 to Kitrinos Healthcare to support their COVID-19 response plan, which involved the creation of a ‘Nightingale’-style medical facility inside the camp to aid those suffering with the virus.
What can you do?
To find out more information about SolidariTee, legal aid and the increasing refugee crisis keep an eye out on the legal side blog throughout the week for more articles related to the charity and the refugee crisis! Furthermore, feel free to check out the SolidariTee website.
If you would like to purchase a ‘SolidariTee’ for yourself, you can buy one through the SolidariTee shop. If you do purchase one, it would be great if you could use one of our personalised codes which are either HARRISNcl21, SPENCERNcl21 or PAYNENcl21.
However, we understand not everyone has the money to purchase one, thus other ways to help the refugee crisis includes mobilising your own social media to raise awareness of what is going on, write to your MP expressing your concern, talk and educate people on the crisis. The key to change is dispelling and challenging discriminatory opinions. Lastly you could volunteer and join the student movement fighting for long-term change, raising funds and awareness in the refugee crisis.
Our Fundraiser
Lastly, Alice, Lucy, Holly and I are all taking part in a fundraiser to raise money and awareness for the refugee crisis through our roles as SolidariTee regional reps for Newcastle University. Throughout January we will be walking, running or biking a distance of 50 miles each. As you can see above, the cause is amazing and thus any donations, however big or small, would be absolutely amazing! Thank you!
You can donate here!
Comments