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Corporate & Workplace Volunteering

Engage your team to make a direct and lasting impact on the lives of children in the communities you serve.

Boy wearing yellow headphones and a red jumper looking at a laptop screen where him and his reading volunteer are in an online reading session

Why work with Bookmark?

Maximise the impact your employee volunteering initiative has by providing your staff access to our efficient, accessible and meaningful reading volunteer role. Your team can deliver reading sessions with children aged 5 to 10 in just 30 minutes a week from their place of work, reading one-to-one with a child at risk of falling behind and helping to ignite their joy of reading. 

How it works

  • 1

    Contact us to identify which of our corporate or workplace volunteering offers best suits your business

  • 2

    We will onboard and train your staff to deliver the reading programme

  • 3

    When they are ready to volunteer, your staff will book their reading programme at times that suit their schedule through our online Volunteer Hub

  • 4

    Your staff can then deliver as many programmes as they like, at a frequency that aligns with your business’s allowance

Further information

  • Once you've applied, we'll give you the training and support you need through our Safer Recruitment process.

    You'll select the programme timing which works best for you, and book it through our Volunteer Hub.

    You'll log on to each session through your PC, laptop, MacBook, Chromebook, iPad, tablet or phone, requiring both a webcam and an internet connection.

  • You'll work with the same child throughout a reading programme (across 6 or 12 weeks). These one-to-one sessions make a significant impact to a child and can stop them falling behind when it comes to reading at primary school.

  • You'll be reading one-to-one with the same child throughout a full reading programme (6 or 12 weeks). Over the course of each 30-minute session you'll read books, play games and see your child improve their reading confidence, enjoyment and skill.

  • The majority of our volunteers deliver two sessions a week with the same child across a six-week reading programme. However, we know for some people that may not work, so we have other models available, such as our single-session programme, with volunteers delivering one 30-minute session a week for at least 6 to 12 weeks.

    Becoming a Bookmark reading volunteer is a meaningful commitment. Given the investment required to onboard each volunteer (£300+), we ask that you apply only when you’re ready to meet the programme requirements and dedicate the necessary time outlined in the role description.

  • We partner with schools in areas of deprivation with high IDACI scores (Income Deprivation Affecting Children Index), high levels of children accessing Pupil Premium, as well as low literacy levels. Teachers decide which children would benefit from reading sessions with us.

  • Ensuring the safety of children and volunteers is at the very heart of what we do. You can find our Safeguarding, Safer Recruitment and other policies relating to volunteering in our Policies & Procedures section. 

  • We have a number of team-based volunteering opportunities for our corporate partners, including packing our Story Starter packs, running book drives, and even revamping school libraries. If you are interested in developing a partnership with us where we can incorporate further volunteering opportunities to engage your staff, please get in touch.

Corporate partners play an important role at Bookmark

Connecting your CSR priorities and employee volunteering schemes to our volunteering programme can be mutually beneficial.

I am inspired that our colleagues are making a tangible difference in the lives of disadvantaged children, equipping them with essential reading skills and fostering a love of learning.

Adrian Sainsbury, CEO, Close Brothers Group

I feel happy to know that I am helping a child to read, and it is also improving my skills too. I have really enjoyed the training and optional training videos. I feel they have helped me improve and I want to continue to learn and improve. I am hoping to keep volunteering long term.

Corporate volunteer, DHL

I like reading with my volunteer because they can help me have a try and I can get smarter.

Child on the one-to-one reading programme

Corporate Social Responsibility

Not only is volunteering with us a great way for your staff to deliver real-time impact, it’s also a seamless way to carry out your Corporate Social Responsibility aims.

Become a corporate partner

Our corporate partners have an amazing and diverse range of skills, experience and products to offer that help us to support children’s literacy. 

Find out more here