We've had an exciting few weeks kicking off 2024's LEGO school deliveries, with many wide eyes and happy faces opening boxes and boxes of LEGO bricks.

At the end of 2023 we had 20 pallets of loose LEGO and DUPLO bricks donated, which with the help of hundreds of volunteer hours, were turned into education packs for schools around Aotearoa. Schools and ECE centres constantly share what a valuable resource this is for them, and how LEGO brings hours of education and play to their classrooms.

This year, deliveries went all over the country! LEGO bricks have made their way as far north as Maungamuka School, in a tiny rural town 90min north of Whangarei, and as far south as Te Waka Unua School in Christchurch. The schools and ECE centres who received the bricks were each selected for their high equity index (low decile) and other socioeconomic factors.

Pomaria School in West Auckland gratefully received their bricks to update the resources they had in their dedicated LEGO room. Principal Kevin Choromanski said: "A few years ago I designed a LEGO room which our learners just love. Each class is timetabled every week to go into the LEGO room which is used to integrate with their Maths, technology and literacy programmes. Learners also have access to the room during lunchtimes. It is a financial battle to keep replenishing the LEGO in the room so thank you".

Omahu School in rural Hawkes Bay has also received LEGO. Their school was forced to close and relocate students to the hall of another local school following Cyclone Gabrielle in February 2023. The school has been reopened for five weeks now and students are able to return to their old classrooms with the arrival of new LEGO bricks, to which they were excited for.

Early Childhood Centres each received 2 large boxes of assorted DUPLO bricks, including community subsidised ECE centres throughout Auckland, Bay of Plenty and Canterbury. In total, 26 schools have each received 60kg worth of LEGO and 17 ECE centres and Kohanga Reo have each received 20kgs each.

Jess Cooper, the Manager of Wellington South Kindy says: “The DUPLO arrived and the tamariki were so over the moon! They absolutely looooved opening the giant boxes and have been engaged in really thoughtful construction with the DUPLO ever since. We are so grateful - thank you so much!".

We're really grateful for LEGO's continued support as we know thousands of hours building, creating, sharing and teaching will happen with each donated brick.

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